‘Majuli in Peril- Challenging the received wisdom on flood control in Brahmaputra River Basin, Assam (1940-000)

详细信息    查看全文

• 作者：Debojyoti Das (1)
  
• 关键词：Flood ; Indigenous knowledge ; Equilibrium ; Command ; Control ; Narrative ; Technomanagerism
• 刊名：Water History
• 出版年：2014
• 出版时间：June 2014
• 年：2014
• 卷：6
• 期：2
• 页码：167-185
• 全文大小：
• 参考文献：1. Agrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and the scientific. Dev Change 26:413-39 CrossRef
  2. Agrawal A, Shivaramakrishnan K (2000) Agrarian environments: resource, representation and rule in India. Duke University Press, Durham, NC
  3. Aisher A (2007) Voices of uncertainty: spirits, humans and forests in Upper Arunachal Pradesh. J South Asian Stud 30(3):479-98 CrossRef
  4. Archaeological Survey of India (2005) Majuli island cultural landscape and living tradition: national dossier for inscription in World Heritage Site. Archeological Survey of India, Delhi, p 30
  5. Berry S (1998) Social institution and access to resources in African Agriculture. Africa 59:41-5 CrossRef
  6. Blackburn S (2008) Himalayan Tribal tales: oral tradition in the Apatani Valley. Brill, Laiden and Boston CrossRef
  7. Blackburn S (2010) The sun rises: the Shaman Chants Ritual exchange and fertility in the Apatani Valley. Brill, Leiden and Boston CrossRef
  8. Botkin DB (1990) Discordant harmonies: a new ecology for the twenty first century. Oxford University Press, Oxford
  9. Brahmaputa Board (1972) The task force for erosion control and flood management, Ministry of Water Resources, Government of India. Basistha; Guwahati, Assam
  10. Brahmaputa Board (1998) A report on the erosion problem of Majuli island (December). Ministry of Water Resources, Government of India. Basistha; Guwahati, Assam
  11. Chioc M (2002) The Rhine; an eco-biography, 1815-000. University of Washington Press, London and Seattle
  12. D’souza R (2006) Drowned and dammed: colonial capitalism and flood control in Eastern India (1803-946). Oxford University Press, New Delhi CrossRef
  13. D’souza R (2007) From natural calamity to natural resource: flood control and the politics of natural limits. In: Baviskar A (ed) Waterscapes: the cultural politics of a natural resource. Permanent Black, Ranikhet, pp 248-80
  14. D’souza R (2009) River as resource and land to own: the great hydraulic transition in Eastern India in Asian environments shaping the world: conceptions of nature and environmental practices. National University of Singapore (Singapore). http://www.nus.edu.sg/dpr/files/abstract/Rohan%20D%27Souza%20paper.pdf
  15. Das D (2006) Structural vulnerability to flood and bank erosion in Majuli Island: The State Policy on flood mitigation in Brahmaputra River Basin. Unpublished M. Phil Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment for the degree in Science Policy at the Centre for Studies in Science Policy, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
  16. Emilie R (1995) Except Africa: postscript to a special section on development narratives. World Dev 23(6):1066
  17. Ferguson J (1994) The anti-political machine: development, depolitization and bureaucratic power in Lesotho. University of Minnesota Press, Minneopolis
  18. Gazetteer of India (1999) Assam state, vol 1, Guwahati
  19. Goswami DC, Das PJ (2003) The Brahmaputra River, India: the eco-hydrological context of water use in one of the worlds most unique river system, special issue on large dams in North-East India-rivers, forest, people and power. Ecol Asia 3(1):9-4
  20. Harvey D (1974) Population, Resource, and the Ideology of Science. Econ Geogr 50:256-77 CrossRef
  21. Harvey D (1993) The nature of environment: the dialectics of social and environmental change. Social Regist 1:1-1
  22. Headland Thomas N (1997) Revisionism in ecological anthropology. Curr Anthropol 38(4):605-30 CrossRef
  23. Hollong C, Meffe G (1996) Command and control and the pathology of natural resource management. Conserv Biol 10:328-37 CrossRef
  24. Karlsson Bengt G (2011) Unruly Hills: nature and the nation in India’s Northeast. Orient Black Swan and Social Science Press, Delhi
  25. Kates RW (1971) Natural hazard in human ecological prospective: hypothesis and models. Econ Geogr 47(3):483-51 CrossRef
  26. Kay J, Scheider E (1995) Embracing complexity: the challenge of the ecosystem approach. In: Westra L, Lemons J (eds) Perspectives in ecological integrity. Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht, pp 49-9 CrossRef
  27. Klingensmith D (2007) One valley and a thousand: dams, nationalism and development. Oxford University Press, Delhi
  28. Leach M, Mearns R (1996) Environmental change and policy: challenge received wisdom in Africa. In: Leach M, Mearns R (eds) Lie of the land: challenging received wisdom on the African environment. James Currey, Oxford, pp 1-3
  29. Leach M, Mearns R, Scoones I (1999) Environmental entitlements: dynamics and institution in community based nature resource management. World Dev 27(2):225-47 CrossRef
  30. McIntosh RP (1987) Pluralism in ecology. Ann Rev Ecol Syst 18:321-41 CrossRef
  31. Menon M, Vagholikar N, Kohli K (2003) Large dams in Northeast India: river, forest, people and power. Ecol Asia 11(1):1-1
  32. Miller DH (1966) Cultural hydrology: a review. Econ Geogr 42(1):85-9 CrossRef
  33. Mosse D (1996) The social construction of peoples knowledge in participatory rural development. In: Bastian S, Bastian N (eds) Assessing participation: a debate from South Asia. Konark Publication, Delhi
  34. Mosse D (1997) The symbolic making of a common property resource: history, ecology and locality in a tank-irrigation landscape in South India. Dev Change 28:467-04 CrossRef
  35. Mosse D (2003) The rule of water: statecraft, ecology and collective action in South India. Oxford University Press, Delhi
  36. Mulvany A (2012) From resilience to reliance: state disruption of traditional flood mitigation strategies. Nar umjet 49(1):23-0
  37. Mulvany A (2013) Policy legend and water policy in the Union Territory of Pondicherry. Water Hist J. doi:10.1007/s12685-013-0081-3
  38. Nath D (2009) Majuli Island: society, economy and culture. Anshan Publication House in association with MAKIAS, New Delhi, Kolkata
  39. Norgard R (1994) Progress betrayed: the demise of development and a co-evolutionary revisioning of the future. Rutledge, London
  40. Pottier J (2003) Introduction. In: Pottier J, Bicker A, Sallito P (eds) Negotiating local knowledge: power and identity in development. Pluto Press, London, pp 1-9
  41. Robbins P (1998) Authority and environment: institutional landscape in Rajasthan. India. Ann Assoc Am Geogr 88:410-35 CrossRef
  42. Roy D (2005) Flood: a small matter of history. India Disaster report. Oxford University Press, New Delhi
  43. Saikia A (2011) Forests and the ecological history of Assam. Oxford University Press, New Delhi
  44. Schroder R, Neumann R (1995) Manifest ecological destinies: local rights and global environmental agendas. Antipode 27:321-24 CrossRef
  45. Scoons I (1999) New ecology and the social sciences: what prospect for a future engagement? Annu Rev Anthropol 28:479-07 CrossRef
  46. Sears PB (1957) Natural and cultural aspects of floods. Science 125:806-12 CrossRef
  47. Sharma J (2010) Making garden, erasing jungle: the tea enterprise in colonial Assam. In: Kumar D, Damodaran V, D’Souza R (eds) The British Empire and the natural world: environmental encounters in South Asia. Oxford University Press, New Delhi
  48. Singh S (2002) Taming the waters: the political economy of large dams in India. Oxford University Press, New Delhi
  49. Sprugel D (1991) Disturbance, equilibrium, and environment variability: what is ‘natural-vegetation in a changing environment? Biol Conserv 58:1-8 CrossRef
  50. Suryanarayana Murthy Gsv (2012) World Heritage Nomination Dossier (ASI: Government of India, 2012).
  51. Swayamprakash R (2013) Exportable engineering expertise for ‘development- a story of large dams in post independence India. Water Hist J. doi:10.1007/s12685-013-0086-y
  52. Thakuria NC (2000) A geographical panorama of Majuli. Majuli Souvenir, pp 8-2
  53. The Independent (2008) World’s Largest River Island washed away under flood waters, London, 7th Feb 2008
  54. The Telegraph (2011) Pottery threat to Majuli riverbank-Potters urged to shift to terracotta, Kolkata, 26th Feb 2011
  55. Wescoat J, James L (1992) Common themes in the work of Gilbert White and John Dewey: a pragmatic approach. Ann Assoc Am Geogr 82(4):593 CrossRef
  56. Weil B (2006) The rivers come: colonial flood control and knowledge systems in the Indus Basin, 1840s-1930s. Environ Hist 12(1):3-9
  57. World Bank (2007) World Bank strategy report on development, growth and natural resource in Northeast India: the natural resource, water and environment nexus. Sustainable Development Department, Environment & Water Resource Management Unit and DoNER, 2008. Vision 20:20 Northeast Region. DoNER, Government of India
  58. White GF (1945) Human adjustment to floods. Chicago: University of Chicago, Department of Geography, Research Paper No. 29
  59. White GF (1964) Choice of adjustment to floods. Chicago: University of Chicago, Department of Geography, Research Paper No. 93
  60. Worster D (1977) Natures economy: a history of ecological ideas. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
  61. Zimmerer KS (1994) Human geography and the “new ecology- the prospect and promise of integration. Ann Assoc Am Geogr 84(1):108-25 CrossRef
  
• 作者单位：Debojyoti Das (1)
  
  1. Department of History, Classics and Archaeology, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK
  
• ISSN：1877-7244

文摘

This paper seeks to provide a framework to understand the politics of flood control and representation of deluge ‘narrative-by looking at Majuli—one of the largest freshwater river islands in the world, located in the upper Brahmaputra valley in Assam. Policy makers and state planner present simplistic explanation of flood and its resultant impact on the island habitable space, as a ‘techno-managerial-crisis needing policy redemption through ‘experts-intervention. I present the phenomenon of flooding as a ‘techno-political-problem and examine the politics of knowledge production. The paper thus challenges the received wisdom on ecological change promoted by institutions who have been working to save the island from two perceived threats—floods and bank erosion. Through a synoptic survey on state measures to control flood in the Brahamapura River Basin since the 1950s, I will show how the ‘statist ecological discourse-based on equilibrium and linear models underlined by a ‘command and control-discourse have dominated policy making on flood mitigation- devaluing other perspectives of ecological change. These new revisionist directions in ecology and science policy discourse bring important insights to understand the phenomena of floods from the multiple pathways of an ecological change paradigm and the ways they are mitigated and perceived.