Contested Waterscapes in the Mekong Region: Hydropower, Livelihoods and Governance Book

The water resources of the Mekong river catchment area, from China, through Thailand, Cambodia and Laos to Vietnam, are increasingly contested. Governments, companies and banks are driving new investment in roads, dams, diversions, irrigation schemes, navigation facilities, power plants and other emblems of conventional "development". Their plans and interventions pose multiple burdens and risks to the livelihoods of millions of people dependent on wetlands, floodplains, fisheries and aquatic resources. This book examines how large-scale infrastructure and development projects are proposed, justified, and built, how such projects are contested and how specific governance regimes influence their outcome. It shows that diverse, and often antagonistic, ideologies and interests are contesting for legitimacy. The authors argue that the distribution of decision-making, political and discursive power influences how the waterscapes of the region will ultimately look and how benefits, costs and risks will be distributed. The book is part of the action-research of the M-POWER (Mekong Program on Water, Environment and Resilience) knowledge network.Read More