Synopses & Reviews
This volume paints a general picture of the environmental situation in Asia, backing it up with several case studies.
Two major points are made in this general picture. The first is that environmental campaigns in Asia tend to have a local focus; they react to very concrete problems in the immediate neighbourhood and as such usually people are engaged in a cause for practical rather than idealistic reasons. Such can be seen in case studies from the volume dealing with campaigns against logging and tree plantations, tourist facilities and factories and in support or defence of nature reserves. This pattern is in marked contrast to the profile of the most successful Western movements (in terms of fund-raising at least) for whom the focus is on perceived problems in distant parts of the world.
The second point is evidence in several of the case studies in the volume, namely that environmental campaigns cannot be understood in terms of environmental issues alone. Rather, they should be regarded as a form of cultural critique and frequently are a form of political resistance in situations where open political action is too risky.
Synopsis
This volume provides an overview of the environmental situation in Asia. Incorporating several case studies the book makes two major points: environmental campaigns in Asia tend to have a local focus and they cannot be understood in terms of environmental issues alone
Description
1289282 Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of Contents
An anthropological perspective on environmental movements / Arne Kalland and Gerard Persoon -- Local dimensions of 'global' environmental debates / Michael R. Dove -- Mahatma Gandhi and the environmental movement in India / Ramachandra Guha -- Culture, gender and community in Taiwan's environmental movement / Robert P. Weller and Hsin-Huang Michael Hsiao -- The forest grant movement in Japan / John Knight -- The anti-tropical timber campaign in Japan / Anny Wong -- Local environmentalism in northeast Thailand / Amare Tegbaru -- Symbols and displacement / Carol Warren -- Local resource dependency and utilization on Timpaus / Harald Beyer Broch -- Asna women: empowered or merely enlisted? / Nandini Sundar -- Divergent approaches to the environment in Kerala / Peter van der Werff -- Perspectives on waste in urban India / Hans Schenk, Isa Baud and Bhuvanna Ramaneshwari.