Description
Book SynopsisThis book centers on the history of polders and investigates the complex hydro-social relationships of the Jianghan Plain in late imperial China. Once a hydraulic frontier where local communities managed the polders, the Jianghan Plain had become a state-led hydro-electric powerhouse by the mid-twentieth century. Through in-depth historical analysis, this book shows how water politics, cultural practice, and ecology interplayed and transformed the landscape and waterscape of the plain from a long-term perspective. By touching on topics such as religious practice, ethnic tensions and local militarization, the author reveals a plain forever caught between land and water, and nature and culture.
Trade Review"As a historial monograph Yangzi Waters is firmly based on a combination of clearly explained theory and well-picked, original material from local sources. This interesting study should not only be read by China specialists but should also appeal to historians interested in a comparative approach of water management within a global setting." -Leonard Blussé, Leiden University, International Journal of Maritime History, 35(1)
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments List of Figures and Tables Introduction Water, Society and Politics 1 Theorizing Water and Politics 2 Revisiting the Relationship between Water and Society 3 The Yuan 4 What Are Yuan? 5 A Long-term View of the Yuan 6 The Jianghan Plain 1 Water-based Disasters and a Cultured Nature 1 The Amphibious Nature of the Jianghan Plain 1.1 A Flood-prone Environment 1.2 Wet-rice Cultivation and Its Significance 1.3 Amphibious Living 2 Networks, Lineages, and the Creation of Yuan 3 Temple-Yuan Relations: Seeing a Cultured Nature 4 Conclusion 2 Disordering Nature Wetlands and Empire Reconstruction (1600s–Early 1700s) 1 The Early History of the Wetlands in the Jianghan Plain 2 Crisis and Restoration 3 Migration and Opening the Plain 4 Amphibious Living: Fluidity of the Jianghan Lifestyle 5 Complexities in Administration 6 The Early Qing State and Its Laissez-faire Policy in Central China 7 Hydraulic Communities: Official and People’s Yuan 8 Enforcement on Collaboration: The Formation of Yuan Zones 9 Customs in Common: Various Solutions for Collaborations 10 Turn Sea to Land: Population Growth and Dike Proliferation 11 Conclusion 3 The Retreat of the Horse The Manchus, Pasturelands, and Water Management on the Jianghan Plain (ca. 1700s–mid-1800s) 1 Manchus and Horses 2 The Jingzhou Garrison 3 Population Growth and Land Reclamation in the Eighteenth-Century Jianghan Plain 4 The Debate over Land versus Water 5 The Dilemma for Statecraft Officials 6 The Manchus and the Local Ecology of Central China 7 Efforts to Reinforce Manchu Cultural Identity 8 The Retreat of Horses in the Jianghan Plain in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries 9 Conclusion 4 Militarizing Water Forts, Polders, and Landscape in an Era of Crisis (1796–1860s) 1 The Rebels and the Jianghan Plain 2 Jianbi Qingye: The Qing State’s Counterinsurgency Agenda 3 Fort Building in the Hubei Highlands 4 Local Militarization and the Lowland Communities 5 Yuan and Tuanlian: Qianjiang County as a Case Study 6 Disruptions in the Hydraulic System with Local Militarization 7 The Rural Famine in the Jianghan Plain from the Late 1850s to the 1860s 8 Conclusion 5 Coping with Environmental Crisis in the Post-Taiping Era 1 Post-Taiping Social Distress and Environmental Crisis 2 Managing the Waters 2.1 Flood Control: Restoring, Diking, or Diverting 2.2 Sedimentation: Ban the Reclamation on Mountains 2.3 Sacrificing the South for the North 3 The Changing Nature of Conflicts over Water 3.1 First, Greater Frequency and on a Larger Scale 3.2 Second, Diversifying Stakeholders 3.3 Third, a “Plebeian Culture” in Popular Action 3.4 Case Study: The Conflicts over the Big and Small Zekou Outlets from the 1840s to the 1910s 4 Changes in Hydrotopography of the Jianghan Plain 5 Conclusion 6 Centering the Plain 1 The Jinshui Reclamation Project 2 The Social, Economic, and Hydraulic Conditions of the Plain 3 Reorganizing the Yuan System in the Early Republic 4 The Nationalist Government’s Scheme of Unifying Watersheds 5 A Divided Central Yangzi Watershed 6 Hydropower: Centering the Yangzi 7 Conclusion Conclusion 1 An Autonomous Water Regime 2 An Amphibious Water Regime 3 The Role of the State 4 Environmental Changes in the Longue Durée 4.1 Hydrogeographic Changes 4.2 Loss of Biodiversity 5 Hopes and Challenges in the Jianghan Plain Appendix: Glossary of Chinese Measurement Terms Works Cited Index
