Hydraulic societies : water, power, and control in East and Central Asian history / edited by Nicholas B. Breyfogle and Philip C. Brown.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Breyfogle, Nicholas B., 1968- editor.

Brown, Philip C., 1947- editor.

Oregon State University. Press, publisher.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Water resources development--Political aspects--East Asia.

Water resources development.

Water resources development--Political aspects--Asia, Central.

Water-supply--Political aspects--East Asia.

Water-supply.

Water-supply--Political aspects--Asia, Central.

Water resources development--Political aspects.

Water-supply--Political aspects.

Central Asia.

East Asia.

Physical Description:

x, 249 pages : illustrations, maps ; 23 cm

Other Title:

Water, power, and control in East and Central Asian history

Place of Publication:

Corvallis, OR : Oregon State University Press, 2023.

Summary:

"Hydraulic Societies explores the linked themes of water, power, state-building, and hydraulic control. Bringing together a range of ecological, geographical, chronological, and methodological perspectives, the essays in this book address how humans have long harnessed water and sought to contain its destructive power for political, economic, and social ends. Water defines every aspect of life and remains at the center of human activity: in irrigation and agriculture; waste and sanitation; drinking and disease; floods and droughts; religious beliefs and practices; fishing and aquaculture; travel and discovery; scientific study; water pollution and conservation; multi-purpose dam building; boundaries and borders; politics and economic life; and wars and diplomacy. From the earliest large irrigation works thousands of years ago, control over water has involved control over people, as the essays in this volume reflect. The intersections of water and political, economic, and social power historically span international as well as domestic politics and operate at scales ranging from the local to the global. The authors consider the role of water in national development schemes, water distribution as a tool of political power, international disputes over waterways and water supplies, and the place of water in armed conflicts. They explore the ways in which political power and social hierarchies have themselves been defined and redefined by water and its control, how state leaders legitimized their rule both culturally and economically through the control of water, and how water management schemes were a means to impose and refine colonial power."-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Water, power, and control : an introduction / Nicholas B. Breyfogle and Philip C. Brown

Ordering the Yellow River for ordering the world : the state mode of environmental production in Northern Song and Jin China, 960-1234 CE / Ling Zhang

Globalization, water, and power in the Ferghana Valley, 1709-1876 / Scott C. Levi

"A field upstream is better than a mirab brother" : searching for power in Central Asian water / Beatrice Penati

Seeding like a state : erosion control and watershed management in colonial Korea / David Fedman

Political charisma, technonatures, and hydrosocial waterscapes : North Korean hydrological engineering, development, and statecraft / Robert Winstanley-Chesters

Sediment and state in Imperial China : the Yellow River Watershed as an earth system and a world system / Ruth Mostern

Floods and governance : the historical construction of vulnerability in Taiwan under Japanese rule / Ya-wen Ku

Lessons from the past? : Suggestions from Early Modern Japanese riparian engineering / Yasuaki Chino

Designing a deluge : a history of design flood estimation in Japan / Shinichiro Nakamura.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

0870712373

9780870712371

OCLC:

1375104172