IN THE NEWS: Book review of Knowing the Salween River

A book review has been written by Stew Motta in Water Alternatives journal on “Knowing the Salween River: Resource Politics of a Contested Transboundary River” edited by Carl Middleton and Vanessa Lamb. The book was the result of a research project co-organized by CSDS and the York Center for Asian Research (see here). The book is published as open access and is available for download here.

The review identifies the book as “the first book of its type on the Salween River and represents a landmark contribution in understanding the diverse knowledge types and complex governance issues at play in that region.”

Read the full review in Water Alternatives here.

IN THE NEWS: Dams and droughts, data and diplomacy in the Mekong

The 2019-2020 drought-affected huge numbers of riparian fishers and farmers in the Mekong Basin. Fishers in northeast Thailand and Cambodia reported drastic declines in fish catches in the Mekong’s tributaries while many farmers in Cambodia and Vietnam deserted their farms to find jobs in urban areas.

“Water diplomacy is emerging in the region, but it is very state-centric and downplays the role of non-state actors including civil society groups and local community groups”, said Dr. Middleton, director of the Center for Social Development Studies at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok.

For the full article please click the link here.

UPCOMING EVENT: Blended Learning Course "Climate Change, Disaster and Displacement with Gender and Human Rights- Based Approach"

From 16 November to 7 December 2021, Self- paced learning and 2 hours via Zoom.

CSDS has collaborated with RWI for the online course.

This course focuses on the interrelatedness between human rights, climate change, disaster and displacement. It is recommended that local and national level government officials and other who works disaster and climate change adaptation join this course.

The course will be 14 hours, 3 weeks self- paced learning and 2 hours of Zoom session every week.

Course Directors,

Dr. Matthew Scott, Head of People on The Move Thematic Area- RWI Dr. Claudia Iturate- Lima, Senior Researcher- Environment, Climate Change and Environment- RWI Dr. Carl Middleton of CSDS contributed the module “Political Ecology of Climate Change, Disaster and Displacement: Insights for Human Rights- Based Approach”.

The registration closes on 12 November 2021.

Please click here for the link to register, and for more information about the course please visit the website here.

UPCOMING EVENT: Southeast Asia's challenges to sustainable and inclusive development [Online, 1 October 2021]

Round table 3 - Mekong: how to ensure biodiversity preservation in the context of a river in permanent transformation?

14.00 BKK Time, Friday, 1 October 2021 via Livestorm

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the speakers

Millions of people from Myanmar, China, Lao PDR, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam depend on Mekong River water resources for agriculture and fisheries. However, the Mekong Basin and especially its biomass is impacted by many dam-building projects, overfishing, intensive aquaculture, pollution from growing cities, excessive groundwater extraction and sand mining. This environmental degradation is compounded by climate change, which makes the region even more fragile.

This session will attempt to discuss how biodiversity in the Mekong Basin can be protected, despite its constant evolution, notably through integrated management and community-based approaches.

Speakers :

• Anoulak Kittikhoun, Chief Strategy and Partnership Officer, Mekong River Commission

• Carl Middleton, Director at the Center for Social Development Studies, Chulalungkorn University (TH)

• Jake Brunner, Head of IndoBurma Group, IUCN

To join this online conference, you can register on the organizer’s webpage here.

UPCOMING EVENT: The Belt and Road Initiative, hydropolitics, and hydropower [Online, 7 June 2021]]

16.00-17.30 am BKK Time, Monday, 7 June 2021 via Zoom

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the speakers

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the speakers for the webinar "Contrasting China's Relationship with South and Southeast Asia: the Belt and Road Initiative, Hydropolitics, and Hydropower."

Carl will speak on ‘Reworking the Mekong River Regime: The Geopolitics and Hydropolitics of Competing Regionalisms’.

About the webinar:

"In this webinar we examine the role of new and planned hydropower projects financed by China in shifting geopolitics between China and South and Southeast Asia. We ask how hydropolitics and dams are enabling new forms of economic, social and political regional institutionalisation through the Belt and Road Initiative, how these play out differently in South and Southeast Asia and what these mean for local communities and nature in particular locales across South and Southeast Asia."

To join this webiner, you can register on the organizer’s webpage here, or register via Zoom on this link https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_vBmdcT0nRXCLne0iWFlD8A.

IN THE NEWS: Between the Lines Podcast S03 Ep08: The Water–Food–Energy-Nexus

Carl Middleton from CSDS was featured in Institute of Development Studies’ Podcast Series “Between the Lines”. Carl was featured on the 8th episode for the Season 3, talking about “The Water–Food–Energy-Nexus”.

Please visit the link here to listen to the podcast.

UPCOMING EVENT: The Mekong, China, & SE Asian Transitions Series-Mekong Dams: Debates and the Politics of Evidence [Online, 29 April 2021]

07.00-08.30 am BKK Time, Thursday, 29 April 2021 via Zoom

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the panelists

In recent decades, people living in the Lower Mekong Region have witnessed major shifts from predominantly subsistence agriculture to industrializing economies, with attendant changes in migration, crop production systems, and major infrastructure (roads, dams, industrial estates). This series of four webinars will explore how communities in the region are experiencing the economic, social, and cultural dislocations of these transformations.

Full webinar series schedule:

• Panel 1 : Jan 27 - Markets for Mekong Commodities

• Panel 2 : Feb 24 - Migration, Mobility, and the Mekong

• Panel 3 : Apr 7 - The Spirits and Spiritual Life of the Mekong

• Panel 4: Apr 28 - Mekong Dams: Debates and the Politics of Evidence

Carl will be one of the panelists on Panel 4.

To register for this event, please visit the Zoom link here. For more information about this event, please visit the organizer’s website here.

This event is organized by Asian Studies Center at Michigan State University.

UPCOMING EVENT: Low Flows, Drought, Data and Geopolitics on the Mekong-Lancang River [Online, 28 April 2021]

10.00 pm BKK Time/ 05.00 pm CEST, Wednesday, 28 April 2021 via Facebook Live from UPF Lund

Public Lecture with Carl Middleton from CSDS

The Mekong-Lancang River flows from the Tibetan Plateau through Yunnan Province of China, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. Since the early 1990s, the river has been increasingly engineered by large hydropower dams. In this seminar, Carl Middleton assesses conflict and cooperation in transboundary water governance, with a focus on the Mekong River Commission established between the four lower basin States, and the China-led Lancang Mekong Cooperation. Heavily influenced by geopolitical tensions between the US and China, Carl Middleton analyzes the heated regional debates over China’s dam cascade and low river flows downstream since 2019, and the impact on peoples’ lives.

Dr. Carl Middleton is an Assistant Professor and Deputy Director on the Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy in International Development Studies (MAIDS-GRID) Program, and Director of the Center for Social Development Studies (CSDS) in the Faculty of Political Science of Chulalongkorn University. Dr. Middleton’s research interests orientate around the politics and policy of the environment in Southeast Asia, with a particular focus on nature-society relations, the political ecology of water and energy, and environmental justice. He has lived in Southeast Asia for fifteen years, with much of his work focused onto the Mekong River.

For more information, please visit the event page here.

UPCOMING EVENT: Water Governance in Southeast Asia: A Roundtable Discussion on the Mekong River Basin [Online, 19 March 2021]

06.30 - 08.00 am BKK Time, Friday, 19 March 2021 via Zoom.

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the speakers for the panel.

This Roundtable focuses on the water governance and water management challenges in Southeast Asia, particularly in the Mekong River basin. It will examine questions of environmental justice with a panel of experts on the region, whose interests include—specifically in relation to the Mekong—issues of political ecology, energy and water security, the protection and restoration of river ecosystems, and the rights of local communities and migrant workers.

Speakers:

• Pianporn Deetes, Regional Campaigns and Communications Director, Southeast Asia Program, International Rivers

• Brian Eyler, Senior Fellow and Director, Southeast Asia program, Stimson Centre, Washington DC

• Melissa Marschke, Associate Professor, International Development and Global Studies, University of Ottawa, Canada

• Carl Middleton, Director of the Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University, Thailand

Chairs:

• Phil Calvert, Former Canadian Ambassador to Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos; CAPI Senior Research Fellow

• Victor V. Ramraj, CAPI Director and Chair in Asia-Pacific Legal Relations; Professor, UVic Faculty of Law

Opening Remarks:

• Kevin Hall, President, University of Victoria

Please click here for the link to register for the Zoom Webinar, and for more information about the event, please visit the organizer’s website here.

UPCOMING EVENT: Opening Talk for the Photo Exhibition “The Mekong is Blue and Dried” [Bangkok, 16 March 2021]

17.30 - 19.00, Monday, 16 March 2021 at the Corner Space, 1st Floor, Bangkok Art and Culture Centre (BACC)

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the speakers for the talk.

A selection of photographs and artworks will be showcased in SEA Junction’s “Mekong is Blue and Dried” exhibition on 16 – 28 March 2021 at Corner Space, 1st Floor, Bangkok Art and Culture Centre (BACC). The exhibition is born out of concern for the environmental degradation of the Mekong River.

The exhibition will be launched with an opening talk (in English) on the issue by the speakers listed below, on 16 March 2021, 5:30 – 7:00 pm at Corner Space, 1st Floor, BACC where the exhibition is held.

Speakers

• Anthony Zola, Independent Researcher

• Carl Middleton, Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University

• Premrudee Daoroung, Lao Dam Investment Monitor

• Laure Siegel, Freelance Journalist

Moderator

• Rosalia Sciortino, SEA Junction

For more information about the event, as well as on how to register, please visit the organizer’s website here.

UPCOMING EVENT: 3rd International Conference on Burma/Myanmar Studies [Online, 5-7 March 2021]

12:30-14:00 Myanmar / 13:00-14:30 Thailand on 5 March, 2021, Online and at Chiang Mai University, Thailand

Carl Middleton (CSDS) and Vanessa Lamb (University of Melbourne) will convene a roundtable session titled: “Knowing the Salween River: Reflections on activism, resource politics and peace” for the 3rd International Conference on Burma/Myanmar Studies. The session will be held on 12:30-14:00 Myanmar / 13:00-14:30 Thailand on 5 March, 2021.

The Salween River basin, shared by Myanmar/Burma, Thailand and China, is dynamic system and a site of long-standing contests over territories, resources, and governance. More recently, it is also increasingly recognised as a site for peace and collaborative water governance. This panel will provide inter-disciplinary perspectives by civil society and academic researchers on the unfolding dynamics on the Salween River in and from Myanmar and in a regional context. We will discuss the politics, activism, and policies linked to intensifying resource extraction, hydropower dam construction as well as conservation and development schemes, and how this is unfolding within a complex terrain of local, national and transnational governance and activist networks. Panellists were all contributors and researchers linked to the 2019 collaborative book, “Knowing the Salween River: Resource Politics of a Contested Transboundary River”, which was also the first book dedicated to understanding this complex river system.

Panelists

 Speakers:

• April Kyu Kyu, Researcher, SaNaR (Save the Natural Resource)

• Saw John Bright

• Pianporn Deetes, Thailand and Myanmar Campaigns Director, International River

• Alec Scott, Independent Researcher

Discussant:

• Professor Saw Win, Senior Research Associate, Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University 

Co-Chairs:

• Vanessa Lamb, Senior Lecturer, School of Geography, University of Melbourne

• Carl Middleton, Director, Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University

The conference will be hybrid: 80% online and 20% onsite. As most sessions will be organized online, the registration fee is waived for all conference participants. All participants, please register here to participate in the conference.

For more information about this conference, please visit the organizer’s website here.

The International Conference on Burma/Myanmar Studies was first organized in July 2015 at Chiang Mai University in collaboration with the University of Mandalay. ICBMS was attended by 543 participants from 29 countries, with 48 sessions of paper presentation and 7 roundtables. The conference brought together scholars, researchers, journalists, NGO workers and observers from Burma/Myanmar, as well as from around the world to engage in discussion on Myanmar’s transition.

ICBMS is organized every two years, with Chiang Mai University and the University of Mandalay taking turns as conference host, and with the possibility of extending collaboration with other universities in both Myanmar and Thailand.

ICBMS3 will happen onsite, in person, at Green Nimman CMU (Uniserv), in Chiang Mai, from 5-7 March 2021.

IN THE NEWS: Mekong's falling water level riles China's downstream neighbors

China's water relations with Southeast Asian neighbors are under strain after Beijing held up the Mekong River's flow at one of its large dams upstream, precipitating a sudden drop in volume for downstream countries that share the region's longest body of water.

——

"There is still a need to deepen cooperation on transboundary water governance," said Carl Middleton, director of the Center for Social Development Studies at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. "The appropriate goal is [for the] accountable operation of hydropower projects that avoid social and environmental impacts to the extent possible, while acknowledging and compensating for harms created."

China, which refers to the Mekong as the Lancang River, has been in the crosshairs of local and international environmentalists for the power it wields to reduce the water flow. Critics say Beijing uses the river as a tap to be turned on or off to meet domestic water requirements.

For the full article, please click the link here.

UPCOMING EVENT: CRISEA Final Conference – Competing Regional Integrations in Southeast Asia: The Project and its Findings [Online, 22 February 2021]

17.00 - 19.10, Monday, 22 February 2021 via Zoom

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be presenting on this event.

Competing Regional Integrations in Southeast Asia (CRISEA) is an interdisciplinary research project funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Framework Programme that studies multiple forces affecting regional integration in Southeast Asia and the challenges they present to the peoples of Southeast Asia and its regional institutional framework, ASEAN.

CRISEA innovates by encouraging ‘macro-micro’ dialogue between disciplines: global level analyses in international relations and political economy alongside socio-cultural insights from the grassroots methodologies of social sciences and the humanities.

CRISEA Final Conference – Programme (05) Competing Regional Integrations in Southeast Asia: The Project and its Findings

Part Two – Research Findings: Case Studies (17.26 - 18.16))

• Carl Middleton, Chulalongkorn University (Environment – WP1) – Southeast Asia and China: Transnational Water Issues on the Mekong

• Dennis Arnold, University of Amsterdam (The Economy – WP2) – The Impact of Covid-19 on Special Economic Zones in Southeast Asia

• Pham Quynh Phuong, Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences (The State – WP3) – State-Society Relations and the Rise of the LGBT Movement in Vietnam

• Jayeel Cornelio, Ateneo de Manila University (Identity – WP4) – Christianity and the War on Drugs in the Philippines

• Kyawt Kyawt Khine, University of Mandalay (The Region – WP5) – Southeast Asia Regionalism and Myanmar’s Relations with ASEAN

For the complete program, please visit here.

The conference will be conducted online via Zoom. To attend, please visit this link here. It will also be broadcasted via YouTube Live on the channel here.

CSDS Statement: Military Coup in Myanmar on 1 February 2021

The Center for Social Development Studies, Chulalongkorn University stands in solidarity with those who condemn the military coup in Myanmar on 1 February 2021.

CSDS Newsletter: October - December 2020

View the full newsletter on this link.

CSDS News: 2020 Year in Review

2020 has been a tough year for everyone, but thanks to your continuous support, we're able to spend it meaningfully. We’ve organized 4 (four) public events, participated in 11 (eleven) invitations, and publish 12 (twelve) publications, and there’s also significant increase in visitors to our website as well as page views, and also an increase in our social media presence.

This year, we also received the “Center of Excellence (CE) with Outstanding Performance” award from Chulalongkorn University. This annual award is presented to recognize the research achievements of the researchers within the center and their research over the previous year. Our team are honored to receive this award and its recognition of our ongoing work.

Thank you for your support this year, and please look forward to our projects in next year too!

Public Events

Due to 2020's public health measures, all the public events were held online.

• Building Power from Within: Rural and Indigenous Community Organizing

• Confronting the Triple Trap in the Mekong Region: The Pandemic, Economic Downturn, and Climate Crisis

• Haze and Social (In)Justice in Southeast Asia: Past Experience and What Next?

• New Research on COVID 19 and its Consequences: People, Planet and Inclusive Society

Publications

Book Chapter

• Flooding disaster, people’s displacement and state response: A case study of Hat Yai Municipality, Thailand

Critical Nature

• Addressing Drought and Climate Change on the Lancang-Mekong River Needs New and Nature-based Solutions - Thai version available here.

• Are China’s dams on the Mekong causing downstream drought? The importance of scientific debate

• Community-Based Tourism in Thailand: Impact and Recovery from the COVID-19 - Thai version available here.

• COVID-19, Health Borders, and the Purity of the Thai Nation

• Beyond Water Data Sharing, Mekong-Lancang River Needs Accountable Water Governance

Journal Article

• How transboundary processes connect commons in Japan and Thailand: A relational analysis of global commodity chains and East Asian economic integration

• The Salween River as a transboundary commons: Fragmented collective action, hybrid governance and power

• Shaping ocean governance: a study of EU normative power on Thailand’s sustainable fisheries

• ASEAN in the South China Sea conflict, 2012–2018: A lesson in conflict transformation from normative power Europe

• Reciprocity in practice: the hydropolitics of equitable and reasonable utilization in the Lancang-Mekong basin

Report

• Contested Knowledges of the Commons in Southeast Asia Research Progress report - Vignettes from the Field (CRISEA Working Paper 2)

NEWS: CSDS Exhibition featured on "Chula at UNESCO High-Level Futures Literacy Summit"

Mark your calendars, from 8 to 12 December 2020, the High-Level Futures Literacy Summit will provide testimonials from around the world that being futures literate changes what people see and do. From high ranking leaders in the public and private sector to activists, artists, students and professors, the Summit will show how people become futures literate and the impact it has on all aspects of life, from dealing with COVID-19 to breaking the reproduction of oppression.

Now, as always, the future is uncertain. Climate change, pandemics, economic crisis, social exclusion, racism, oppression of women, inter-generational conflict, and more, shatter the conventional images of the future that humans use to feel secure, to be confident enough to invest in tomorrow.

This is not a small problem. Without images of the future that inspire hope and foster collaboration there is a high risk of despair and war. The malaise of poverty-of-the-imagination must be overcome.  

Register Now!

Chula at UNESCO High-Level Futures Literacy Summit

Futures Literacy, a universally accessible skill that builds on the innate human capacity to imagine the future, offers a clear, field tested solution to poverty-of-the imagination.

This hybrid event will provide testimonials from around the world how being Futures Literate changes what people see and do and innovate the present. The event consists of Summit Plenary engaging in “future conversation” by world leaders, Agora (virtual exhibition) from more than 50 leading institutions and Global Futures Literacy Network side-events online. Chulalongkorn University, the only invited participating institution at the Summit from Thailand, will join the Summit Plenary and showcase its flagship projects in Agora, aiming to reach out future collaborators and partnerships across the world.

Dates: December 8-12, 2020

Register: click here

For further information: The Event, More on Futures Literacy

UPCOMING EVENT: ARI E-Workshop on Transboundary Environmental Governance in Southeast Asia [Online, 4 December 2020]

15.40-17.30, Friday, 4 December 2020 via Zoom

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be presenting on this event.

The Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, is going to organize an inter-disciplinary workshop on "Transboundary Environmental Governance in Southeast Asia" to explore how, why, when and what forms of transboundary environmental governance are emerging in Southeast Asia.

The workshop will be conducted online via Zoom. To register, please visit this link here and the organizer will reply prior to the event with the Zoom link.

Panel IV. Hybrid Governance of Transboundary Commons

Chairperson: Zu Dienle Tan, National University of Singapore

Panelists:

• Beyond the Commons/Commodity Dichotomy in the Lancang-Mekong Basin: Implications for Transboundary Water Governance by Carl Middleton, Chulalongkorn University

• Unruly Fires: Nonhumans as Transboundary Actants in Governing Indonesia’s Wildfires by Rini Astuti, National University of Singapore and Yuti Ariani Fatimah, Nanyang Technological University

• A Multi-Scalar Political Economy Analysis of Thailand’s Widespread Urban Air Pollution by Danny Marks, Dublin City University

• Path Dependency of Land Use in Southeast Asian Peatlands by Lahiru Wijedasa, National University of Singapore

Abstract:

Beyond the Commons/Commodity Dichotomy in the Lancang-Mekong Basin: Implications for Transboundary Water Governance

Extensive hydropower construction across the Lancang-Mekong basin is changing the river’s hydrology and ecology, with implications for the availability and governance of common pool resources, as well as for riparian livelihoods. In this paper, I assess how the transboundary commons are being reworked as the river is transformed by large dam operation. The paper applies an analytical lens that seeks to move beyond a commons-commodity dichotomy in water related resource governance (Paerregaard and Andersen, 2019) to argue that at the present time the Lancang-Mekong River is neither fully commodified nor fully a commons, but rather a hybrid of the two. The paper will examine how transboundary hybrid governance regimes are reworking the hybrid commons, drawing attention to how states, communities, and even private actors, seek to maintain particular types of commons, whilst simultaneously either furthering or resisting commodification of some properties of the river. The paper will discuss the implications of this hybrid governance perspective for recent hydropolitics in the river basin and existing and new transboundary water governance institutions, namely the Mekong River Commission and the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation framework.

For more information about this event, please visit the organizer’s webpage here.

UPCOMING EVENT: “Making the Renewables Revolution a Reality: Challenges & opportunities in Asia and the Pacific (REN21 Virtual Academy 2020)”

15.00-16.30 (Thailand time), Tuesday, 24th November 2020

Carl Middleton from CSDS will moderate this panel.

 This panel discussion will address the challenges of the renewable energy transition in the Asia and the Pacific region, hosted as part of the REN21 Virtual Academy 2020. The panel will address the following four topics: 1) Tackling Asia’s coal investments to meet nationally determined contributions (NDCs) as committed in the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, and mitigate air pollution; 2) Providing low-cost and effective sustainable energy options to eliminate energy poverty; 3) Accelerating regional connectivity for sustainable energy; and 4) Applying energy-water-food nexus lens in sustainable energy planning and investments.

The panelists are:

• Ms. Monica Yamin Wang, Director, REpowering Asia, WWF

• Mr. Abhishek Jain, Director, Powering Livelihoods, Council on Energy, Environment and Water

• Dr. Akbar Swandaru, Lead Researcher, ASEAN Center for Energy

• Ms. Bridget McIntosh, Country Director for Cambodia, Energy Lab

Following brief framing presentations by each speaker, all session participants are invited into an interactive online space to discuss the four topics outlined and to interact with the speakers.

To learn more about and register for the REN21 Virtual Academy 2020, please visit here: https://www.ren21.net/2020-ren21-academy/

Read more about CSDS's research on the water-food-energy nexus here.

NEWS: CSDS Exhibition Booth at CU Social Innovation Hub (12-25 November 2020)

CSDS is hosting an exhibition booth at the Chulalongkorn University Social Innovation Hub for its Grand Opening Ceremony on 12 November 2020.

Displayed in the CSDS' exhibition booth is various information about the Center, including:

• An online game titled "Exploring Reciprocity in Water Governance: A Role Play Game in Riverbank City", where audience will play as a trusted advisor of Riverbank City's governor, where there is a contested visions for development in the city and surrounding areas.

• An introduction video about the CSDS, it’s mission, and our research from the perspective of the CSDS Committee Members (video here);

• A video by the CSDS Director, Dr. Carl Middleton, explaining about CSDS's ongoing research on water diplomacy and water data democratization in the Mekong-Lancang basin.

Posters are also displayed explaining about CSDS's research on "Exploring Reciprocity as an Innovative Approach to Transboundary Water Governance in the Mekong-Lancang Basin" and "Innovating Institutions, Policy and Platforms for Water Data Democratization in the Mekong-Lancang River".

The exhibition for the CU Social Innovation Hub is located at the Visid Prachuabmoh Building, which is located on the Google Map here. The exhibition is open between 12 November 2020 to 25 November 2020 and is open for students and the public to visit.