Changing Lives in Laos: Society, Politics and Culture in a Post-Socialist State
$42.00 SGD
Contributions by Martin Rathie, Oliver Tappe, Patrice Ladwig, Vatthana Pholsena, Nicole Reichert, Oliver Évrard, Ian G. Baird, Michael B. Dwyer, Vanina Bouté, Grégoire Schlemmer, Guido Sprenger, Chris Lyttleton, Yunxia Li, Sverre Molland, Kabmanivanh Phouxay and Annabel Vallard
Changes in the character of the political regime in Laos after 2000, a massive influx of foreign investment, and disruptions to rural life arising from improved communications and new forms of mobility within and across the borders have produced a major transformation across the country. Witnessing these changes, a group of scholars carried out studies that document the rise of a new social, cultural and economic order. The contributions to this volume draw on original fieldwork materials and unpublished sources, and provide fresh analyses of topics ranging from the structures of power to the politics of territoriality and new forms of sociability in emerging urban spaces.
"In Changing Lives in Laos, Vanina Bouté and Vatthana Pholsena have assembled an invaluable collection of papers on Laos by key established and emerging scholars of the country. While Laos remains under-studied compared to most of the region, these chapters show an increasingly thorough engagement with people and places and a better understanding of the texture of transition and transformation." - Jonathan Rigg, National University of Singapore
"This new book on Laos, edited by two leading specialists on this country, features articles by a new generation of historians, anthropologists, geographers and political scientists. Studying state formation, new economic trends, and issues such as the cultural integration of ethnic minorities and rural migration, this interesting book brilliantly demonstrates how in less than fifty years Lao society has been deeply transformed." - Yves Goudineau, Director of the French School of Asian Studies (EFEO) and Chair in Comparative Anthropology of Southeast Asia (Paris)
"...an encompassing analysis of contemporary processes of social, political and cultural change in Laos." - Kearrin Sims, Contemporary Southeast Asia
Vanina Bouté is an associate professor at the Sociology Department, University of Picardie, and a member of the Southeast Asia Centre (CNRS-EHESS).
Vatthana Pholsena is an associate professor at the Department of Southeast Asian Studies, National University of Singapore, and a Fellow at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS).
Publication Year: 2017
472 pages, 229mm x 152mm
25 b/w illustrations, 10 map and tables
Paperback
ISBN: 978-981-4722-26-1
NUS Press