Table Of ContentChallenges of the Agrarian Transition in Southeast Asia (ChATSEA)
Fields of Desire
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Challenges of the
Agrarian Transition in Southeast Asia
(ChATSEA)
The shift from rural societies dependent upon agricultural livelihoods to
predominantly urbanized, industrialized and market-based societies is one
of the most significant processes of social change in the modern world. The
Challenges of the Agrarian Transition in Southeast Asia (ChATSEA) project
examines how the transformation is affecting the societies and economies of
Southeast Asia. Headed by Professor Rodolphe De Koninck, holder of the
Canada Chair in Asian Research at the University of Montreal, and sponsored
by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the
ChATSEA project includes publications by senior academics as well as junior
scholars.
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Fields of Desire
Poverty and Policy in Laos
Holly High
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© 2014 Holly High
Published by:
NUS Press
National University of Singapore
AS3-01-02, 3 Arts Link
Singapore 117569
Fax: (65) 6774-0652
E-mail: [email protected]
Website: http://www.nus.edu.sg/nuspress
ISBN 978-9971-69-770-9 (Paper)
All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in
any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be
invented, without written permission from the Publisher.
National Library Board, Singapore Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
High, Holly, author.
Fields of desire : poverty and policy in Laos / Holly High. – Singapore :
NUS Press, [2014]
pages cm. – (Challenges of the agrarian transition in Southeast Asia)
ISBN : 978-9971-69-770-9 (paperback)
1. Poverty – Laos. 2. Poverty – Political aspects – Laos. 3. Poverty –
Government policy – Laos. I. Title. II. Series: Challenges of the agrarian
transition in Southeast Asia.
HC443
305.56909594 — dc23 OCN861246598
Printed by: Markono Print Media Pte Ltd
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For everyone that helped along the way
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Contents
List of Maps viii
List of Illustrations viii
Acknowledgements ix
Note on Transcription xiii
1 Introduction: Towards a Political Ethnography of Desire 1
2 Eat with You: Power as Nurturing and Devouring 24
3 The Mobility of the Marginal 44
4 Poverty becomes You: Black, White and Gold 69
5 Stories of State 86
6 Resurrecting the State: “The will and desire of the people” 106
7 The Participatory Poverty Reduction Project 125
8 Mutual Aid: Delirium and the Political Field 151
9 Conclusion: Fieldnotes from the Postrevolution 169
Notes 179
Bibliography 193
Index 204
vii
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List of Maps
Map 1. Laos in Southeast Asia xv
Map 2. Southern Laos xvi
List of Illustrations
Figure 1. A mother and three of her sons transplant rice seedlings 2
Figure 2. The Sii Phan Don area of the Mekong River is peppered
with many islands 2
Figure 3. The main hall of the Don Khiaw Buddhist temple also
served as the venue for most village meetings 17
Figure 4. A boat moored by the shore of Don Khiaw. Boats were
the main form of transport during my fieldwork 17
Figure 5. Harvesting rice 27
Figure 6. I have translated haa kin ( find and eat) as “a hand-to-
mouth existence.” It often includes gathering wild foods,
such as this assortment collected from the forest 28
Figure 7. A woman prepares a meal using herbs grown in a
homestead garden 28
Figure 8. Beauty is bounty and bounty is beauty: this scene is an
example of the over-abundance that is valued in displays
of donations at Buddhist celebrations 73
Figure 9. PRF promotional pamphlet circulated in 2003 128
Figure 10. This was one of the best areas of footpath that resulted
on Don Khiaw from the “road to nowhere” project 148
Figure 11. Wrapping rice sweets in preparation for a merit-making
donation 159
Figure 12. Monk’s begging bowls piled high with rice, sweets, and
bananas 159
viii
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Acknowledgements
I have dedicated this book to all the people who have contributed to, en-
couraged and facilitated its research and writing. I am confident that those
people know who they are. It would be tedious in some cases, a breach of
confidentiality in others, and perhaps impossible anyway to list each and every
one and detail their good deeds. Let me just say that even the smallest of
kind words and good advice has had the greatest of impacts.
That said, I do not want to forgo writing a more traditional acknowledge-
ments section altogether, in part because I always find acknowledgements so
fascinating to read. This is one of the rare instances where authors who might
usually be stuffy allow themselves to mention the conviviality of intellectual
friendships and the profound sense of enduring gratitude to field informants,
where writers who might usually present smooth and authoritative accounts
allow themselves to thank chance encounters and unruly networks of col-
leagues. This is so precious for our record of how knowledge is produced.
With this in mind, what I will present below is an account of the non-linear
path this manuscript took from its conception to final rendition. I cannot
mention everyone here who helped along the way, but I hope that by tracing
this path readers will get a sense of just how deep, and how diffuse, this
book’s intellectual debts are.
The original research for this book was completed as part of my PhD
training at The Australian National University, The Research School of Pacific
and Asian Studies, Anthropology Programme and was supported by an
Australian Postgraduate Award and fieldwork funds from the Anthropology
Programme. My main supervisor was Andrew Walker and other members
of my supervisory team included Francesca Merlan, Alan Rumsey and Philip
Taylor. It was a line-up of very smart, very conscientious anthropologists. The
programme was lively and challenging: I could not have asked for more. I also
completed my undergraduate studies at ANU: Ian Keen and Chris Gregory
particularly deserve my thanks. The first year of PhD studies was completed
at The University of Sydney under the supervision of Peter Hinton. He was
an incredibly supportive supervisor, and it was only due to his illness that I
later moved to ANU.
ix
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x Acknowledgements
It was under Peter’s guidance that I completed my pre-fieldwork trip to
Laos in 2000 and chose what was to be the area of my study: Sii Phan Don.
During that year I also commenced learning Thai with Aacaan Nilawan at
The University of Sydney, and she facilitated my enrolment in a summer
course at Salaya University, Thailand. In 2001 I suspended my enrolment at
Sydney pending transfer to the ANU and arrangement of my research per-
misions from the Government of Laos. I spent the year living in Vientiane.
Denley Pike and the team at Vientiane College must be acknowledged here
for providing me with gainful employment and a stimulating intellectual envi-
ronment in Vientiane. I tried numerous strategies to obtain research permis-
sion, determined that my research should be “above board” and legal. After
many disappointments, it was with great relief that I met Mr Khamphat
Phetlasy of the External Affairs Division of The Ministry of Education.
He instructed me on how to submit an application. This was reviewed in
2001 and approved in early 2002. While I waited for this application to
be processed (12 months), I continued language learning in Vientiane with
private teachers, again arranged by the Ministry of Education. I would like
to thank the Ministry staff for their professional and friendly assistance in all
these matters.
With news that my permissions had been approved, I returned to
Australia to transfer my PhD candidature to the ANU, apply for research
funds, and present my pre-fieldwork seminar to the Anthropology Pro-
gramme, and improve my Lao further under the tuition of Adam Chapman.
This was a busy three months that passed quickly in a very supportive new
environment. By July, I was back in Laos, research permission letters in hand,
and making my way through the Lao bureaucracy from Vientiane, to Pakse, to
Mounlapamok, to Don Khiaw. At each step of the way, Ministry of Educa-
tion staff accompanied me and explained my research permission to the local
authorities. This eased my entry to the field enormously.
By late July, 2002, I found myself at last installed on the island of Don
Khiaw. All the bureaucrats who had delivered me there went back to their
distant homes, and I was faced with the peculiar task of “doing” fieldwork.
I was fortunate to be surrounded by an incredibly friendly and generous
group of neighbours and co-villagers. Just as this was my first fieldwork, I
was their first anthropologist, and we were all feeling our way. If I were to
summarize what I learned about fieldwork in that first, astonishing, difficult
and humbling year is that fieldwork isn’t something that you “do” after all: it
is what happens while you are making plans for what on earth it is that you
are going to do as one event after another takes hold of you and the people
around you. For my first fieldwork I stayed for 16 months. By the time I had
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