Heritage and the Making of Political Legitimacy in Laos

The Past and Present of the Lao Nation
Erscheinungsjahr 2021
ISBN: 978-94-6372-702-0
Verlag: Amsterdam University Press

Buch, Englisch, Band 7, 190 Seiten, Format (B × H): 156 mm x 234 mm

Reihe: Asian Heritages

The Lao People’s Democratic Republic is nearly fifty years old, and one of the few surviving one-party socialist states. Nearly five decades on from its revolutionary birth, the Lao population continues to build futures in and around a political landscape that maintains socialist rhetoric on the one hand and capitalist economics on the other. Contemporary Lao politics is marked by the use of cultural heritage as a source of political legitimacy. Researched through long-term detailed ethnography in the former royal capital of Luang Prabang, itself a UNESCO-recognized World Heritage Site since 1995, this book takes a fresh look at issues of legitimacy, heritage, and national identity for different members of the Lao population. It argues that the political system has become sufficiently embedded to avoid imminent risk of collapse but suggests that it is facing new challenges primarily in the form of rising Chinese influence in Laos.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Wilcox, Phill

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Asiatische Geschichte
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politische Ideologien Marxismus, Kommunismus
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Regierungspolitik Wirtschafts- und Finanzpolitik
• Wirtschaftswissenschaften Volkswirtschaftslehre Wirtschaftspolitik, politische Ökonomie

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of Acronyms and Abbreviations

Author’s Note

Acknowledgements

1 Introduction – Heritage, State, and Politics

Being Revolutionary, Being Lao

Constructing the People’s Democratic Republic

Socialist Ideology – Capitalist Politics

Nation State Fragility

Cultural Intimacy of/in Laos

Heritage With an Agenda

Future Building in Laos

Rising China

The Book

Future Directions

References

2 Making the Past (Dis)appear: Heritage as Legitimacy in (Re)creating Luang Prabang

Luang Prabang and the Creation of Nostalgia

Dealing With ‘Difficult Pasts’ at the National Museum

Heritage and Almsgiving

‘We Don’t Talk About It Openly’: Timelessness and Silence

An Economy of Selective History

A Suitably Idealized Past

Conclusions: Heritages and Future Directions

References

3 Hmong (Forever) on the Margins: Crypto-Separatism and the Making of Ethnic Difference

Ethnicity in Laos

Dreams of Hmong Statehood and Zomia

‘We Are Hmong’

Difference as Belonging

Zomia as a Persistent Alternative

Conclusions: Reproducing Societal Inequality?

References

4 One World: One Dream: Voices of Pessimism, Strategies of Pragmatism and Facing the Rise of China

‘One World: One Dream’?

‘China Is Developed’

‘We Will No Longer Have Jobs’

Pessimism With Ambivalence: The New ‘Things of the House’

Final Thoughts – One Belt: Multiple Paths?

References

5 Conclusion – Long Live the Revolution?

Royal and Revolutionary Heritage

Essentializing the State

The Dynamics of Authoritarianism

Difficult Heritages

Difference as (Not) Belonging

On China and Changing Laos

Final Reflections

References

Bibliography

Index

Über Autor(innen)

Wilcox, Phill
Phill Wilcox is a Research Associate in the Faculty of Sociology at Bielefeld University, Germany. Her book chapter ‘Contested Heritage in Luang Prabang’ was published as part of the Routledge Handbook of Urbanization in Southeast Asia in 2018.