The monograph The Everyday Politics of Resources: Lives and Landscapes in Northwest Vietnam by Associate Professor Nga Dao, Department of Social Sciences, York University (Canada), will be published by Cornell University Press on May 15, 2025.

This work offers a critical examination of the transformative effects of development initiatives—such as hydropower dams, rubber plantations, and mining operations—on the lives, livelihoods, and environments of communities in Northwest Vietnam. While these projects have generated significant profits for the state and private enterprises, they have also resulted in widespread displacement, impoverishment, and ecological degradation.

Drawing on more than two decades of in-depth ethnographic fieldwork, Professor Dao documents the highly uneven outcomes of these development processes. The monograph presents compelling narratives from individuals and communities who have faced dispossession and loss, alongside those who have adapted and, in some cases, benefited from these transformations. Through this nuanced analysis, The Everyday Politics of Resources provides an urgent and insightful contribution to debates on development, inequality, and environmental change in contemporary Vietnam.

We invite readers and scholars with interests in Southeast Asian studies, Vietnam Studies, development studies, anthropology, and political ecology to engage with this publication.

For more details, visit the official Cornell University Press page