Abstract
Since 2011 and the transition to civilian government, Myanmar and the Ayeyarwady Delta in particular are witnessing swift and dramatic changes in the modalities of access and use of natural resources. Drawing from political ecology, and on the basis of ethnographic work conducted in Yeinek village tract in the Nyaungdone Township of the Ayeyarwady Delta, this article places recent resources dynamics in a historical perspective. Rather than seeing natural resources as a 'given', we see them as resulting from socially embedded strategies of resource-making. These strategies contribute to a constant redefinition of the resource-frontier the delta has historically been for multiple actors. Notably, we show how land for rice cultivation, and water for capture fisheries and aquaculture, have been made into key resources over time, often in an exclusionary way. Post-2011 land and fishery reforms are the most recent examples of resource-making dynamics; they have certainly triggered significant resource re-allocation, but existing cross-scale patronage networks still largely shape how this takes place in practice. Finally, in this deltaic environment where resources are part water, part land, part rice, part fish, and the legitimacy of one's claims often hinges on proving prior use of a specific resource, it is the nature of the resource to be reallocated that is contested. In the newly politicized context of Myanmar, resources and institutional fluidity is in itself a frontier to navigate. Keywords : Ayeyarwady Delta; Myanmar; fisheries; land; resource making; frontier; exclusion
Highlights
The Ayeyarwady Delta2 in Myanmar has long been seen as a "resource-frontier" to be reclaimed
In the following sub-sections, we describe resource-making dynamics at play in this newly politicized context through two case studies: (1) a case whereby local fishermen tried to regain access to Inn fisheries that had been encroached by fish ponds built by a private company and (2) a case where local residents claimed access to land that had been allocated and redistributed several times
As broadly argued by Fold and Hirsh (2009: 95) about "the frontier" in South East Asia, enacting the Ayeyarwady Delta as a frontier in that particular way made it a symbol of national development; it hinged on the "making of land" as a valuable yet underutilized resource that needed to be tapped into
Summary
The Ayeyarwady Delta in Myanmar has long been seen as a "resource-frontier" to be reclaimed. Doing so in the current political context of Myanmar, which is going through an incomplete and fragile transition from authoritarianism towards more democratic representation, is interesting at another level It allows engaging with what the assemblage analytics highlights as constituting a frontier too, e.g. the uncertainty that relates to shifting power regimes and legitimacy frameworks and the (in)ability of different actors to navigate it and reshape access and use to resources. We draw from this work to interrogate the strategies and social practices through which the Ayeyarwady Delta resources (and conflicts) have been and continue to be produced and reproduced (which we call resource-making), and how these define an ever-shifting frontier, which has both a "ground reality" and needs to be understood as a political formation
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