‘Our Path from the Land’: Environmental Displacement and Anthropocenic Futures in Chinese Short Fiction

Abstract

ABSTRACT As global warming imperils resource production and international security, nations around the world have been urged to develop sustainable, resilient infrastructure to curb and mitigate the worst effects of climate change. China has raced ahead in this process, commissioning hydraulic and green energy megaprojects to maintain the nation’s economic stability in the face of environmental precarity. However, these developments have come with a high cost for Chinese citizens, permanently forcing millions from their homes. Literary and cultural responses to displacement from Chinese authors abound, dividedly praising and critiquing the state’s technocratic, growth-centric response to climate change challenges. This article compares two such short stories, namely Liu Cixin’s ‘Yuanyuan’s Bubbles’ (2015) and Wang Ping’s ‘Maverick’ (2007) to consider the tensions surrounding green infrastructural transitions in contemporary China, where, on both sides of the polemic, the environmental migrant functions as a symbol of the nation’s uncertain social futurity.