“Crossing the River by Feeling the Stones”: How Borders, Energy Development and Ongoing Experimentation Shape the Dynamic Transformation of Yunnan Province

Thomas Ptak and Victor Konrad

Journal of Borderlands Studies, 2021, vol. 36, issue 5, 765-789

Abstract: This article details the dynamic transformation of Yunnan’s border regime during the early twenty-first century through the Great Western Development Strategy, Bridgehead and Belt and Road Initiative. Although China’s macro-scale national strategies frame border change, experimental ideology and local-scale mechanisms drive border change and refine through constant adjustment. As illustrated in this article, border positioning and repositioning is incremental, constituted of many small and different components, dependent on locals and localities, and employing an array of border mediation strategies. Seemingly large scale border alteration is actually accrued through micro-changes, small scale experiments in specific places, trial and error adjustments and, essentially “crossing the river by feeling the stones.” Whereas Yunnan’s geostrategic location and vast energy resources have catapulted the province through rapid growth and into a globalized international context, ongoing transformation has also bolstered boundaries and bordering processes in Yunnan’s mobile border regime and generated antithetical and reactionary bordering responses that need to be viewed within a post-globalization border framework.

Date: 2021
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/08865655.2021.1924074 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:rjbsxx:v:36:y:2021:i:5:p:765-789

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/rjbs20

DOI: 10.1080/08865655.2021.1924074

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Borderlands Studies is currently edited by Emmanuel Brunet-Jailly, Henk van Houtum and Martin van der Velde

More articles in Journal of Borderlands Studies from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().