Abstract
I assess the outcomes of issues related to environmental justice under conditions of scientific uncertainty and cultural diversity using the case of the Tseng-Wen Reservoir Transbasin Water Diversion Project, Taiwan, to explore policy stakeholders’ perceptions and the policy implications of indigenous struggles and local action. This water conflict reflects the expansion of a development-focused and resource-securing state, and represents a pattern of exclusion and control that disturbs traditional indigenous land and water systems. This study underscores the interrelationship among problems related to the inequitable distribution of interests and risk; the lack of recognition of cultural differences, local knowledge, and perspectives; and exclusion from the environmental impact assessment and decision-making processes. The findings also highlight local distrust of experts and the conflicts and confrontations among experts in differing disciplines. I argue that in order to reach a consensus through intercultural and interdisciplinary dialogue, local circumstances and knowledge must be included in knowledge production and policymaking.
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Notes
Taipei Times. MORAKOT: THE AFTERMATH: Victims blame reservoir project. Available at http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2009/08/18/2003451435/print (last accessed 2009/10/26).
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This study was funded by National Science Council (NSC 99–2410-H010–004-MY2). The author declares that no conflict of interest exists.
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Fan, Mf. Environmental Justice and the Politics of Risk: Water Resource Controversies in Taiwan. Hum Ecol 44, 425–434 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-016-9844-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-016-9844-7