Abstract
The adaptation of human societies to the deep transformations imposed by the globalisation of the world economy and related changes to various environments constitutes probably the most prominent challenge for the 21st century, especially in mountainous and marginal areas occupied by ethnic minorities. In Southeast Asia, modern states are continuing to build their territorial legitimacy, integrating areas inhabited by groups that have become ethnic minorities. In Vietnam’s Lâm Đồng province, Dalat is thus more and more integrated into national and international economic networks, especially those of tourism and agricultural production (coffee, flowers, vegetables, etc.). This integration has transformed the life of the people living in nearby villages. Our hypothesis is that there is a differentiation in this process as ethnic minorities are mostly marginalised compared to Kinh (or Vietnamese) people. In this text, we examine the general context of agrarian and urban transitions and how it has affected three villages, Da Sar, Da Nhim and Da Chaïs, in Lac Duong district. This study is mostly based on fieldwork conducted in 2011 and 2012 as a comparison with previous research done since 2007 in the same area.
On ne peut parler de la ville sans parler de la campagne, on ne peut évoquer Hanoi sans parler des villages qui l’entourent et qui l’ont organisée.
We cannot speak of the city without speaking of the countryside, one cannot mention Hanoi without evoking the villages that surround it and have organized it.
Quertamp (2010, p. 110).
This text has been formerly presented at the conference of the IGU commission on Globalization, Marginalization and Regional and Local Response (C08-47) “Geographies of Marginality: The Realities of Physically Marginalized Areas”, University of Zagreb, Dubrovnik, 19–23 August 2012. The portrait of that period remains valid, especially when updates will eventually allow seeing evolution trends. Only some minor updates were made. Thanks are addressed to the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) for its grant to the project “Intégration des régions montagneuses d’Asie du Sud-Est continentale, 1960–2010: entre adaptation et marginalisation” (CRSH: 410-2011-2439), directed by Steve Déry and that allows fieldwork by Déry from 2011 to 2015, Boisclair in 2011 and Lucas in 2012.
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Notes
- 1.
Field observations by Déry in 1996, 1997, 2001, 2003 as well as every year from 2005 to 2012. Boisclair in 2011 and Lucas in 2012 have also conducted fieldwork in Lâm Đồng province. Déry has continued its annual visits to the region between 2013 and 2017.
- 2.
On December 31, 2012, there were 214,443 inhabitants according to the Vietnamese Internet site of the city of Đà Lạt (accessed 12 November 2017; http://dalat.lamdong.gov.vn/). The Internet site of Lâm Đồng province provides only the preliminary figures of the 2009 census; http://www.lamdong.gov.vn/en-US/government/Organization/Districts-cities-towns/Pages/default.aspx. Wikipedia in English lists 406,105 for 2015, but does not give a source. This may be the (badly defined) agglomeration of the population of the city of Đà Lạt combined with the neighbouring districts of Duc Trong (c. 166,000 inhabitants), where is Đà Lạt airport, and of Lac Duong to the north (just under 20,000 inhabitants).
- 3.
- 4.
Field work by Déry and Boisclair, June 2011. Improvements of the road, particularly those observed in 2014, have rendered the district capital better accessible.
- 5.
Natural growth is weak because of high fertility and high mortality.
- 6.
Natural growth declines because of the decrease of both fertility and mortality.
- 7.
- 8.
All land use data have first been published in De Koninck (1997, pp. 68–70).
- 9.
See Boisclair (2014) for details.
- 10.
Also spelled Đa Đâng in Vietnamese publication, and sometimes Đa Đeung.
- 11.
One could eventually discuss the “everyday forms of resistance” (Scott 1985), whether of the ethnic minorities or of the Kinh themselves, but this would take us into a different direction.
- 12.
- 13.
- 14.
In 2009, Lâm Đồng province received 1.6 million tourists, but only a bit more than 260,000 came from abroad (Tuổi Trẻ, 07/09/10, p. 14).
- 15.
Far from being scientific, this statement results from the observation of a larger number of cars within the city, and from the diversity of their origins as visible from their number plates.
- 16.
Field work by Déry in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2011 et 2012.
- 17.
The population alone cannot be considered a determining factor for the importance or the centrality of a place (Christaller 1966, p. 17).
- 18.
The economic distance is determined by the cost of freight, insurance, storage; the time and the weight loss or the transit space; as concerns passenger transport, the cost of transports, the time required, and the (non)comfort of the journey (Christaller 1966, p. 22).
- 19.
Of course, a more detailed analysis would be needed to support this hypothesis and see how strong is the relationship.
- 20.
Interviews by Déry in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017.
- 21.
Other varieties of better quality, like Arabica, can take five years or more before they become productive.
- 22.
Fieldwork Lucas (2012).
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Déry, S., Lucas, M., Boisclair, L. (2019). Agrarian and Urban Transitions in Lâm Đồng Province, Vietnam: Adaptation or Marginalisation for Ethnic Minorities?. In: Leimgruber, W., Chang, Cy. (eds) Rural Areas Between Regional Needs and Global Challenges. Perspectives on Geographical Marginality, vol 4. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04393-3_7
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