Environment and Resettlement Politics in China

The Three Gorges Project

Gørild Heggelund

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN: 9781351939768
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Physical Sciences
• Subtopic: Geography
• Index: Geography

The Three Gorges dam, currently being constructed on the Yantgze River in China, is controversial both inside and outside China, particularly because of the large number of people to be resettled (officially 1.2 million) and the environmental impacts. Using material previously unavailable in any Western language, it analyses the Chinese discussions over policy-making for the resettlement process and impacts. It concludes that the environment and resettlement policies have been linked in a new way in this project. However, despite these positive developments, it argues that the social impacts from resettlement have not yet reached a high level of political attention and that the Chinese authorities need to acknowledge that resettlement has social costs. The book provides an understanding of the social, political and economic factors of one of the largest and most controversial development projects currently being implemented. It also sheds light on China's policy-making procedures and political priorities over the past decade.

Chapter 1
Introduction

The topic of the book is the Three Gorges dam project (Sanxia gongcheng),¹ which is currently being constructed on the Yangtze River in China. Few dams in the world are as well known. The controversy surrounding the project has contributed to international campaigns against the dam as well as articles and books about the project both inside and outside China. This book attempts to contribute to increased knowledge and understanding of the Chinese domestic resettlement and environment issues related to the dam, and portrays the official policymaking for these issues as well as the academic discourse in China.

Background

The National People's Congress approved the dam project in 1992. Construction of the dam began in 1994, and its completion is scheduled in 2009. The project was approved after decades of debate among bureaucrats, scientists and journalists. The Three Gorges dam is part of China's development and modernisation efforts. The purpose of the Three Gorges project is electricity production, flood control, and improved navigational facilities, which may be beneficial for the population living in the areas surrounding the Yangtze River. Nevertheless, the dam is not perceived by everyone as a symbol of national development, and arguments against constructing the dam have been numerous. Opponents state that the perceived benefits will not materialise, and the negative impact may be greater than anticipated. One of the issues of contention is the main topic of this book: the resettlement issue. The Three Gorges project will displace approximately 1.13-1.2 million people according to Chinese official figures.² Reservoir resettlement involving such a large number of people is unprecedented in China, as well as in the world. Furthermore, the official figure is disputed by opponents of the project, who believe that the number of people to be resettled is much higher (1.4 to almost 2 million).³ In addition, there are potential socio-economic problems that are associated with the resettling of such a large population. The opposition is also related to the mixed previous experience with dam resettlement in China, where many of the resettled people still live in poverty. Moreover, while Chinese experts and officials anticipate that the Three Gorges dam and resettlement will have a certain environmental impact on the area, they disagree on the scale of the impact. The dam itself may influence the area in a number of ways, and water pollution is expected to increase when the fast-flowing river becomes a reservoir. Likewise, the resettlement of the large population is expected to have great impact on the environment in the reservoir area, i.e. the region that is affected by the reservoir, and aggravate the existing environmental problems.⁴ The Three Gorges reservoir area has a fragile eco-system, as it is densely populated and agricultural practices have created serious erosion problems. The environment issue and environmental policymaking will receive special attention in the book due to its close link to the resettlement issue.

Objectives of the Book

The book focuses on the three following objectives: the dynamics in the decision-making process seen in relation to the changes in Chinese society, the Chinese discussion about the resettlement and environment issues and the validity of the analytical approach used. These three are all interrelated and to some extent overlapping, as they concern the changes in Chinese society and how these have affected the resettlement policymaking for the project.

Dynamics in the Decision-making Process in Light of Changes in the Chinese Society

The book aims to analyse the decision-making process for the resettlement of the Three Gorges dam project, and will link the development of the Three Gorges project with developments in the Chinese society at large. Chinese society is undergoing rapid change, including changes in decision-making. The book will shed light on how these changes may have influenced the resettlement policymaking for the Three Gorges project. The major players in the policymaking process will be introduced, and their role in the process discussed. The discussion within China about the resettlement policy involves mainly the leadership,⁵ bureaucracy, some intellectuals, scientists and the media, and is not a grassroots debate. Thus, understanding the politics and bureaucracy for the project and the interaction between these actors is necessary, as well as gaining knowledge of the relations within the Three Gorges project bureaucracy and their impact on the resettlement policy. Numerous studies have focused on actual environmental problems in China, and research of the implementation of environmental policy in China has been carried out.⁶ Fewer studies concern the relationship between resettlement and environmental policymaking. By analysing the resettlement and environmental policymaking for the dam project in relation to the developments that have taken place in China in general, this study will contribute to increased insight and understanding of the resettlement and environmental policymaking in China.

The Chinese Discussion

The Chinese Three Gorges resettlement discussion is not well known outside China, although there is great interest and concern for the dam project in a number of countries. A goal of the book is therefore to shed light upon the Chinese resettlement perspectives for this dam project. It is important to let the Chinese discussion on the resettlement issue come to the fore, as the discussion outside of China is mainly dominated by Western⁷/non-Chinese perspectives. Furthermore, the social and economic costs of the resettlement issue are beginning to receive increased attention in China, which makes a study of these issues relevant. Chinese perspectives on resettlement are diverse, as in other countries, and the intention of this book is not to represent one voice in the discussion. Rather, it intends to shed light on as well as analyse the discourse about the Three Gorges resettlement in an unbiased fashion.

Little research is being carried out about the resettlement policymaking for the dam project, in particular in relation to the environment., In addition to a few longterm analyses for the dam project,⁸ the majority of the existing information about the dam includes articles that are published in Western journals and newspapers regarding the different aspects of the Three Gorges project at large, including the resettlement and environment issues. Reporting about the resettlement in relation to the dam project often focuses on specific isolated incidents or topics, and does not discuss policy developments. This may have to do with the nature of the articles, limited space in newspaper articles, or that specific focus has a certain news value. Few articles penetrate deeply into the political processes surrounding the Three Gorges dam, and few look at the diversified discussion that is going on in China. This book aims to provide insight into both official policy and unofficial viewpoints (scientific and others) in order to obtain a deeper understanding of the project's resettlement developments, as well as how these developments relate to the developments in Chinese society at large. It will also seek to identify measures that are being carried out by Chinese authorities, and the basis for these decisions. Moreover, views of the scientific world and the nature of the problems in the reservoir area in relation to the resettlement and the environment will be examined.

The Research Question: Why Resettlement Policy Change?

Before the Three Gorges dam was approved, trial resettlement had been going on for some years in order to find the best resettlement plan for the dam project. The trial resettlement was perceived as successful by Chinese authorities, and was the basis for the 'real' resettlement that was initiated following the approval of the dam in 1992. The final resettlement plan that was intended to guide the large-scale resettlement for the project stressed the reliance on agriculture for the rural population, as well as resettlement of the rural population in the vicinity of their old homes (jiudi houkao). In the first period following approval, the resettlement proceeded smoothly according to Chinese authorities. In 1998 the second phase (1998-2003) of the construction was initiated, during which a great challenge would be to resettle a large group of people in a short period. In May 1999, a departure from the original resettlement policy, i.e. policy change, was introduced, indicating that the process may have been less smooth than portrayed in the state media.

This book takes as its starting point the resettlement policy change that was introduced in May 1999, announced by Premier Zhu Rongji. The policy change itself is only the culmination of policymaking carried out behind the scenes; thus, the developments beforehand that made the change possible as well as those afterwards are the topics that make up the study. The resettlement policy change involves moving a large number of people completely out of the reservoir area that originally were intended to be resettled within the reservoir area. The stated reason for the policy change was the weak environmental and ecological condition in the area. Consequently, the environmental policymaking for the dam project receives much attention in this book, as it is directly linked to the resettlement change. The resettlement policy change mainly affects the rural population;⁹ the study therefore does not include the urban population.

Since Chinese authorities have given the impression that they prefer to resettle people within the reservoir area, why and how did the resettlement policy change take place? By studying the decision-making process for the resettlement policy, this book attempts to describe and explain the causes for policy change. Since the project was approved in 1992, important developments in Chinese society have appeared. It is necessary to link these general developments with the Three Gorges resettlement. Thus, the research question concerns the concrete policy change seen in relation to developments in the Three Gorges project as well as the dynamics in Chinese society at large. The developments over time may have made the resettlement policy change possible, and three possible explanatory factors for the policy change will be discussed in the book:

1. The environment—The stated reason for the resettlement policy change is the environmental degradation in the reservoir area, and the lack of capacity to settle the large population. In order to understand how the environment could become the decisive factor for the resettlement policy change, it is necessary to go through: a) China's environmental developments in general, and b) the specific environmental developments for the Three Gorges project.
2. The resettlement problems—A number of problems have emerged in the resettlement process. One assumption in this book is that these may have been important in bringing about the resettlement policy change, and examples from the resettlement implementation process are presented and discussed. In addition, a debate about the possible consequences for the resettled population as well as the environment has been going on in academic journals that have portrayed actual and potential problems. The actual and anticipated problems of the resettlement process will be discussed as possible factors for policy change.
3. A changing Chinese society—China is a changing society where information and science are increasingly important for decision-making. One assumption in this book is that this ongoing change has been important for the resettlement policy change, and that information from the academic world may have increasingly been taken into consideration. The book attempts to give an analysis of the factors in Chinese society that may have enabled the policy change, such as the change of leadership (the Premier and the Three Gorges leadership); the new leadership and the interaction with the state media; increased reliance upon think-tanks in decision-making; and the importance of diversified backgrounds of leaders.

Thus, one may say that the explanatory factors are on three different levels: the stated and immediate cause (the environment), the assumed and unsaid cause (the problems of implementing resettlement) and a slightly more indirect cause (developments of the Chinese society) that constitute the framework in which the decisions are made. These factors will be further introduced below, in relation to the chapters of the book.

Organisation of the Book

In order to give the reader some background to the very long debate about this dam project, the book will start, in Chapter 2, with an empirical introduction to the Three Gorges project. The chapter includes facts about the project, the purposes for constructing the dam, the history from the time it was introduced in 1919 until present, as well as the present status of the project. The long history of the project as well as the many attempts to have the project approved signify the complexity of the project, and its political significance is commented on in this chapter. This historical chapter gives the necessary background for the resettlement and environment discussion, as the chapter introduces the issues involved in the debate, the many attempts to launch the project, and a number of the actors and interest groups.

The analytical framework for the book is described in Chapter 3. The chapter begins with an introduction to three theoretical approaches that have been employed in studies of policymaking in general. It continues with an introduction to approaches that have been applied in studying policymaking in China. Finally, an introduction of the approach applied in this book is given, i.e. the fragmented authoritarianism approach. This approach assumes that decision-making in China involves building consensus among equal units, and in the process of reaching consensus, bargaining takes place. This approach has been applied on the Three Gorges project decision-making process more than a decade ago, and was an important tool to explain the ways of the Chinese bureaucracy before the dam was approved. It is therefore useful to apply this approach in the study of the resettlement policymaking, in order to assess its validity more than a decade later.

The following five chapters, 4-8, shed light on the resettlement policymaking and implementation and the environmental policymaking for the dam project.Chapter 4 is an introduction to China's general resettlement history and experience, and is intended as background for the discussion in the resettlement Chapter 5. It begins with an introduction to the international dam building debate in order to link the Three Gorges project to the international discussion. It continues with an introduction to the resettlement experience in China in general, and looks into the background for the development of the Three Gorges resettlement policy. The problematic resettlement history has prompted Chinese leaders to think of alternative methods for the Three Gorges project, and the new resettlement scheme for the Three Gorges project is also presented here.

Chapter 5 is an analysis of the resettlement policy change. It begins with the introduction of the resettlement policy change and why it is interesting to study the change. References will be made to implementation problem...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Maps, Figures and Tables
• Acknowledgements
• List of Abbreviations
• Glossary of Chinese Terms
• 1 Introduction
• 2 The Three Gorges Project: A Story of Development and Modernisation
• 3 Analytical Framework
• 4 Resettlement Experience in China
• 5 The Three Gorges Project Resettlement Policy Change: Implementation Challenges
• 6 China's Environmental Policymaking: Trends and Developments 1972-2001
• 7 The Three Gorges Project Environmental Developments—1972-2001: Linkage between Resettlement and Environment
• 8 China's Changing Shape of Decision-making and the Three Gorges Project: Interaction between Leadership, Knowledge and Media
• 9 Conclusions
• Bibliography
• Index