Plural Ecologies in Southeast Asia Hierarchies, Conflicts, and Coexistence

This book draws on ethnographic studies in Southeast Asia to provide new insights into human–environmental relationships and ecologies, together with a set of theoretical innovations. Contextualizing ecologies in this region as pluralizing or hegemonic, conflictive or cooperative, the case studies in these chapters bring into dialogue ontological approaches, the issue of distinct worldviews and concepts of nature on the one hand and political ecology and power relations on the other. They discuss plural ecologies in diverse settings, reaching from urban Vietnam to the Javanese coast and the dense forests of the Southeast Asian highlands. Southeast Asia is one of the most biodiverse and culturally diverse regions in the world. Thus, what occurs in this region is vitally important to the future of Earth. Documenting the plurality and dynamics of ecologies in Southeast Asia, this book provides prime examples for the potentials of alternative human–environmental relationships and sustainable development. It will be of interest to academics studying political ecology, environmental anthropology, sustainability sciences, political sciences, development studies, human geography, human ecology, Southeast Asian studies, and Asian studies.

Chapter 1. Introduction. Plural Ecologies: Beyond ontology and political ecology in Southeast Asia, Guido Sprenger, Michaela Haug, Kristina Großmann, Timo Duile; Chapter 2. Ontologies of possibility: Future-oriented indeterminacy in Southeast Asian animism, Guido Sprenger; Chapter 3. Conflicting ways of dealing with invisible human-like beings: Including – Neglecting – Ignoring, Susanne Rodemeier; Chapter 4. Home of spirits and loggers: Plural perspectives on the forest in Indonesian Borneo, Michaela Haug; Chapter 5. Animism and indigenous movements in Indonesia, Timo Duile; Chapter 6. Negotiating plural ecologies of adat land in Indonesia, Kristina Großmann; Chapter 7. Ecological disturbances: Negotiating indigeneity and access to land in Indonesia, Birgit Bräuchler; Chapter 8. Entrepreneurial ecologies in a Javanese fishery, Katharina Schneider; Chapter 9. The reinvention of moral ecologies in Indonesia, Thomas Reuter; Chapter 10. "Talking" trees: Urban ecologies in late socialist Hanoi, Gertrud Hüwelmeier; Chapter 11. A positive other? Comprehending the hope in animism’s overcoming the capitalist socio-ecological crisis, Michael Kleinod

Timo Duile is a researcher at the Department of Southeast Asian Studies, University of Bonn, Germany. Kristina Großmann is a professor at the Department of Southeast Asian Studies, University of Bonn, Germany. Michaela Haug is a substitute professor at the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Freiburg, Germany. Guido Sprenger is a professor at the Institute of Anthropology, Heidelberg University, Germany.