Dams and Development in China

A succinct and very useful introduction.

Andrew Mertha:
An ambitious book on the complexities inherent in China's quest for cleaner sources of energy and power through the development of hydropower—and its effects.... It should be read by students, scholars, and policy analysts as they wrestle with the complexities and contradictions China faces in the development versus conservation conundrum.

Richard Louis Edmonds:
A good book for a course related to cultural geography and anthropological themes of development.

Sinead Ferris:
A practical look at some of the most interesting challenges of our time.

Emily Yeh, University of Colorado at Boulder:
Dams and Development is a highly readable and wide-ranging account of hydropower development in China, providing insights on topics ranging from the relationship between state capitalism and the building of dams, to new data on the effects of resettlement on livelihoods, attitudes and social networks, his reflections as an anthropologist on bringing together different epistemologies of expertise in a large, interdisciplinary project on hydropower decision-making, and information on China's new dam construction overseas. Carefully avoiding black and white characterizations, Tilt instead explores water management as a struggle over competing values among groups and differential access to resources and power. Dams and Development is a welcome addition to the anthropological literature on China's environment, and will be excellent for classroom use.

Brian Richter, director of Global Freshwater Strategies, The Nature Conservancy:
With the clear-eyed objectivity and inquisitive mind of an anthropologist, Tilt explores the prospects for reshaping the political economy of Chinese dam building—where planning has for too long been dominated by a 'dictatorship of engineers'—by infusing a moral economy in which culture, heritage, equity, and natural ecosystems are given due consideration. With more than 2,000 dams being built in China each year, a transformation of dam development is urgently needed.