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ABSTRACT
The 2015 earthquakes in Nepal killed more than 9,000 people, displaced millions of people and deeply affected the economy. The earthquakes and reconstructions processes also transformed Nepal into a complex terrain of geoeconomic accumulation and geopolitical manoeuvring, including major international capital flows, the promulgation of a new constitution, an economic blockade by India and the expansion of trade corridors with China. Building on critiques of ‘disaster capitalism’, we propose and mobilize the concept of ‘geo-logics of power’ to draw further attention to the materialities of geopolitical and geoeconomic processes shaping reconstruction in post-earthquake Nepal. Focusing on two trans-Himalayan corridors connecting Nepal and China, we argue that the Nepal experienced a particular form of disaster capitalism: one in which the geo-logics of power – including trans-Himalayan discourses, practices, and materialities – came to shape political and economic transformations of a country long portrayed as a ‘buffer’ state between Indian and China. More broadly, we suggest that geo-logics of power result from a combination of geopolitical and geoeconomic power dynamics informed by geological formations and associated socio-natural processes.
Notes
1. There is a growing literature on materialities and infrastructure, notably emphasizing the ‘role of material infrastructures in constituting governmental power’ (Schouten Citation2013, 553), or the process of materialization of infrastructure that follows political processes such as securitization (Aradau Citation2010).
2. Van Schendel’s concept of zomia in particular emphasizes the relative commonality within trans-Himalayan regions at the margin of strong states and can provide an important insight on the manifestation of geo-logics of power in the Himalayan materialities.
3. The industrial development programmes were initiated by the state in Nepal since the 1960s, informed by the then growing idea of state-led industrialization and import substitution economies. Dozens of industrial zones were created throughout the country. In some cases, the technical as well as financial support was sought from foreign countries such as China, USSR, the United States and India (Seddon Citation1987).
4. Several issues were openly or tacitly motivating the Indian government’s blockade, including the Terai as one province (thereby facilitating negotiations with a single province and – in the perspective of Nationalist Nepali – offering a proxy province supporting Indian interests within Nepal), provisions of top political posts available to naturalized citizen originally from India and easier control of water flows from Nepal to India.
5. Delivery was to take place in Kyirong/Kerung city in Tibet Autonomous Region. http://admin.myrepublica.com/feature-article/story/30353/12-tankers-leave-for-kerung-to-receive-chinese-grant-fuel.html.
7. Interview with Indian embassy official in charge of reconstruction, 21 December 2017.
8. http://dol.gov.np/site/monthlyreport (accessed on Sept 15 2018).
11. Chinese President’s speech on BRI http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2017-05/14/c_136282982.htm.
12. Yubaraj Shangraula, Dean of Law School, BRI Conference, 21 December 2017.
14. Dan Hirslund and Prem Phyak, Cementocracy. Kathmandy Post, 18 December 2017. http://kathmandupost.ekantipur.com/news/2017-12-18/cementocracy.html.
16. Interviews in Timure, Rasuwa district, December 2017.