The Role of Law in Shaping Resettled Identity: A Case Study of the Three Gorges Project
(2025) SOLM02 20251Department of Sociology of Law
- Abstract
- For those who experience development-induced displacement and involuntary resettlement, they have to confront a range of adverse consequences, including the impoverishment risks, lifestyle and livelihood changes, and the precarity brought by asymmetrical power relations. Based on a case study of the Three Gorges Project (TGP), this research investigates the role of state law in shaping the identity of involuntarily resettled people. Drawing on Foucauldian concepts and the discourse theory of Laclau and Mouffe, the study analyzes how historical narratives, official discourses, and migrant accounts rooted in lived experience construct, stabilize, and transform the resettled identity. Particular attention is given to how the legal... (More)
- For those who experience development-induced displacement and involuntary resettlement, they have to confront a range of adverse consequences, including the impoverishment risks, lifestyle and livelihood changes, and the precarity brought by asymmetrical power relations. Based on a case study of the Three Gorges Project (TGP), this research investigates the role of state law in shaping the identity of involuntarily resettled people. Drawing on Foucauldian concepts and the discourse theory of Laclau and Mouffe, the study analyzes how historical narratives, official discourses, and migrant accounts rooted in lived experience construct, stabilize, and transform the resettled identity. Particular attention is given to how the legal articulation of the resettled identity becomes a site of discursive struggles. The analysis employs the framework of social, political, and fantasmatic logics proposed by Glynos and Howarth to interpret the underlying social practices.
This study argues that the principle of “developmental resettlement” in legal discourse is a historically contingent construction of resettled identity, one that works to obscure the failures of past resettlement efforts through a developmental fantasy. Under a top-down managerial logic, dam construction has been prioritized over just and adequate resettlement. This leaves migrants in a structurally subordinate position, burdening them disproportionately within an imbalanced power structure. While the law offers limited avenues for migrants to resist and challenge the imposed identity, it has largely served as a discretionary tool, a source of legality, and a mechanism of suppression in governmental practices at the central and local levels. Ultimately, this study advances the literature on TGP resettlement by highlighting how identity formation among displaced populations is deeply embedded in power relations. By adopting a socio-legal lens, it further sheds light on the multidimensional role of law in an authoritarian governance context, demonstrating how legal discourse simultaneously enables, legitimizes, and constrains practices of control. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9192790
- author
- Chai, Jingyi LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- SOLM02 20251
- year
- 2025
- type
- H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
- subject
- keywords
- Three Gorges Project, China, involuntary resettlement, law, discourse, identity
- language
- English
- id
- 9192790
- date added to LUP
- 2025-06-23 09:27:21
- date last changed
- 2025-06-23 09:27:21
@misc{9192790,
abstract = {{For those who experience development-induced displacement and involuntary resettlement, they have to confront a range of adverse consequences, including the impoverishment risks, lifestyle and livelihood changes, and the precarity brought by asymmetrical power relations. Based on a case study of the Three Gorges Project (TGP), this research investigates the role of state law in shaping the identity of involuntarily resettled people. Drawing on Foucauldian concepts and the discourse theory of Laclau and Mouffe, the study analyzes how historical narratives, official discourses, and migrant accounts rooted in lived experience construct, stabilize, and transform the resettled identity. Particular attention is given to how the legal articulation of the resettled identity becomes a site of discursive struggles. The analysis employs the framework of social, political, and fantasmatic logics proposed by Glynos and Howarth to interpret the underlying social practices.
This study argues that the principle of “developmental resettlement” in legal discourse is a historically contingent construction of resettled identity, one that works to obscure the failures of past resettlement efforts through a developmental fantasy. Under a top-down managerial logic, dam construction has been prioritized over just and adequate resettlement. This leaves migrants in a structurally subordinate position, burdening them disproportionately within an imbalanced power structure. While the law offers limited avenues for migrants to resist and challenge the imposed identity, it has largely served as a discretionary tool, a source of legality, and a mechanism of suppression in governmental practices at the central and local levels. Ultimately, this study advances the literature on TGP resettlement by highlighting how identity formation among displaced populations is deeply embedded in power relations. By adopting a socio-legal lens, it further sheds light on the multidimensional role of law in an authoritarian governance context, demonstrating how legal discourse simultaneously enables, legitimizes, and constrains practices of control.}},
author = {{Chai, Jingyi}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{The Role of Law in Shaping Resettled Identity: A Case Study of the Three Gorges Project}},
year = {{2025}},
}