Juliet Lu

Juliet Lu
Cornell University | CU · Department of Development Sociology

Doctor of Philosophy

About

18
Publications
4,834
Reads
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287
Citations
Introduction
I am a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Cornell University Atkinson Center for Sustainability in the Department of Global Development (formerly the Department of Development Sociology). I am a political ecologist and China scholar, and I focus on Chinese overseas land investments, Chinese approaches to sustainable development and foreign aid, and the engagement of Chinese firms in transnational sustainable value chain initiatives.
Additional affiliations
January 2018 - May 2018
University of California, Berkeley
Position
  • Instructor
Description
  • Political Ecology, ESPM 168
August 2015 - December 2015
University of California, Berkeley
Position
  • Instructor
Description
  • Political Ecology, ESPM 168

Publications

Publications (18)
Article
Full-text available
In this paper, we examine the extensive use of bans (temporary prohibitions or moratoriums) on resource exploitation activities by the government of Laos as an authoritarian environmental governance tool. We focus on bans enacted recently in three sectors: on the granting of land concessions in 2012, on the expansion of banana plantations in 2014,...
Article
The expansion of commercial agriculture is one of the primary drivers of livelihood and land-use changes in the world. Globalisation and other factors have intensified this expansion to the point where booms in single cash crops overtake entire regions before going bust, a pattern that is particularly pervasive in resource frontiers. Using case stu...
Article
Despite decades of efforts to curb the global supply of illicit drugs and significant shifts in how those efforts are designed and implemented, illicit crop cultivation persists. In this paper, we examine state and international development efforts to eradicate coca in Peru, opium poppies in Laos, and cannabis in California, USA and the ever-changi...
Article
Full-text available
Chinese state firms are expected not only to profit but also to serve state interests. But the Chinese state is fragmented: border provinces are taking on an expanded role in China's global expansion and a broad range of firm activities could be defined as patriotic contributions. Through the case of Yunnan State Farms (YSF), a province-level state...
Article
Full-text available
Human geographers investigating socio-environmental change in resource frontiers often encounter illicit activities occurring alongside the licit processes they study. These encounters pose logistical challenges to conducting research and moral and analytical dilemmas for researchers. Illicit activities produce what we refer to as spheres of ambigu...
Book
Full-text available
Presents key results of the integrated analysis of the 2017 national land concession inventory (LCI), assessment of quality of investment (QI), and other national socio-economic and environmental datasets in Lao PDR. The analysis reveals key characteristics, trends, and contexts of land leases and concessions in Lao PDR as well as their impacts on...
Article
Mainstream portrayals of Chinese overseas land investments tend to treat Chinese capital as monolithic, synonymous with the Chinese state, and extracting resources from other countries unhindered. These portrayals flatten host country landscapes where investment occurs, obscure the embeddedness and diversity of Chinese investors, and ignore the spa...
Technical Report
Full-text available
This report explores rubber plantation value chains in Laos - considering issues of land, labour, latex and wood production.
Technical Report
Full-text available
Studies on rubber (Hevea brasiliensis) in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Lao PDR, Laos) have largely focussed on land allocation and relations between the Lao State, investors, and Lao rubber farmers. The history and international context, and some environmental and social impacts have been investigated to a lesser extent, and there are no c...
Cover Page
Full-text available
Ordered lines of rubber that tower over a red, dirt road. Rolling hills of maize that locals have dubbed ‘bald mountains’ as far as the eye can see. Valleys and foothills blanketed with banana, cassava, and watermelon fields. These images characterise the changing rural landscapes of mainland Southeast Asia, where a mosaic of rice, upland gardens,...
Book
Full-text available
This atlas of agriculture presents a comprehensive spatial analysis of the agricultural activities and production patterns in the Lao PDR in 2011, and the respective changes during the first decade of the 21st Century. It presents the household-based statistics of the country’s last Census of Agriculture (LCA) of 2011 at the village level, and the...
Article
In land grab narratives, foreign investors are portrayed as predatory resource grabbers and host states as weak victims or colluders. But foreign land investments are often forged through fragmented relations of state power which investors struggle to navigate. For example, over the last decade, Chinese companies have been granted contracts to deve...
Article
Despite centuries of state-directed eradication efforts, opium cultivation persists in northern Laos and Myanmar. The most recent of these efforts is China’s Opium Replacement Program (ORP). Like other illicit crop substitution programmes, the ORP seeks to provide opium cultivators with licit livelihood alternatives. Unlike other programmes, it doe...
Article
Southwest China’s Yunnan province has been affected throughout history by climate-induced water stresses, with the 2009 drought as a recent example. To deal with such stresses, mountain farmers have developed many local coping strategies. This paper provides case studies of these coping mechanisms in three mountain communities in Baoshan Municipali...

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