Man and Nature in China: Gender, Natural Resources Management and the Chinese State in an Inner Mongolia Village

The process of China's rural modernization over the past half-century was punctuated by an ambitious attempt to transform the natural environment. "Wars against nature" were long a nationwide characteristic in rural China during the collective period. After decollectivization, rather than being reversed, overexploitation of nature intensified due to rapid economic development and increased inequality. Meanwhile, the rhetoric of "man can conquer nature" was replaced by "rehabilitate beautiful landscapes," seeming to embody a shifting conceptualization of people's relationship to nature. In the background of the twin campaigns of "war against nature" and "rebuilding beautiful landscapes," this dissertation provides a first-hand understanding of natural resource management and environment changes from a gender perspective in the context of larger economic and ecological transformations in a peasant community in Inner Mongolia over the past five decades. It examines how village men and women managed, viewed, and negotiated environmental resources in their everyday lives along lines of wealth, ethnicity, age, marriage status, and livelihood.