Fields of Desire: Poverty and Policy in Laos

Acknowledgements

ix Acknowledgements I have dedicated this book to all the people who have contributed to, encouraged and facilitated its research and writing. I am confident that those people know who they are. It would be tedious in some cases, a breach of confidentiality in others, and perhaps impossible anyway to list each and every one and detail their good deeds. Let me just say that even the smallest of kind words and good advice has had the greatest of impacts. That said, I do not want to forgo writing a more traditional acknowledgements section altogether, in part because I always find acknowledgements so fascinating to read. This is one of the rare instances where authors who might usually be stuffy allow themselves to mention the conviviality of intellectual friendships and the profound sense of enduring gratitude to field informants, where writers who might usually present smooth and authoritative accounts allow themselves to thank chance encounters and unruly networks of colleagues . This is so precious for our record of how knowledge is produced. With this in mind, what I will present below is an account of the non-linear path this manuscript took from its conception to final rendition. I cannot mention everyone here who helped along the way, but I hope that by tracing this path readers will get a sense of just how deep, and how diffuse, this book’s intellectual debts are. The original research for this book was completed as part of my PhD training at The Australian National University, The Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Anthropology Programme and was supported by an Australian Postgraduate Award and fieldwork funds from the Anthropology Programme. My main supervisor was Andrew Walker and other members of my supervisory team included Francesca Merlan, Alan Rumsey and Philip Taylor. It was a line-up of very smart, very conscientious anthropologists. The programme was lively and challenging: I could not have asked for more. I also completed my undergraduate studies at ANU: Ian Keen and Chris Gregory particularly deserve my thanks. The first year of PhD studies was completed at The University of Sydney under the supervision of Peter Hinton. He was an incredibly supportive supervisor, and it was only due to his illness that I later moved to ANU. It was under Peter’s guidance that I completed my pre-fieldwork trip to Laos in 2000 and chose what was to be the area of my study: Sii Phan Don. During that year I also commenced learning Thai with Aacaan Nilawan at The University of Sydney, and she facilitated my enrolment in a summer course at Salaya University, Thailand. In 2001 I suspended my enrolment at Sydney pending transfer to the ANU and arrangement of my research permisions from the Government of Laos. I spent the year living in Vientiane. Denley Pike and the team at Vientiane College must be acknowledged here for providing me with gainful employment and a stimulating intellectual environment in Vientiane. I tried numerous strategies to obtain research permission , determined that my research should be “above board” and legal. After many disappointments, it was with great relief that I met Mr Khamphat Phetlasy of the External Affairs Division of The Ministry of Education. He instructed me on how to submit an application. This was reviewed in 2001 and approved in early 2002. While I waited for this application to be processed (12 months), I continued language learning in Vientiane with private teachers, again arranged by the Ministry of Education. I would like to thank the Ministry staff for their professional and friendly assistance in all these matters. With news that my permissions had been approved, I returned to Australia to transfer my PhD candidature to the ANU, apply for research funds, and present my pre-fieldwork seminar to the Anthropology Programme , and improve my Lao further under the tuition of Adam Chapman. This was a busy three months that passed quickly in a very supportive new environment. By July, I was back in Laos, research permission letters in hand, and making my way through the Lao bureaucracy from Vientiane, to Pakse, to Mounlapamok, to Don Khiaw. At each step of the way, Ministry of Education staff accompanied me and explained my research permission to the local authorities. This eased my entry to the field enormously. By late July, 2002, I found myself at last installed on the island of Don Khiaw. All the bureaucrats who had delivered me there went back to their...