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“...HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies Volume 37 | Number 2 Article 9 December 2017 Aftershock: Reflections on the Politics of Reconstruction in Northern Gorkha Rune Bolding Bennike University of Copenhagen, runebennike@gmail.com Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya Recommended Citation Bennike, Rune Bolding (2017) "Aftershock: Reflections on the Politics of Reconstruction in Northern Gorkha," HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies: Vol. 37 : No. 2, Article 9. Available at: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya/vol37/iss2/9 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution- Macalester College Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License. This Perspectives is brought to you for free and open access by the DigitalCommons(2)Macalester College at DigitalCommons(2)Macalester College. It has been accepted for inclusion in HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association...”
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“...Aftershock: Reflections on the Politics of Reconstruction in Northern Gorkha Acknowledgements The author would like to thank Geoff Childs and colleagues at the Rule and Rupture Research Program as well as one anonymous reviewer for incisive comments to drafts of the article. Research for the article was supported by the European Research Council. This perspectives is available in HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies: http:/ / digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya/vol37/iss2/9...”
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“...Aftershock: Reflections on the Politics of Reconstruction in Northern Gorkha Rune Bennike Many commentators have described the aftermath of the 2015 earthquake in Nepal either (1) through the notion that 'nothing is going on' in regards to post- quake reconstruction; or (2) through a celebration of grassroots resilience and urban entrepreneurship in the face of disaster and state neglect. In this article, I draw on observations from Kutang and Nubri in the mountains of northern Gorkha District to argue that neither of these descriptions is fully accurate. Even in this remote and inaccessible area, much was being done in the aftermath of disaster, and a great deal of this activity diverges, in multiple ways, from the notions of spontaneous egalitarianism that are often associated with 'resilience' I describe the fraught politics involved in distributing relief aid in a village where the local government has been non-existent for years; the active positioning of new political players on the...”
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“...around the government in relief and reconstruction (Nelson 2015; Leve 2015; Sander et al. 2015; Tamang 2015). Despite these sensitivities, parts of the debate seemed distinctly at odds with what I was seeing take place in northern Gorkha. One of the things I found most strik- ing was the persistent narrative that nothing, really, was going on in Nepal in terms of reconstruction. For instance, at the South Asia Conference at the University of Wisconsin—Madison in October 2015 participants in a roundtable discussion on the earthquake kept repeat- ing the same laments that were prevalent in Nepali and international news media that none of the over $4 billion that international donors pledged to the Nepali state for post-earthquake reconstruction had yet been distrib- uted. While this was certainly true at the time and highly problematic, many people seemed to equate this inactivity on the side of formal, state-led reconstruction with a total lack of reconstruction. Due to the very tangible, infrastruc-...”
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“...position. The aftershock, in other words, shakes things up in ways that cannot be adequately articulated through mainstream notions of disaster assessments, reconstruction or compensation. A Note on Positionality My starting point for writing this article is personal. It had never crossed my mind that I would, suddenly, be reflecting on disaster and doing research on post-disas- ter transformation. But I was in Kathmandu when the earthquake hit. The stories that I tell in this article stem from my experience of post-disaster from this highly-en- gaged position. Like many others, it took me a few days to get my bearings, as I was thoroughly shaken and scared, like everyone else. I needed to figure out what had hap- pened and what was going on. Once my fears subsided, I contacted some friends from my ongoing research on tourism development in northern Gorkha. They were in Kathmandu, and were already in full swing, calling friends and relatives. In some places phone connections were gone, in...”
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“...1 have been back twice: for a two-week visit in January 2016 and a six-week stay in November-December 2016. These visits have been enlightening for the glimpses they have given me of the aftershock as a continuously unfolding reality. In January 2015, Nepal’s new contentious constitution was passed, and the country was still in the grip of the fuel blockade that followed its promulgation. In November and December of 2015 public debate was filled with discussions about 'tin lakh1—the Nepal Reconstruction Authority’s promise to provide Nrs. 300,000 to each household whose house was fully damaged during the earthquake. Each visit gave me a new perspective on what the aftershock of disaster means. In my mind, however, the aftershock remains confusing. I feel that what I’m writing now might be countered, again, in a month or two; that the aftershock continues its churning that creates new forms of political potentiality past the present moment of stocktaking. Thus, what I write here is more a...”
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“...Figure 1. House under reconstruction shortly after the first major earthquake. (Bennike, 2015) trail that provides the lifeline to the area had been broken. Foods usually brought from the bazaar in Arughat, which is a three-day walk downstream, were in short supply. For a while, people had stores of local foods (e.g. corn, barley, millet, potatoes) on which to survive, but their stocks of rice, lentils, salt, tea, and milk powder were quickly depleted. Everything coming into the area had to be trans- ported by helicopter, a process that was both costly and inefficient. Hence, the priority for people in the area was not the usual relief materials, but was in fact the reopening of the trail. The distribution of the relief materials that did trickle into Bihi, loaded into small helicopters was a complicated political affair. With local elections suspended for almost two decades, no formally legitimate local bodies existed to which to turn. In this vacuum, a local leader and former VDC head...”
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“...For a while, it looked like this would be the consequence, but by November 2016, the old trail was back in use. To the relief of local small-scale tourism businesses, trekkers and locals alike seemed to have deemed the safe, high trail too cumbersome to use. Reconstruction: Opportunities for Good Work The emotive language of suffering, aid, and rehabil- itation is generally difficult to argue with head on: what could be wrong with ‘good work’? (Simpson 2013: 266) The earthquake created new opportunities for fundraising and opened up peripheral areas, such as northern Gorkha, to a host of new organizations and an increased influx of resources. Following the initial focus on logistics and relief, the emphasis shifted to reconstruction. While the govern- 60 HIMALAYA Fall2017...”
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“...been erected just after the earthquake so that this part of the river valley was also, now, connected to the outside world via cheap and accessible mobile phones. Many of these development projects had been planned well before the earthquake, but had suddenly been accomplished in the rush of reconstruction work after the earthquake. Furthermore, villagers themselves had pri- vately chosen to utilize some of the cash distributed after the earthquake to fly CGI sheets for roofing and toilets in by helicopter and some were planning to spend the expected government reconstruction funds to build small ‘home-stay’ houses for future tourist. The aftershock also reverberated in local politics. One villager, rumored to have been associated with the heavy- handed rule of the past, had emerged as the de-facto leader of development initiatives in the village. He told me how Bihi used to be regarded as a bad, less developed place compared to most other villages in the area. Now, it was going to be different...”
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“...destination, destined to become the ‘next Annapurna.’ Nonetheless, locals currently seem hesitant. In 2015, a total of 2,414 international trekkers visited the area, down from 5,918 the year before. Will the numbers go up again? Furthermore, while infrastructural development—roads and dams—were a cornerstone of Nepali developmental imaginaries even before the earth- quake, the aftershock has, if anything, reinforced this focus. However, as illustrated by recent years’ develop- ments in Annapurna, the extension of road networks deep into and across the Himalayan range can run counter to the promotion of eco-nature and trekking tourism. In the meantime, the young people who are currently working well-paid jobs in the reconstruction industry may be out of work soon again, when the funds dry up and the spotlight moves elsewhere. What will be their position when this happens? 62 HIMALAYA Fall2017...”
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“... Day. Himal Southasian. Bennike, Rune Bolding. 2015b. Textbook Difference: Spatial History and National Education in Panchayat and Present- day Nepal. Indian Economic and Social History Review 52 (1): 53-78. Bista, Dor Bahadur. 1991. Fatalism and Development: Nepal’s Struggle for Modernization. Madras: Sangam Books Ltd. Childs, Geoff H. 2004. Tibetan diary :from birth to death and beyond in a Himalayan valley of Nepal. Berkeley: University of California Press. Cohen, Charles, and Eric Werker. 2008. The Political Economy of “Natural” Disasters. In Working Paper: Harvard Business School. Dixit, Kunda. 2015. Operation Mountain Express. Nepali Times, 19-25 June. Fujikura, Tatsuro. 2001. Discourses of Awareness: Notes for a Criticism of Development in Nepal. Studies in Nepali History and Society 6 (2): 271-313. GoN. 2009. Tourism Vision 2020. Kathmandu: Government of Nepal, Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation. GoN. 2010. Nepal Trade Integration Strategy 2010. Kathmandu: Ministry of Commerce...”
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“...Toward a broader understanding of macroeconomic risk and resilience. Climate Risk Management 3: 39-54. Nelson, Andrew. 2015. Classquake: What the global media missed in Nepal earthquake coverage, accessed 8 March. . Pigg, Stacy Leigh. 1992. Inventing Social Categories through Place: Social Representations and Development in Nepal. Comparative Studies in Society and History 34 (3): 491-513. Pigg, Stacy Leigh. 1993. Unintended Consequences: The Ideological Impact of Development in Nepal. South Asia Bulletin 13 (1 & 2): 45-58. Sander, Catherine, Kimber Haddix McKay, Angjuk Lama, and Pralhad Dhakal. 2015. Pro-Government’ Is Not ‘Pro- Corruption’ in the Aftermath of the Nepal Earthquakes. Anthropology News 56 (6). Simpson, Edward. 2013. The political biography of an earthquake: aftermath and amnesia in Gujarat, India. London: Hurst. Simpson, Edward, and Michele Serafini. 2015. The Neoliberal...”