Negotiating Territorial Restructuring in Chinese Borderland Margins: The Viewpoints of Residents of Nujiang, Yunnan

ABSTRACT: This article focuses on the study of Chinese territorial dynamics produced by the relation between government actors and residents of a southwestern borderland margin. As state policies aim to further integrate remote borderland margins to national territory through modernisation or poverty alleviation development projects, residents live through fast-paced territorial restructuring that bears the risk of social conflicts. To explore the construction of borderland margins as territories, this article studies power relations emerging from integration policies. It draws on a geopolitical approach focused on the study of local protests. From the case study of the Nujiang River Valley (Yunnan), it finds that resident agency to protest can result in the adaptation of government-led territory building. KEYWORDS: borderland, China, geopolitics, margin, protests, resident, territorial restructuring, spatial planning, territory, Yunnan.