Material symbolism on Saigon's edge: The political-economic and symbolic transformation of hồ Chí Minh City's periurban zones

Pacific Affairs

Volumn 84, Issue 3, 2011, Pages 455-473

  Harms, Erik ^a  

^a YALE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

H Ch Minh City; Periurban; Saigon; Space; Vietnam

Indexed keywords

CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK; INFRASTRUCTURAL DEVELOPMENT; PERIURBAN AREA; POLITICAL ECONOMY; URBAN DEVELOPMENT; URBAN PLANNING;

HO CHI MINH CITY; VIET NAM;

EID: 80052705846     PISSN: 0030851X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.5509/2011843455     Document Type: Article

References (61)

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4. Erik Harms, Saigon's Edge: On the Margins of Ho Chi Minh City (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2011).
5. Many readers will likely harbour reservations towards the avowedly structuralist analysis of binary oppositions presented in this essay. Nevertheless, while recent social theory has productively moved away from attempts to understand the world in structuralist terms, my informants in Hồ Chí Minh City consistently referred to the opposition between inner-city and outer-city spaces in decidedly binary terms. Their categorization of city space into the opposition between inside and outside was and remains unmistakable and omnipresent. Instead of discarding their own explanations as false or overly simplifying binaries, this essay takes their explanations seriously, trying to understand the dynamism inherent within what appear at first glance to be inflexible categories. This essay should also be understood as one form of analysis among many, and readers interested in a more ethnographic approach should consult the monograph cited in the preceding note.
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21. Hùynh Kim Khánh, Vietnamese Communism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982), 103.
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23. Hồ Hanh, {Eth}̂̀ Hóc Môn: {Eth}̂̀ phòng giá ao [Hóc Môn land: Precautions to prevent illusions about prices], Vit Báo, 7 March 2002.
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26. Cu·c Tĥ́ng Kê Thành Pĥ́ Hồ Chí Minh [Ho Chi Minh City Statistical Office], Ŝ́ liê{dot Below}u kinh tế xã hồi 2008 [2008 Socio-economic Data], (2009).
27. The 2008 exchange rate was approximately 16,000 d{stroke}̂̀ng to the US dollar. 924,570 d{stroke}̂̀ng equals nearly 58 dollars 1,739,580 d{stroke}̂̀ng equals nearly 109 dollars, 1,248,900 d{stroke}̂̀ng equals just over 78 dollars, and 2,632,100 d{stroke}̂̀ng equals nearly 165 dollars.
28. H.{Eth}. and T.A., Không thê{hook Below} tie}̂́p tu·c quan lý ÿô thi nhu quan lý các làng, xã [cannot continue administering urban areas in the same way of administering villages and communes], Tuối Tre{hook above}, 27 July 1995.
29. Paraphrased in David Marr, A Brief History of Local Government in Vietnam, in Beyond Hanoi: Local Government in Vietnam, eds. Benedict J. Tria Kerkvliet and David G. Marr (Singapore: ISEAS, 2004), 48-49.
30. Hãn Nguyên Nguyễn Nhã, Các biê·n pháp giáo dô minh thi· viê·t tác phong vǎn minh ÿô thi tai viê·t Nam [Concrete educational procedures for the urban lifestyle in Viet Nam], in Hô·i tha{hook above}ao quố: Phát trin ÿô thi bền vũng, vai trò cũa nghiên cúu và giáo duc (Thành Phồ Hồ Chí Minh: 1999)
31. Lê Nhu Hoa, Qua{hook below}n Lý Vǎn Hoá {Eth}ô Thi Trong Kiê·n Cong Nghiê·p Hoá Hiê·n Hoá Nuóc [Managing Urban Culture in the Circumstances of Industrializing and Modernizing the Nation] (Hà Nô·: Viê·n Vǎn Hoá và Nhà Xuât Ban Vǎn Hoá - Thông Tin, 2001)
32. Trân Hồng Vân, Tác di cu xã hồi cua di cu tu do vào Thành Phố Hồ Chí Minh trong thòi kŷ Mềi [The Social Impact of Spontaneous Migration into Ho Chi Minh City During the Doi Moi Period] (TP.HCM: Nhà Xuât Ban Khoa Hồc Xã Hồi, 2002).
33. Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Decree Providing for Implementation of the Law on Land (No. 181-2004-ND-CP), in 181-2004-ND-CP, ed. Office of Government and Pham Van Khai (Hanoi, 2004), available at http://www.eng.hochiminhcity.gov.vn/eng/news/default.aspx?cat_id=551&news_id=3390#content.
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35. For a useful analysis of the 2010 land prices, see Tùng Nguyền, Toàn cî̀nh B Ba{hook above}nggiá d{stroke}ât nǎm 2010 ca TPHCM [All about the HCMC Land Price Schedule for 2010], Dân trí, 29 December 2009, available at http://dantri.com.vn/c20/s20-369981/toan-canh-bang-gia-dat-nam-2010-cua-tphcm.htm
36. Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee, Bàng giá d{stroke}ât 2010 (Ban hành kèm Quyêt ÿinh sô 102 /2009/Q{Eth}-UBND ngày 24 tháng 12 nǎm 2009 cua Uy ban nhân dân thành phố Hồ Chí Minh) [Land Price schedule: Issued in conjunction with Decision number 102/2009/Q{Eth}-UBND December 24th, 2009 by the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee] (Ho Chi Minh City, December 24, 2009), available at http://dantri.vcmedia.vn/Uploaded/Download/bang_gia_dat_2010.xls.
37. The 2010 exchange rate was nearly 19,000 per US dollar, so 1,050,000 d{stroke}ng equals just over 55 dollars; 260,000 d{stroke}ng equals nearly 14 dollars; 2,149,000 d{stroke}ng equals just over 113 dollars; and 1,300,000 d{stroke}ông equals just over 68 dollars.
38. Tùng Nguyên, Toàn canh Bang giá d{stroke}at nǎm 2010.
39. Annette Kim, Learning to Be Capitalists: Entrepreneurs in Vietnam's Transition Economy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 39-45.
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42. Li Zhang, In Search of Paradise, 213-216
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45. Trân Ngoc Thêm, Co So Vǎn Hóa Viê·t Nam [Vietnam's Cultural Basis] (Thành Phí Hồ Chí Minh: Nhà Xuat Ban Giao Duc, 1999), 122, 124.
46. Historians explain that Saigon-Hồ Chí Minh City first became recognized as a city (thành phî́) in the true sense of the word when Nguyền CuX {Eth}àm built a citadel in 1772. The formative conception of inside and outside emerges from the notion of a complementary relationship between the space inside the walls (nû̀goai thành) and the surrounding hinterland supporting it (nû̀i thành). Nguyền {Eth}ình {Eth}âu, From Saigon to Ho Chi Minh City: 300 year history (Thành Phí Hồ Chí Minh: Land Service Science and Technics Publishing House, 1998), 20.
47. Anne Burlat, Processus Institutionnels et Dynamiques Urbaines dans L'Urbanisation Contemporaine de Ho Chi Minh Ville (1988-1998): Planification, Production, Gestion des Secteurs D'Habitat (Thèse de Doctorat en urbanisme et aménagement, Université de Lyon II, 2001), 217.
48. T.G. McGee, The Emergence of Desakota Regions in Asia: Expanding a Hypothesis, in The Extended Metropolis: Settlement Transition in Asia, eds. Norton Ginsburg, Bruce Koppel and T.G. McGee (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1991).
49. Fieldnotes, 2008.
50. T. D{stroke}., Nhà nghi ven d{stroke}ô-d{stroke}iếm he{dot below}n cúa các cǎ{dot below}p tình nhân [Hotels on the urban fringe-where lovers meet], VNexpress, 24 August 2003.
51. Lê Vǎn Hai, Nan rai d{stroke}inh ÿã về Hóc Môn [The plague of spreading nails has returned to Hóc Môn], Tuô{hook above}i Tre{hook above}, 28 February 2003
52. Phúc Huy, TP.HCM: nỗi lo. nhà siêu mong [HCMC: Worried feelings. Super thin houses], Tuô{hook above}i Tr{hook above}, 10 December 2004.
53. VNexpress, Nhiều hô{dot below} dân TP HCM ÿang uô {hook above}ng nuóc tù nghĩa d{stroke}ia [Many families in HCMC are drinking water from cemeteries], VNexpress.net, 20 July 2002
54. VNexpress, Ô nhiễm nguỗn nuóc do nghĩa d{stroke}ia tuhook{dot below} phát o TP HCM [Spontaneously built cemeteries pollute water sources in HCMC], VNexpress.net, 27 May 2003.
55. Dinh Huy Liêm, Chuyê{hook above}n Biến Cua Kinh Tế Nông Hô{dot below}và Kinh Tế Hohook{dot below}p Tác Trong Nông Nghiê{dot below}p Ngoai Thành Thành Pĥ́ Hồ Chí Minh, 1975-1994'' [The Transformation of the Agricultural Household Economy and the Collective Economy in Ho Chi Minh City's Suburban Agriculture, 1975-1994] (Thesis, Viê{dot below}n KHXH ta{dot below}i TP.Hồ Chí Minh, 2001), 76-77.
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57. VNexpress, Sǎ́p có ÿô thi xanh ven sông Sài Gòn - Ra{dot below}ch Tra [Soon to Have a Green Urban Zone on the edge of the Saigon River-Tra Canal], VNexpress.net, 22 September 2002.
58. Nguyȩ̂n Ngo·c Châu, Qua{hook above}n lý d{stroke}ô thi [Urban Administration] (Hà Núi: Nhà Xuat Ban Xây Dû̀ng, 2001), 66.
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60. A similar double symbolic association can be seen in the gendered meaning of femininity, which also ranges from celebratory to highly derogatory. Women's crucial importance as symbols makes them central to national imaginings, but their supposed propensity for lapses from normative ideals-feminine disorder-means that they can just as easily threaten the national essence.''
61. Ann Marie Leshkowich, ''Feminine Disorder: State Campaigns against Street Traders in Socialist and Late Socialist Viêt Nam, in Le Viêt Nam au féminin [Viêt Nam: Women's Realities], eds. Gisèle Bousquet and Nora Taylor (Paris: Les Indes Savantes, 2005), 190.