Reclaiming Rights to the Socialist City

Bureaucratic Artefacts and the Affective Appeal of Petitions

Bibliographic Data

ID5768258
AuthorsC Schwenkel (0000-0003-0186-6255, corresponding author)
Year2015
Volume23
Issue2
Pages205-225
Publication date2015-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSouth East Asia Research (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0967-828X • E-ISSN: 2043-6874
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.5367/sear.2015.0257
OpenAlexW2290557888
LanguageEN
Citations received10
References cited28

A long history of war and revolution in the industrial city of Vinh has perpetuated cycles of mass destruction followed by urban renewal. This paper examines citizen responses to the shift from post-war socialist urbanization that sought to eradicate inequality to post-reform city planning that advocates private property. It asks: how do urban residents at risk of relocation articulate their rights to the post-socialist city? Tracing the use and circulation of bureaucratic artefacts between citizens, developers and the state, it shows how government documents, far from being mere tools of state regulation, are productive of active, participatory subjectivities and a growing sense of moral-political agency. This agency manifests itself in the collective act of petitioning through which residents contest urban redevelopment and the withdrawal of the state by employing the language of tình cảm (sentiment) as an affective tool and logic of bureaucratic rationality

Bureaucracy · Communism, Protests, Social Movements · European history and politics · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies

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Open DOISci-HubOpen Access