{"product_id":"the-art-of-not-being-governed-james-scott-9780300169171","title":"The Art of Not Being Governed | James C. Scott","description":"\u003ch2\u003eThe Art of Not Being Governed [Yale Agrarian Studies Series]: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia | James C. Scott\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhy did millions of hill tribes in Southeast Asia deliberately choose isolation, geography, and statelessness to escape state control? \u003cstrong\u003eJames C. Scott\u003c\/strong\u003e investigates.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eAbout the Book\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor two thousand years the disparate groups that now reside in Zomia (a mountainous region the size of Europe that consists of portions of seven Asian countries) have fled the projects of the organized state societies that surround them—slavery, conscription, taxes, corvee labor, epidemics, and warfare.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis book, essentially an anarchist history, is the first-ever examination of the huge literature on state-making whose author evaluates why people would deliberately and reactively remain stateless.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAmong the strategies employed by the people of Zomia to remain stateless are physical dispersion in rugged terrain; agricultural practices that enhance mobility; pliable ethnic identities; devotion to prophetic, millenarian leaders; and maintenance of a largely oral culture that allows them to reinvent their histories and genealogies as they move between and around states. In accessible language, James Scott, recognized worldwide as an eminent authority in Southeast Asian, peasant, and agrarian studies, tells the story of the peoples of Zomia and their unlikely odyssey in search of self-determination.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe redefines our views on Asian politics, history, demographics, and even our fundamental ideas about what constitutes civilization, and challenges us with a radically different approach to history that presents events from the perspective of stateless peoples and redefines state-making as a form of internal colonialism.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis new perspective requires a radical reevaluation of the civilizational narratives of the lowland states. Scott's work on Zomia represents a new way to think of area studies that will be applicable to other runaway, fugitive, and marooned communities, be they Gypsies, Cossacks, tribes fleeing slave raiders, Marsh Arabs, or San-Bushmen.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eSummary\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia\u003c\/em\u003e is a book by American anthropologist James C. Scott, published in 2009 and analyzing the high-altitude Zomia region of southeast Asia.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eA Fascinating Study\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eState evasion, shifting cultivation, and stateless peoples. James C. Scott explores an anarchist history of Zomia in \u003cem\u003eThe Art of Not Being Governed\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eGrab Your Copy\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eExplore the groundbreaking \u003cstrong\u003eYale Agrarian Studies\u003c\/strong\u003e masterpiece challenging conventional narratives of civilization and statecraft. Tap to discover this classic today!\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Bust-Down Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50342022316347,"sku":"0300169175","price":35.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0855\/2077\/7531\/files\/9780300169171.jpg?v=1787984225","url":"https:\/\/bustdownbooks.com\/products\/the-art-of-not-being-governed-james-scott-9780300169171","provider":"Bust-Down Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}