Annotated Bibliography on the Mekong

Edited by Charnvit Kasetsiri and Chris Baker

The Mekong is the focus of wide-ranging debates over development strategy, governance, legal issues, and environmental management. In recent years the river and its surroundings have become a “development corridor” and a framework for thinking about trade, investment, energy, transportation, and telecommunication within a perspective broader than the nation-state. This bibliography is a contribution to understanding the Mekong in its new setting as a subregion. It concentrates on works published since 1950 that have a geographical spread or conceptual framework that transcends national concerns. The focus is not on individual member countries as such but on their role as part of the Mekong subregion.

The bibliography has been compiled and annotated by a team of experts actively involved in the issues affecting the region—scholars based in the Mekong countries themselves or their Asian near-neighbors. It thus offers a home-grown perspective that highlights many works that might otherwise remain little known outside the region. The entries include works not only in English and other European languages but also in Burmese, Japanese, Mandarin, Thai, and Vietnamese, giving publication details and commentary on more than a thousand titles across a range of subject areas covering the culture, natural resources, economics, social issues, and politics of the region. There are also more than two hundred additional entries that provide information about other bibliographies, leading journals, multimedia titles, websites, and organizations working in the area.

This book is an indispensable aid for anyone interested in the Mekong. It is also a companion volume to The Mekong Arranged and Re-arranged (Mekong Press, 2006), which explores the concepts that underpin the Mekong as a subregion historically, politically, and economically.