Diversity of water management systems: Examples from Hmong and Thai communities in Mae Sa watershed, northern Thailand

摘要

In Thailand water is widely perceived as an open access resource. It is also common belief that organisation of highland irrigation in northern Thailand is characterised by a relatively simple structure, and that local communities are not able to adjust their management practices to new realities. The existence of diverse forms of control, ownership and rights of use relating to water resources is widely ignored. This goes along with a stereotypical and static picture of highland people—and ethnic minorities in particular—as being environmentally destructive and culturally...