Irrigation in the Khorezm oasis, past and present: a political ecology perspective
Irrigation in the Khorezm oasis, past and present: a political ecology perspective
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花拉子模绿洲的灌溉，过去和现在：政治生态学视角
DOI：
10.2458/v23i1.20177
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发表时间：
2016
影响因子：
2.3
通讯作者：
E. Brite
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
E. Brite
花拉子模绿洲位于环境灾难的中心。自19世纪后期以来，该地区不断扩大的灌溉已经改变了阿姆河三角洲的自然水文，导致大面积荒漠化，世界第四大湖咸海几乎完全消失。这种情况被广泛认为是一场规模空前的环境灾难，但这并不是花拉子模历史上的第一次灌溉危机。在这片绿洲的考古记录中记录了许多灌溉崩溃的事件，科学界的许多人现在对这一过去的记录非常感兴趣，因为它有可能为现代危机提供信息。不幸的是，人们也倾向于忽视过去三千年来导致这片绿洲灌溉的不同历史条件。在这篇文章中，我采取了另一种方法，借鉴了政治生态学关于环境行为的文化嵌入性的见解。我比较了花拉子模的两个灌溉时期，一个是古代的，另一个是现代的，以展示每个时期的特定社会背景如何以不同的方式塑造灌溉计划。古代系统与现代系统的设计和实施特点明显不同，对环境可持续性和人类福祉的影响也大不相同。关键词：水，灌溉，咸海，考古学，崩溃，苏联，游牧
The Khorezm oasis sits at the epicenter of an environmental disaster. Since the late 19th century, the continual expansion of irrigation in this region has altered the natural hydrology of the Amu Darya delta, leading to widespread desertification and the near total disappearance of the world's fourth largest lake, the Aral Sea. The situation is widely acknowledged as an environmental catastrophe of unprecedented scale, and yet it is not the first irrigation crisis in Khorezmian history. Numerous events of irrigation collapse are recorded in the archaeological record of this oasis, with many in the scientific community now very interested in this past record for its potential to inform on the modern crisis. Unfortunately, there has also been a tendency to overlook the different historical conditions that led to irrigation in this oasis over the last three millennia. In this article, I take an alternative approach that draws on political ecology's insights about the cultural embeddedness of environmental behavior. I compare two periods of irrigation in Khorezm, one ancient and the other modern, to show how the particular social contexts of each period shaped irrigation schemes in different ways. Significantly different design and implementation features are apparent in the ancient versus modern systems, with vastly different implications for environmental sustainability and human well-being. Keywords: water, irrigation, Aral Sea, archaeology, collapse, Soviet Union, nomadic pastoralism