Chayakul, Jidapa

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Chayakul, Jidapa
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jidapa.ch@kmitl.ac.th

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    Item type:Publication,
    Contested waters: Hydrosocial territories and power dynamics in the landscape of peri-urban Chiang Mai, Thailand
    (2026-02-01)
    Chayakul, Jidapa
    ;
    Veldwisch, Gert Jan
    ;
    Bruins, Bert
    ;
    Boelens, Rutgerd
    The centuries’ old Muang-Fai irrigation systems and their communities in Chiang Mai, Thailand, have undergone rapid landscape changes, mostly from urbanization and uncoordinated development, displacing their traditional land and resource management and creating highly fragmented landscape patterns. While studies have examined these changes, they remain mostly descriptive, overlooking underlying power relations, failing to integrate land use/land cover data, or landscape patterns and the broader ecological consequences for local communities. This paper explains these landscape transformations as struggles between contested hydrosocial territories, where unequal power among human and non-human actors, worldviews, and practices influence infrastructures, ecologies, and livelihoods. Using the lens of Hydrosocial Territory in relation to landscape ecology, this paper examines the Phaya-Kham system as it is variously depicted as (predominantly) an irrigation system, an urban sewage system, a flood control system, or a socio-cultural-spiritual network. Complex social, material, and symbolic dynamics shape the pluriform landscape of the Phaya-Kham network, while certain groups hold more power to materialize their interests, creating profound social-ecological consequences. This paper argues that, rather than merely ecological patchiness or physical changes, landscape fragmentation is a product of contested socio-political projects. Overlay analysis reveals how territories exist as superimposed projects, with conflicting uses and meanings competing for inscription in the same physical space; hereby, infrastructure embeds and enforces territorial claims. By showing how landscape fragmentation in peri-urban Chiang Mai reflects multi-scalar struggles over water, infrastructure, and meaning, the paper reveals the limitations of conventional planning frameworks, transcending their scale-based representations.
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    Item type:Publication,
    Scales and Sustainability: The Politics of Riverine Landscape Governance in Chiang Mai, Thailand
    (2026-05-01)
    Chayakul, Jidapa
    ;
    Veldwisch, Gert Jan
    ;
    Bruins, Bert
    ;
    Boelens, Rutgerd
    While national agencies increasingly adopt ‘sustainable’ rhetoric, their policies frequently prioritize bureaucratic legitimacy over local landscape realities. This research examines how Thailand’s development policies shape water and spatial governance in riverine landscapes, focusing on Chiang Mai Province and the Phaya-Kham irrigation system. Despite ambitious sustainable development objectives, implementation is marked by institutional silos, overlapping mandates, and scalar misalignments, resulting in fragmented governance that favors short-term economic gains over long-term ecological health. These dynamics undermine water resource management and exacerbate socio-ecological inequalities. Drawing on archival reviews, policy analysis, mapping, and interviews, the study employs political ecology perspectives and David Mosse’s framework of policy performance to investigate the disjuncture between policy intentions and on-the-ground realities. The Phaya-Kham system illustrates how modernization pressures, urban expansion, and agricultural intensification destabilize community-based water governance. Findings underscore that governance challenges in Chiang Mai are fundamentally political, rooted in struggles over authority and resource control rather than technical shortcomings. Sustainability-oriented policy frameworks may reproduce socio-ecological degradation. Achieving fairer water and landscape governance requires confronting these dynamics, integrating local knowledge, and fostering inter-agency cooperation. By recognizing context-based hydrosocial territories, policies can move toward more socio-environmentally healthy frameworks supporting local riverine communities and landscape realities.