Putting ‘rupture’ to work at the Three Gorges Dam

Abstract

This provocative article by Sango Mahanty and co-authors proposes rupture as a temporally and spatially expansive view of change and one that encompasses intersections with other crises. In our commentary, we put rupture to work as an analytic, thinking through the dynamics of China's massive Three Gorges Dam as a rupture episode with far-reaching disruption to everyday lives and hydrological and socio-economic systems. Through our consideration of the complex temporalities, spatial and material relationships, and generative sociopolitical potential of the Three Gorges Dam, we see value in the authors’ expansive view of change that looks well beyond the boundaries of ‘the project’. Practically speaking; however, we see the need to put some boundaries around our analysis, or the scope of rupture is potentially endless.