Visualizing water struggles: Using Photovoice for research and community empowerment in northwest Vietnam
- 1Social Science, York University
- 2Center for Water Resources Conservation and Development (WARECOD)
Abstract
Research on hydropower development in Southeast Asia has documented processes of dispossession and environmental change, yet small hydropower projects and their cumulative, everyday impacts on community life remain comparatively underexamined. This article positions photovoice as a methodological intervention into feminist political ecology research on hydropower development in northwest Vietnam. Through a participatory photovoice process, villagers engaged as co-researchers, using photography and collective dialogue to document and interpret lived experiences of socio-ecological change associated with small hydropower projects. The study demonstrates how photovoice foregrounds affective, relational, and intergenerational dimensions of environmental change that are often difficult to capture through conventional political ecology methods. Read through a feminist political ecology lens, participants' photographs and narratives reveal experiences of solastalgia, intersectional and intergenerational inequalities, and everyday practices of resilience, resistance, and reworking. Rather than presenting definitive claims about hydropower impacts, the article treats these insights as generative methodological provocation for re-examining participation, power, and lived experience in political ecology research. Participants' reflections further highlight how photovoice reshaped conditions of participation and knowledge production by enabling authorship over representation, fostering critical reflection, and supporting collective sense-making. The article concludes by arguing that photovoice is both methodological and contextually suited to addressing the under-visibility of small hydropower impacts and contributes to ongoing debates on participatory, feminist, and visual methodologies in resource governance research.
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BibTeX
@article{dao2026visualizing,
title = {{Visualizing water struggles: Using Photovoice for research and community empowerment in northwest Vietnam}},
author = {Nga Dao and Lan Thi Ngoc Nguyen and Linh Vi Nguyen and Thanh Hoai Pham},
journal = {Journal of Political Ecology},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
doi = {10.2458/jpe.8635},
url = {https://doi.org/10.2458/jpe.8635},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Visualizing water struggles: Using Photovoice for research and community empowerment in northwest Vietnam
AU - Nga Dao
AU - Lan Thi Ngoc Nguyen
AU - Linh Vi Nguyen
AU - Thanh Hoai Pham
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/11/01
JO - Journal of Political Ecology
DO - 10.2458/jpe.8635
UR - https://doi.org/10.2458/jpe.8635
AB - Research on hydropower development in Southeast Asia has documented processes of dispossession and environmental change, yet small hydropower projects and their cumulative, everyday impacts on community life remain comparatively underexamined. This article positions photovoice as a methodological intervention into feminist political ecology research on hydropower development in northwest Vietnam. Through a participatory photovoice process, villagers engaged as co-researchers, using photography and collective dialogue to document and interpret lived experiences of socio-ecological change associated with small hydropower projects. The study demonstrates how photovoice foregrounds affective, relational, and intergenerational dimensions of environmental change that are often difficult to capture through conventional political ecology methods. Read through a feminist political ecology lens, participants' photographs and narratives reveal experiences of solastalgia, intersectional and intergenerational inequalities, and everyday practices of resilience, resistance, and reworking. Rather than presenting definitive claims about hydropower impacts, the article treats these insights as generative methodological provocation for re-examining participation, power, and lived experience in political ecology research. Participants' reflections further highlight how photovoice reshaped conditions of participation and knowledge production by enabling authorship over representation, fostering critical reflection, and supporting collective sense-making. The article concludes by arguing that photovoice is both methodological and contextually suited to addressing the under-visibility of small hydropower impacts and contributes to ongoing debates on participatory, feminist, and visual methodologies in resource governance research.
SN - 1073-0451
ER -