摘要：Few mountain communities remain untouched by the influence of globalization. Until just 30 years ago, the village of Jardhar in Garhwal, India, in the middle Himalaya led an isolated existence, living from a composite agroecology that ensured a high degree of food security and ecological sustainability. Certain events—forest degradation, the Chipko resistance movement (tree hugging), the introduction of Green Revolution farming, and the building of the large Tehri dam nearby—ended this isolation and, in the process, disrupted Jardhar's social and ecological cohesiveness. The present article argues that the global conservation ethic and global development are, in certain circumstances, detrimental to local interests: they transfer costs from powerful urban centers and demand sacrifices from fragile mountain communities. The story of Jardhar illustrates how this global politics is played out in a remote mountain village, and what lessons it has for both policy makers and communities.
