Academic journal publishing in and about Nepal was started more than 60 years ago. Dozens of journals with contents related to the broad social sciences have been started in the years since. While many of these have turned out to be ventures with short life spans, a few have earned a reputation for their endurance, regularity and quality. Given this history and the fact that journals play an important role in the lives of academics, there have been very few written or oral discussions related to the journal publishing scene in and about Nepal over the years.The panelists will reflect on the lives of these publications. The concerns they will try to address will include the current academic dynamics of journal publishing in and about Nepal and challenges that need…

Since the early 50s, health service in Nepal has been heavily and consistently supported by foreign aid – either via supporting the state mechanism to provide services or foreign aid supporting the beneficiaries directly, outside the state system. However, increasingly in the past few decades a large portion of foreign aid in health sector is channeled through project assistances. Health services are contracted (and sub-contracted) out to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) at national and local levels. This contracting out health service and interventions coincides with growing number of NGOs and private sector consulting firms working in health sector since the 1990s. Whether it is used to deliver services, generate evidence, provide technical assistance, and/or to strengthen the health system, a number of intermediary organizations and/or through consortium of organizations manage a…

This paper examines post-disaster agroecological transition and change in mid-montane farming communities located near the epicenters of Nepal’s 2015 earthquakes. Decisions to adopt new agricultural technologies and crop patterns within these communities occur within a constellation of socioecological and economic factors. Using a suite of methods and tools including key informant and informal interviews, focus groups, participant observation, crop calendars and participatory budgeting, we observe that social and landscape effects from the 2015 earthquakes, including shifting labor opportunities and field degradation, catalyze transition to market-oriented crops. In our field sites within Dolakha district, economic and ecological co-benefits incentivize the adoption of cardamom, A momum subulatum, given post-disaster farming scenarios. We describe disaster-specific decision factors for farmers transitioning to cardamom, as opposed to or alongside other cash crops and explore how…

It has been ten years since Nepal emerged from a decade-long internal armed conflict, during which at least 13,000 people were killed. Following the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in 2006, measures under the framework of transitional justice (TJ) have been implemented to redress human rights violations. Processes of TJ, which consist of judicial and non-judicial mechanisms, seek to facilitate justice and reconciliation typically during a political transition from an authoritarian regime towards a liberal democratic future (Hinton 2010:2). While Hinton (2010) argues that “local justice,” or the ways in which justice is perceived, experienced, produced, and conceptualized on the ground, must be taken seriously if TJ is to be successful, existing research has emphasized how the conceptualization of the “local” during processes of TJ often reflects elite…

Jagannath Adhikari Over the past two decades, Nepal has undergone two distinct processes of agrarian transformation – growing participation in non-farm economy through migration, remittances, and urbanisation, and a change in rural community lives as seen in creation of new community structures and new challenges for institutions to look into the problems of left-behind members like the children and elderly. This transformation calls for a new approach for community-based resource management and other development.  Even though the practice of moving out of national border is not a new practice in Nepal, the present form of globalisation that is seen, especially after early 1990s, has changed the magnitude and direction of mobility across national borders. This process of globalisation in Nepal is seen in different flows across space – economic (remittances…

Neel Kamal Chapagain Opening of the Upper Mustang region to foreign visitors since 1992 has not only made it a popular trekking destination, but also a complex laboratory for research into various socio-cultural aspects of historic and contemporary lives in Upper Mustang as well as field site for a number of conservation and development projects. In the same context, various literatures have emerged to cover a broad spectrum of knowledge and practices. The region, most of which was known as the kingdom of Lo or Lso Tshyo Dhun, has been discussed in oral literature, including the religious stories, as well as recording of oral histories, through what is called karchyags. While the earlier or pre-modern literatures deal with religious and political matters, the latter or modern literatures primarily attempt to…

Shamik Mishra and Deepak Aryal Focusing on the referendum of 1979-80, one of the most important political events during the Panchayat era, the paper will explore the use of political ephemera (posters & pamphlets) during the period in Palpa district. Based on the study of the production, distribution, and consumption mechanism of such ephemera, this work will trace how different and effective this form of communication was as compared to the mainstream media, particularly in a place like Palpa where the presence of print media was rather weak. Further, the research will delve into how the process of writing, editing, printing, and consumption occurred under the domineering presence of the state-controlled radio and newspapers as well as the backdrop of the laws of the time. The resources at the Madan…

Sascha Fuller In Nepal, the term thulo manche (big person) connotes a person’s authority, influence, and status, and demands deference. Today’s thulo manche culture can be seen as a legacy of the Panchayat period that impacts upon Nepali everyday life, yet a detailed critical analysis of thulo manche culture remains absent from much of Nepal’s anthropological literature. Drawing on ethnographic material collected during fieldwork in a Bahun hill village in Gorkha, I will demonstrate that the cult of the thulo manche is ever present in daily village life and underlies village level decision-making. In defining what it means to be a village thulo manche in the context of a changing Nepal, this paper aims to highlight the extent of the thulo manche influence and the effects it has on village,…

Shyamu Thapa Magar Ethnic politics became visible after 1990s peoples’ movement following thirty years of Panchayat political system as well as the ten years of Maoist conflict in Nepal. Various indigenous ethnic groups that had established their ethnic social organisation to work for the cultural development turned into political movements. They established a Federation for all indigenous ethnic groups in order to bring them together for their collective voices. Among them, the Magars, the largest minority group in the country, are constructing their Magar identity through the establishment of the Nepal Magar Association by imagining representing the whole community by themselves. Nepal Magar Association works as a common forum for all Magar activists who represent their district chapters in the central committee. Their affiliation provides them not only the primordial…