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The Making of the National Border between China and Vietnam-Laos: Focusing on Trans-border Ethnic Groups

  • 중앙사론
  • 2020, (52), pp.407-445
  • DOI : 10.46823/cahs.2020.52.407
  • Publisher : Institute for Historical Studies at Chung-Ang University
  • Research Area : Humanities > History
  • Received : November 22, 2020
  • Accepted : December 11, 2020
  • Published : December 31, 2020

Ahn Chi-Young 1,  Chang, Jung-a 1

1인천대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This article explores the historical basis of trans-border exchange in Chinese border areas. International movement and exchange transcending the borders established by modern states are subject to state control and management. Any movement and exchange that occurs outside government control and management is considered illegal. In reality, however, movement and exchange in border areas varies depending on state capacity for border management, historical circumstances, regional characteristics, and other factors. In China, residents of border areas are granted special privileges, allowed to cross over borders and engage in exchanges without special permission. This implicit allowance has been longstanding. The complicated characteristics of movement and exchange in Chinese border areas thus signify a border not as a line clearly demarcated and controlled by the state but a mechanism for new and various movement and exchange. Movement and exchange occurring in China’s border areas are not only related to China’s management of its borders with surrounding states but also, more fundamentally, the history of China’s border formation. The objective of the current study, then, is to understand the history of the formation of the border between China and Vietnam-Laos. The article deals with a hitherto little-explored issue in the formation of this border: the living space for local residents known as ethnic minorities. These residents were all but invisible in the border formation process not only to the Qing Dynasty central government and colonial authorities but also the central governments of neighboring states following their achievement of independence. The border thus took form without regard for these residents’ existence, intentions, or living space, which has been artificially fractured into the territories of different states. It is precisely this border formation process that has been such an important factor in creating China’s numerous trans-border ethnic groups. Movement and exchange occurring in China’s border areas and the differing forms of movement and exchange that have emerged over the course of China’s opening are related to the history of the marginalization of ethnic minorities in China’s border areas amid the process of border formation. This article, which explores the formation of the border between China and Vietnam-Laos through modern and contemporary history, focuses on the signing of national border treaties. The existence of trans-border ethnic groups signifies that border areas serve as the artificially divided living spaces of ethnic communities.

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