The course of two millennia

over the course of two millennia, been fleeing the oppressions of state making

projects (Scott 2009 cited in Michaud 2010).

Schneiderman’s ethnographic work with the Jhami, an ethnic community of central

eastern Nepal, (Dolpa and Sindhupalchock districts) north eastern India, (in the

Gargeeling district of West Bangal and Sikkim), and Tibetan region tends to explore

that numbers of such ethnic groups are engaged in the process of simultaneously

situation themselves to make strategies and political claims vis-a-vis multiple nations

states, while also remaining deeply committed to the 'ungoverned' aspect of their

identity in cultural and psychological terms (Ibid).

Diagnostic surveys of shifting cultivation were conducted in Luant Prababg and

Oudomsay provinces in Northern Laos to understand the practice from the farmers'

perspective to observe fields and to identify and give priority to problems and

research to address problems (Fujisaka, 1991). In Western Thailand, the role of

timber forests products (NTFPs) in shifting cultivator's subsistence economies has

been studied (Delang 2006). The findings reveal that by ignoring shifting cultivator's

dependence on NTFPs, the involvement of government in forest management

especially through restriction imposed on shifting farming practices is likely to have

considerable impact on the livelihoods of these communities (Ibid).

Major requirements of the study of ecological changes related to shifting cultivation

have discussed with respect to climax forest and second growth vegetation (Richards

1952, Symington 1933), specific crops and crops succession (Burkill 1935; Grist

1955), and critical carrying capacities (Allen 1949; Carneiro 1960; 1968b; van

Klaveren 1953 cited in Conklin 1961). An important introduction to the general

potentialities and limitations of swidden farming has been outlined and revised by

Pelzer (1945, 1958a) and these factors have been delineated more specifically for

particular regions such as van Beukering (1947) for particular Indonesia, Kolb

(1942:105-40) for central Africa. In assessing these system, leach (1949; 1959) has

stressed the importance of estimating total yields per unit of labor and of expressing

economic advantages in terms of available capital and other resources (Conklin,

1961).

The studies on shifting cultivation in Nepal are basically concerned with the

ecological and economic aspects of the shifting cultivation. These studies hardly look

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