Which Gridded Population Data Product Is Better? Evidences from Mainland Southeast Asia (MSEA)

The release of global gridded population datasets, including the Gridded Population of the World (GPW), Global Human Settlement Population Grid (GHS-POP), WorldPop, and LandScan, have greatly facilitated cross-comparison for ongoing research related to anthropogenic impacts. However, little attention is paid to the consistency and discrepancy of these gridded products in the regions with rapid changes in local population, e.g., Mainland Southeast Asia (MSEA), where the countries have experienced fast population growth since the 1950s. This awkward situation is unsurprisingly aggravated because of national scarce demographics and incomplete census counts, which further limits their appropriate usage. Thus, comparative analyses of them become the priority of their better application. Here, the consistency and discrepancy of the four common global gridded population datasets were cross-compared by combing the 2015 provincial population statistics (census and yearbooks) via error-comparison based statistical methods. The results showed that: (1) the LandScan performs the best both in spatial accuracy and estimated errors, then followed by the WorldPop, GHS-POP, and GPW in MSEA. (2) Provincial differences in estimated errors indicated that the LandScan better reveals the spatial pattern of population density in Thailand and Vietnam, while the WorldPop performs slightly better in Myanmar and Laos, and both fit well in Cambodia. (3) Substantial errors among the four gridded datasets normally occur in the provincial units with larger population density (over 610 persons/km2) and a rapid population growth rate (greater than 1.54%), respectively. The new findings in MSEA indicated that future usage of these datasets should pay attention to the estimated population in the areas characterized by high population density and rapid population growth.

Re-evaluating Pleistocene–Holocene occupation of cave sites in north-west Thailand: new radiocarbon and luminescence dating

Established chronologies indicate a long-term ‘Hoabinhian’ hunter-gatherer occupation of Mainland Southeast Asia during the Terminal Pleistocene to Mid-Holocene (45 000–3000 years ago). Here, the authors re-examine the ‘Hoabinhian’ sequence from north-west Thailand using new radiocarbon and luminescence data from Spirit Cave, Steep Cliff Cave and Banyan Valley Cave. The results indicate that hunter-gatherers exploited this ecologically diverse region throughout the Terminal Pleistocene and the Pleistocene–Holocene transition, and into the period during which agricultural lifeways emerged in the Holocene. Hunter-gatherers did not abandon this highland region of Thailand during periods of environmental and socioeconomic change.

The Myngoon plot: Seditious state-making and the 1902 Shan rebellion in northern Siam

In August 1902, the Siamese army occupied the northern township of Phrae after a rebellion by Shan timber workers, miners and traders. The Siamese general who investigated the rebellion claimed that the Shan attack on Phrae was part of a wider plot to restore Prince Myngoon to the Burmese throne. Myngoon was exiled from Burma in 1868 and had been living in Indochina since 1889. Most observers have regarded the so-called ‘Myngoon plot’ as implausible. This article provides the first detailed history of the plot. It argues that the plot was a product of ‘seditious state-making’ in the borderlands of mainland southeast Asia, a region in geopolitical flux. This exploration of the Myngoon plot uncovers a cosmopolitan web of seditious statecraft that extended from India, through Burma and Indochina and into Siam. The Shan rebellion was one outbreak in a region-wide web of Shan agitation dating from the early 1880s. The rebellion took place at the intersection of the competing colonial agendas of Siam, Britain and France, and various actors in this competition had been planting the seeds of a Myngoon-led rising since the 1880s. Myngoon's story was the product of a time when British, French and Siamese colonial agents were still grappling (and colluding) with dispersed and fragmented royal power.