Water Ecosystems Threats Across the Vietnam Mekong Delta’s Diffused Territories

The rural to urban migration trend at the world’s Delta regions has contributed to making cities along major Deltas in South East Asia, among those with the highest densities in urbanized territories. Once known as the ‘rice bowl’ of Vietnam, the Mekong Delta contributed 60% of Vietnam’s GDP in agriculture and aquaculture. Nevertheless, climate change has increased intensities of drought, land subsidence and salination, and liberalization has accelerated the rate of urbanization. Desakota growth and Hydraulic Society actors have resulted in spatial gaps between urban and rural territories, exacerbating environmental degradation. The research epistemology centers on a proposition that the Citta Diffusa phenomenon exists across the Mekong’s territorial organization and that it has transformed due to water-related urbanization challenges, and hypothesizes on the contradictory relationships between urban centralization and rural decentralization processes. Climate change serves as a driver for rethinking the artificially constructed conditions, and the Project of Isotropy serves as a means to interrogate these issues. To produce knowledge about the Delta’s natural and artificial transformation over time, a project can be elaborated via Research-by-design methods of territorial and situational analysis, include mapping territories, constructing microstory narratives and devising spatial-operational frame-works.