耶鲁大学教授詹姆斯·斯科特在2009年的著作《不被治理的艺术》(The Art of Not Being Governed)中提出佐米亚的概念。他认为,佐米亚地区的民族文化世代传承,而为关于现代性的老套故事提供了一种反面的叙述:即一旦人们接触到现代技术和现代国家的便利,他们就会被同化。佐米亚的部落有意识地逃避国家统治和国家中心经济。他在序言写道:
学者爱德华·斯特林厄姆(英语:Edward Stringham)和凯莱布·J·迈尔斯(Caleb J. Miles)分析东南亚社会的历史和人类学研究,得出结论认为佐米亚人数千年来一直在逃避国家管治。斯特林厄姆进一步分析了用于避免、遏制和阻止国家的方式。他进一步得出结论,如佐米亚一般的无国籍社会利用地理位置、特定的生产方式和对国家的文化抵抗成功驱逐了国家的强势影响[6]。
^Scott, James C.The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. Yale Agrarian Studies. New Haven & London: Yale University Press. 2009: 14–16. ISBN 978-0-300-15228-9. Notes to pages 5 – 14: Other explicit proponents of a systematic view from the periphery include Michaud, Turbulent Times and Enduring Peoples, especially the Introduction by Michaud and John McKinnon, 1–25; Turner, S., C. Bonnin and J. Michaud (2015) 'Frontier Livelihoods. Hmong in the Sino-Vietnamese Borderlands' (Seattle: University of Washington Press); and Hjorleifur Jonsson, Mien Relations: Mountain Peoples, Ethnography, and State Control (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005). F. K. L. Chit Hlaing [F. K. Lehman], “Some Remarks upon Ethnicity Theory and Southeast Asia, with Special Reference to the Kayah and Kachin,” in Exploring Ethnic Diversity in Burma, ed. Mikael Gravers (Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2007), 107–22, esp. 109–10.
^Michaud, Jean. Journal of Global History. Journal of Global History (Cambridge Journals Online). 2010, 5 (2) [September 7, 2011]. ISSN 1740-0228. (原始内容存档于2016-06-09). Published for London School of Economics and Political Science
^Victor B. Lieberman. Marvin B. Becker Collegiate Professor of Southeast Asia, pre-modern Burma, early modern world history. University of Michigan. [September 7, 2011]. (原始内容存档于2008-09-23).
^Little, Daniel; Michael E. Smith; et al. Zomia reconsidered(blogspot). web-based monograph. UnderstandingSociety: 1. October 18, 2010 [September 7, 2011]. (原始内容存档于2023-05-08). [Lieberman's] most recent volumes, Strange Parallels: Volume 1, Integration on the Mainland: Southeast Asia in Global Context, c.800-1830 (v. 1) and Strange Parallels: Volume 2, Mainland Mirrors: Europe, Japan, China, South Asia, and the Islands: Southeast Asia in Global Context, c.800-1830, are directly relevant to Scott's analysis.
^Tom Brass (2012), "Scott's 'Zomia,' or a Populist Post-modern History of Nowhere", Journal of Contemporary Asia, 42:1, 123–33
参考文献
James C. Scott (2009). The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. Yale Agrarian Studies. New Haven & London: Yale University Press