This chapter traces the reconstruction of boundaries between ethnic
groups in the lowlands of today’s Eryuan county from the early Ming by
examining their settlement history, military rank, household
registration and occupation. The author argues that the integration of
military households into civilian lijia units for the purposes of tax
collection and labour service assignments from the late sixteenth
century led to the formation of Bai communities during the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries; these Bai communities formed the basis for the
recognition of the Bai as an ethnic group in the mid-twentieth century.
Marshalling empirical evidence from three valley basin societies, the
author shows that the Ming transformation in western Yunnan did not
result in the formation of fixed, stable ethnic identities, but created
fluid social boundaries and ethnic identities. It was this fluidity that
eventually led to the formation of new communities based on common
property held under the name of village temples and managed by the
gentry and village leaders from the seventeenth century onward. The
author concludes that these communities were not shaped by language and
custom, but emerged through the agency of the local elite, who managed
wet-rice irrigation facilities and religious activities through village
temples.