Forests Are Gold examines the management of Vietnam's forests in the tumultuous twentieth century-from French colonialism to the recent transition to market-oriented economics-as the country united, prospered, and transformed people and landscapes. Forest policy has rarely been about ecology or conservation for nature's sake, but about managing citizens and society, a process Pamela McElwee terms environmental rule. Untangling and understanding these practices and networks of rule illuminates not just thorny issues of environmental change, but also the birth of Vietnam itself.