Southeast Asian borders and research | New Mandala

Southeast Asian borders and research | New Mandala

NICHOLAS FARRELLY,

 27 NOVEMBER 2014

Hindsight is a wondrous thing. Back in the day, once upon a time, right at the beginning, I didn’t quite realise that my own academic interests were taking root in soil that had, for many years, been cultivated by others. It is a peculiar, but common, aspect of most immature scholarly ambitions: we only have a vague inkling of where things began, or who came before, or what started things off. In my case I came to realise, over time, that for my own academic formation it was the Thai-Yunnan project, and Ajarn Gehan Wijeyewardene, and Ajarn Ted Chapman, that came before. Sadly, I never met either of them.

For today’s discussion, I think it worth considering our anthropological ancestors and their careful stewardship of the ideas, concepts and research strategies that we now, so often, take for granted.

My brief presentation seeks to examine how it is that the study of Southeast Asian borderlands has germinated on this campus, and what that means for those of us who are seeking to find newly fertile fields for their research. This treatment is deliberately integrative. It is partly anecdotal, partly grounded in real research, and also occasionally gripped by my own flights of fancy. That, after all, has been one of the basic orientations that Thai-Yunnan inspired work on this Australian National University campus and beyond.

Let us start, as we often do, with Thailand. The Thai-Yunnan project was forged by scholars who knew Thailand intimately and sought to latch on to the political and social transformations that the end of the Cold War created. From the vantage of northern Thailand, ground zero for Thai-Yunnan, it made sense to look north, and east and west, in the expectation that different research strands could be profitably pursued. Yet in all of those directions the flows and possibilities were interrupted by borders. The notion of a borderless realm, ala the Zomia of Jim Scott’s 2009 “anarchist history”, was nowhere to be found.

Thailand, since then, has rumbled along in its usual fashion: coups have caused new consternation but the Thai society of today is one that earlier generations of Thai-Yunnan academics would recognise well. Indeed, they wrote about “Thailand since the coup“, just as we do. The gadgets and high octane modernity change some of the cosmetic impressions but, behind them, the building blocks of Thai society – hierarchy, obedience, violence, impunity, materialism, loyalty, pride, scheming and so on – are as apparent as ever. For studies of Thai-Yunnan these elements, arguably some of the classic tropes of lowland Southeast Asian civilisation, offer a certain timelessness to our studies of society, culture and politics. I’m not much for the romantic, but I see something in the Thai-Yunnan project’s early output that resonates today, and with what came before.

To put such history in its appropriate frame, let us turn to Myanmar, or Burma as the earlier generations consistently knew it. During the phases of research most commonly associated with the Thai-Yunnan project, Myanmar remained an enigma: research permission was almost impossible to come by and there were few of the institutional hooks that made Thailand, by comparison, hospitable ground. This has changed during recent decades, and those of you who follow conditions closely will appreciate that academic freedom in Thailand is nowadays much constrained. Even foreign researchers, so long able to come-and-go from Thailand as they pleased, are faced with stark choices about their work’s public presentation. There are those who hold academic appointments, and specialize in the study of that country, but can no longer get past Suvarnabhumi International Airport. It is an unfortunate state of affairs, but one that shows no immediate signs of revision. Many Thai academic colleagues have fewer options, and in the past years some have judged it necessary to leavetheir country behind in the hope of pursuing scholarly enquiry in environments where restrictions on commentary about important social and political issues are not so significant.

The irony, perhaps, is that research in Myanmar today is arguably easier, in terms of official research access, liberty of interaction with informants, and all the rest, than ever before. I judge that today’s conditions are temporary. Yet even in sensitive borderland environments researchers are able to carve out sufficient space to adequately, and critically, engage with Myanmar societies and cultures, at this time of great flux. The other presentations here this morning have amply demonstrated the potential of such studies.

When research in Myanmar falls, as it probably will, into a period of constraint and caution we will look to those who managed to build new understandings, and harness fresh data, for guidance. They will be the benchmark for years to come. It is also worth mentioning that as the number of scholars focused on other parts of mainland Southeast Asia has remained steady, or fallen, a mini-boom has emerged for Myanmar. This isn’t just an Australian National University phenomenon but it’s clear that our University is well-positioned to forge new paths through what remains often difficult academic terrain.

And yet what is most apparent is that our grounded perspectives, based in the fluency of culture and language that prolonged periods of field research can bring, now need modification for the new spaces that are more explicitly at the margins of knowing. It is these cyber-spaces, online spheres, pixilised universes, that are increasingly re-shaping how all borderlands can be conceived.

It is a little known fact that the inspiration for New Mandala, founded by ProfessorAndrew Walker and I back in June 2006, is firmly rooted in the Thai-Yunnan Project. Andrew, alongside Professor Nick Tapp, inherited much of the responsibility for mainland Southeast Asia research during the rebuilding phase that followed Gehan and Ted’s untimely deaths. Those of you who know Andrew will appreciate that he has often sought to push the boundaries: he is the classic borderlands scholar in that sense. New Mandala was the response to the constriction that was occurring in academic debates as moribund publishing models failed to keep pace with the requirements of an enmeshed, entangled, electronic world.

The borders that New Mandala has hopped have been many. In eight-and-a-half years the website has garnered a reputation that challenges some of our expectations of academic work and the people who produce it. Fair to say, it is not everyone’s cup of tea. And yet, from my vantage, it fits quite neatly into the evolution of publishing, researching and interacting that informed the genesis of the Thai-Yunnan Project, and sustained it through so many successful years.

With this cursory treatment of research practice across the borderlands of Thailand, Myanmar and more out of the way, let me make some final reflections. They could just as easily be thought as provocations.

First, it is clear that when we stop experimenting and fail to learn what we can from other ways of being and doing, the entire academic experience, for those of us who accept the vocation, begins to unravel. The grumbling about the state of modern Universities is, for mine, not a crisis of political economy, or ideology, or society. It is, more squarely, a crisis of imagination.

Second, border crossing and borderland research made sense in the context of the Thai-Yunnan project because the frontiers had for too long been thought impregnable. To do research from China, to Vietnam, to Burma, to northern Thailand, to even perhaps dream of venturing to northeast India, was to break down all of the basic expectations that came with academic research. It would never again be neat, bounded and predictable. For that we owe the grandfathers or great-grandfathers of Thai-Yunnan research our many thanks.

Third, there is the fundamental challenge of building meaningful collaborations, nurturing institutions, and making some impact at the conceptual level while still keeping a weather eye on the logistical foundations of what we do. The Thai-Yunnan Project was famous for the style in which it could communicate research across borders, to multiple audiences, to feed the basic human instinct of curiosity about other people. None of this was easy. Indeed the force multiplier technologies at our disposal today mean that we have no excuse for failing to get our messages out, particularly compared to those who laboriously edited the hard-copy Thai-Yunnan Project Newsletters, and then sealed those hundreds of envelopes.

By concluding with these points of provocation I would suggest that the Australian National University has not seen the end of the creative and imaginative work that led to the Thai-Yunnan heyday. It is a credit to Roger Casas and Dr Phillip Taylor, and so many others, that the effort continues. Indeed as the research on borderlands presented here today suggests, we have new concepts and intriguing new fields where our ideas can be tested.

It is a splendid thing to be part of a long line, an anthropological lineage, where the genesis of the next big idea is still out there, somewhere across the border.

Dr Nicholas Farrelly is the co-founder of New Mandala and is based in the Australian National University’s School of International, Political and Strategic Studies. He holds an Australian Research Council fellowship for a study of Myanmar’s political cultures “in transition” This text was prepared for a workshopheld at the ANU on 27 November 2014, titled “At Risk, Under Care: Nurturing culture, the environment and the human in the Thai-Yunnan region”.

Jokowi: hope for Papua? | New Mandala

Jokowi: hope for Papua? | New Mandala

 

HIPOLITUS YOLISANDRY RINGGI WANGGE, GUEST CONTRIBUTOR, 

24 NOVEMBER 2014

One of Jokowi’s ‘trademarks’, dialogue, offers the best chance of giving disaffected Papua what it needs and wants, writes Hipolitus Yolisandry Ringgi Wangge.

During his presidential campaign, Joko Widodo, widely known as “Jokowi,” visited the Indonesia’s most eastern province, Papua, three times.

He made one key promise to Papuans—giving it more attention.

This attention includes promoting welfare instead of security , building more infrastructure, and providing more access to education and medical services. All of these seem relatively similar to former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s (SBY) promises when he came to office in 2004.

Whether Jokowi’s government can keep his promises to the Papuan people, rest on three factors; affirmative action, welfare policy, and the military . And all of these have to factor in Jakarta’s decision-making elites. In this regard, it’s useful to look at what previous governments did in Papua.

Since the downfall of Suharto in 1998, Papua has been one of Indonesia’s three trouble spots, haunting every regime. Of the other two East Timor attained its independence in 1999, and Aceh received its special privileges under the 2005 Helsinki Agreement. Even though, the Papuan rebellion movement is categorised as a small-scale armed struggle, there is no comprehensive policy that can suppress its aspiration to detach from Indonesia.

Former presidents BJ Habibie and Abdurahman “Gus Dur” Wahid undertook affirmative action in Papua. They knew that as the Papuan people are a minority group which has been excluded and underrepresented historically, measures had to be taken to raise participation at various level of society. Habibie invited 100 Papuan representatives to hold a discussion in Jakarta in 1999 and promised to initiate an equal dialogue between Jakarta and Papua.

Yet the dialogue never happened. Gus Dur proposed more progressive measures by allowing the Papuans to hold the First Papua National Assembly in June 2000, crafting a space for Papua to reclaim its names as “Papua,” not “Irian,” and permitting the Papuan flag to be raised alongside the Indonesian flag. He also included Freddy Numberi, the first Papuan after the downfall of Suharto, to become a cabinet member. However, both presidents firmly rejected the idea of West Papuan independence.

Megawati, the daughter of Indonesia’s founding father Sukarno, amplified the military approach to Pa[ua rather than taking more comprehensive affirmative actions. She launched the Special Autonomy Law (Otsus) in 2001 as a way to uplift Papuans’ lives, yet she also issued a presidential decree (Inpres No.1/2003) to divide Papua into three new provinces, thus contradicting the spirit of the autonomy law. Moreover, Megawati’s feeblest policy allowed the military to tightening its grip over Papua, an action it had long favored. The 2001 killing of charismatic Papuan leader Theis Elluay, by the Indonesian Special Forces (Kopassus), occurred under her tenure.

Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who took over government in 2004 and left office in October 2014, combined affirmative action and welfare policies without thoroughly reviewing the military’s presence in Papua. During his 10-year tenure, SBY included three Papuans in his government. In 2010, he initiated the mega investment project, the Merauke Integrated Food and Energy Estate (MIFEE), at the expense of customary rights over land that belongs to Papuans. In 2012, he proposed an ad-hoc agency, the Unit for the Acceleration of Development in Papua and West Papua (UP4PB) which has had no impact whatsoever.

Additionally, SBY failed to review security policies that have been in place since this province was forcefully integrated into Indonesia in 1969. Human rights abuses by the military still frequently occur.. Ironically, the military reform initiated during SBY’s first term has had no impact in Papua.  Antonius Made argues that military reform failed at the domestic level, particularly in conflicted regions. Three indicators of the failure are the military deployment and its relation to the rise of human rights violations, the military involvement in local politics, and its close ties to business in Papua.

When it comes to Jokowi, many Papuans believe that he will overhaul current conditions in the province. And yet it seems his government will continue what has been done so far. Shortly after he was inaugurated, he appointed Yohana Susana Yembise, the first female Papuan minister, in an act of affirmative action. However, there is no policy yet directly addressing the Papuan issue.

There is also the question of how Jokowi will deal with development in Papua. This concern is related to the investment-oriented agenda he presented in front of business leaders at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in China a couple of weeks ago. Whether or not there will be another project like MIFEE is still a big question.

In terms of welfare reforms, Jokowi’s government has moved forward by providing three cards; the prosperous family card, the health card, and the smart card. All of these cards are related to the welfare program he promised during the presidential campaign. However, these cards seem unlikely to deal with current conditions in Papua. The basic prerequisite of this program is infrastructure readiness and its stakeholders.  In Papua, as Bobby Anderson argues in Inside Indonesia (Jul-Sep 2013), it is about not only hospitals or schools, but also who will be serving as a doctor, nurse, or teacher. In this regard, the central government has to review all welfare programs in Papua before promoting other programs.

Another crucial policy that will be launching in coming months is the transmigration policy. The new transmigration minister, Marwan Jafar, proposed a transmigration program for people from outside islands, primarily from Java, to go to Papua. Shortly after the announcement, many Papuans raised their concerns and firmly rejected the policy. This concern is highly understandable.

According to the Justice and Peace Secretariat of the Jayapura Bishopic Mission huge numbers of people transmigrating has negatively affected the indigenous population by subordinating Papuans in cultural, political, and economic spheres.  This shift in population leads to never-ending conflicts between the settlers from the outside islands and the indigenous people.

Furthermore, the transmigration policy will exaggerate the current Papuan demographic structure and also the relation between the central government and Papuans.  The decline of the indigenous population is obvious. According to Anderson (quoted in The Jakarta Globe), migrants from other islands now compose almost half the population of Papua province. In addition, while the ratio of indigenous people and non-indigenous people, was 52-48 in 2010, Anderson predicts there may be 60 migrants to every 40 Papuans in 2014.

In the security arena, there will not be any significant change under Jokowi, particularly the huge number of military troops in Papua. This tendency can be seen by the appointment of one of the most controversial and conservative generals, Ryamizard Ryacudu, as the Indonesian defense minister. Papuans still remember him as a general who praised as heroes the Kopassuss soldiers who killed Theys Elluay.

In addition, Jokowi has appointed Andhika Perkasa as commander of the presidential security detail. According to the Jakarta Post, Andhika was allegedly involved in the killing of Theis Elluay when he was a Koppasus officer back in 2002. Other former generals with bad human rights records, such as Hendropriyono, Wiranto, and Sutiyoso also have been in Jokowi’s inner circle. All of these figures will maintain the military conservative value of defending the unity of the country by wiping out all rebellion groups, even at the expense of civilians–as it has over the years.

All the policies and actions proposed so far clearly describe the ‘elitist’, Jakarta-centric way of thinking on the Papuan issue.  For example, Marfan Jafar is a former politician from the National Awakening Party (PKB) that has supported Jokowi. As a politician without sufficient background on the Papuan issue, Jafar clearly has been initiating an ill-constructed policy.  He thinks by sending many migrants to Papua, the problem of poverty in some densely populated islands, will partly be handled without looking at the real condition of the Papuan people.

Accordingly, one can argue that Jokowi lacks ministers who can absorb his vision deeply. Because he has to compromise with those elites, oligarchs, and former generals, he has to sacrifice the people’s hope. This is an irony of democracy. Jokowi has been elected constitutionally, but he cannot fully exercise his right to govern because he has to deal with those shadowy figures, which have no constitution rights whatsoever.

Beyond these challenges, Jokowi has to execute a long-awaited dialogue with the Papuans. This is the prominent solution to deal with all problems in Papua. Consultations are the only way to know deeply and thoroughly what Papuans need. In turn, the central government can form policy that positively affects Papuans. The Papua Peace Network (JDP) formed by the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) has been conducting preliminary consultations that can be used as a gateway to create a more intensive and comprehensive dialogue with the Papuans.

A network of various political actors in Papua has been set up through the consultations.It would be constructive if the central government gradually held discussions with various actors, such as local activists, student activists, religious figures, armed groups, and particularly those who are living and struggling for Papuan independence from abroad.

Dialogue was one of Jokowi’s “trademarks” (beside the impromptu visit), when he was mayor of Solo, and governor of Jakarta. This is a real opportunity for Jokowi to execute the dialogue with the Papuan people. By supporting consultation with the people, the government can send a strong signal about building trust and eliminating suspicions regarding Papua.

Hipolitus Yolisandry Ringgi Wangge, is an Arryman Scholar and a visiting scholar at the Buffet Center for International and Comparative Studies (BCICS), Northwestern University.  

Reality check on Islam, Buddhism in Myanmar | New Mandala

Reality check on Islam, Buddhism in Myanmar | New Mandala

 

MELISSA CROUCH, GUEST CONTRIBUTOR

 – 17 NOVEMBER 2014

The West has been wondering what has gone wrong with Buddhism in Myanmar since 2012 and the violence primarily by Buddhists against Muslims. Yet I want to suggest that this is the wrong question, and that the West needs to take a look in the mirror. The West’s skewed view of Buddhism as a ‘peaceful’ religion, combined with the stereotypical view of Islam as inherently ‘violent’, are a core part of the problem.

Over the past month several reports and a barrage of media reports have surfaced in an attempt to explain the violence against Muslims in Myanmar. Yet implicitly such reports often promote the ‘real’ teachings of Buddhism as a ‘peaceful’ religion, and this adds to the Western stereotype of Islam as somehow ‘violent’.

Let me illustrate this by taking a different perspective to some of the issued raised byContesting Buddhist Narratives. This report prioritises understanding Buddhist fears and concerns, represented in the irrational ranting of the monk (and former convicted criminal) U Wirathu, who is mentioned or quoted from at least 25 times in the report. Yes, we need to understand all aspects of the conflict, but we have paid so little attention to Muslim communities in Myanmar, and this lack of information continues to fuel stereotypes about both Buddhism and Islam. This obscures Muslims’ concerns and fails to acknowledge that Muslims have serious fears too.

The basic premise of the report is that one key way forward is to use Buddhist narratives of non-violence. This is one option, but what about other alternatives, such as secularism? There is very clear precedent for this in Myanmar. General Aung San, the revered martyr and national independence hero, was a secularist. For example, in the drafting of the 1947 Constitution, he insisted that Burma should be a secular state. It was only after his assassination (when he died alongside his colleague and Muslim cabinet member, U Razak) that the provision in the draft constitution on religion was revised to give Buddhism a ‘special position’ (this was actually based on the Irish Constitution and its recognition of Catholicism). Things of course turned from bad to worse in 1961 when U Nu passed a constitutional amendment to make Buddhism the state religion, and the coup of 1962 followed soon after. Collective popular memory in Myanmar of General Aung San seems to have conveniently forgotten that he stood for secularism.

The strength of the report is its knowledge of Buddhism, yet it devotes just one paragraph to representing Muslim views. I understand the report does not claim to focus on understanding Muslims, but that’s precisely my point. Why do Buddhists who are promoting violence deserve our understanding, and Muslims who have suffered the consequences do not? This lack of focus on Muslims has led to many misunderstandings, not least the fact that the West equates Muslims in Myanmar with the term ‘Rohingya’. There is little appreciation of the diversity within the Muslim communities in Myanmar, nor is there any acknowledgement that most Muslims in Myanmar are probably not (or do not self-identify as) Rohingya. The concerns of Muslims in Rakhine State are acute and need to be addressed, but we can’t continue to ignore the fact that Muslim communities can be found right across Myanmar and that they have been severely affected by this violence.

The report also hints at the need to reform Islamic education, although it rightly acknowledges that efforts to promote tolerance in religious-based schools should take place in all religions. But let’s interrogate this view that somehow Islamic education institutions in Myanmar are partly blame (which is also what the Rakhine Commission Report indicated). Using Islamic education institutions as a convenient scapegoat indicates both an ignorance about these institutions, and a failure to remember the past. For example, prior to 1962 there were top schools run by Muslims (and there were also Muslim children who attended top Christian schools) and these institutions provided a broad education, alongside an Islamic education. When Ne Win took over in 1962, Islamic schools, like all other religious schools, were at risk of nationalisation. And many of these Islamic schools were nationalised. Some, however, that were able to convince Ne Win’s regime that they would only teach a narrow Islamic studies curriculum were allowed to continue to function as madrasas. So I think we need to keep past government policies in mind, before we go pointing the blame at Islamic education institutions.

The report does provide some interesting examples of how Buddhists are participating in inter-religious dialogue. But it fails to mention that some Muslims have been doing this for decades in Myanmar. There has been a very distinct movement in Myanmar for a very long time of Muslims who have bent over backwards to fit in, to tolerate Buddhism and its traditions, and to show that they belong to Myanmar too. These ‘Burmese Muslims’ have insisted on using Burmese language (rather than Arabic or Urdu) as the language of instruction in Islamic schools. These Burmese Muslims have insisted that their women should be free to wear Burmese dress if they choose (which is more revealing than traditional Islamic teachings allow). I am not saying Muslims should have to identify as ‘Burmese’ or compromise their religion in this way; of course if they chose to retain their Indian or Chinese or Shan identity alongside their Muslim identity, they should be allowed to too.

We need to put aside this preoccupation with proving that Buddhism is an inherently peaceful religion while remaining ambiguously silent on Islam. Western media and scholarship needs to intentionally work to dispel the assumptions that Islam is bad and Buddhism is good, that Islam is violent and Buddhism is non-violent, that a monk in a saffron robe is peaceful, but that a man with a beard and wearing a skull cap is violent. These dichotomies are false and contribute to the tensions.

It is time that the West takes a serious reality check on how it views Islam and Buddhism. While the violence and discrimination against Muslims is a reflection on Myanmar, the response of the West is a reflection of persistent stereotypes in the West about Islam and Buddhism.

Melissa Crouch is a Research Fellow at the National University of Singapore

Myanmar: The calm before the storm? | New Mandala

Myanmar: The calm before the storm? | New Mandala

 

MATTHEW J. WALTON, GUEST CONTRIBUTOR, 

16 NOVEMBER 2014

How should we interpret the current state of anti-Muslim Buddhist nationalism in Myanmar that has emerged as one of the greatest threats to the country’s still-uncertain political transition? Compared with previous moments, the last few months have been relatively quiet, with no riots or bloodshed. U Wirathu’s summit meetingwith Bodu Bala Sena leaders in Sri Lanka was cause for concern, but it is still unclear what cooperation might actually materialize between Buddhist partisans in the two countries. Large demonstrations in several cities in favor of four pieces of religious legislation proposed by monks that unfavorably target Muslims have kept the issue in the headlines, but given other pressing constitutional and legislative concerns, there seems to be no rush in Parliament to pass them.

Is this merely a lull, staged possibly in connection with the visits of so many world leaders this month? Can we expect—as many do—to see a renewal of religious violence, possibly even intensifying as we move closer to the 2015 presidential elections?

My colleague Susan Hayward and I have recently published a paper through the East-West Center’s Policy Studies series, analyzing the current religious conflict in Myanmar, including the historical dimensions of Buddhist nationalism, the contemporary anxieties that fuel it, and alternate interpretations that could counter its current anti-Muslim orientation. We outline the many factors that have contributed to the present situation, all of which are likely to persist for at least the near future. While the piece is a relatively comprehensive overview up to the moment, the situation on the ground continues to change.

Between the first draft as a conference paper in November 2013 and revisions in mid-2014, the 969 Movement was eclipsed by MaBaTha (The Organization for the Protection of Race and Religion) while the strategy of “buy Buddhist” boycotts of Muslim businesses shifted to a legislative agenda, with large public rallies and cooperation between nationalist groups and political parties. As the tactics of nationalist organizations shift in response to changing political opportunity structures, anyone seeking to effectively respond to religious violence and discrimination must take this into account.

While the first year or so of religious conflict in Myanmar saw little organized opposition, eventually civil society was galvanized in important ways. In March 2014, many groups came together to create the Pan Zagar campaign, which has sought to promote “flower speech” on- and offline, and to discourage people from dangerous or incendiary speech. Civil society groups also spoke out strongly against the proposed law that would restrict inter-religious marriage. Women and women’s organizationstook the lead in this case, debunking the nationalists’ argument that the bill was designed to protect women and instead demonstrating how it was a further restriction of women’s freedoms.  The price for taking these public stands in opposition to the legislation was high. Some activists faced death threats for speaking out. While human rights activists in Myanmar are no strangers to these kinds of threats, having faced persecution from the paramilitary thugs of previous regimes, the shadowy source of the threats in today’s more complex political environment heightens their chilling effect.

Although the current moment may appear to be a lull, it is critical that those who oppose religious violence and discrimination use these moments of relative calm to counter misguided and bigoted views and to renew social and economic ties between religious communities that have been strained or severed by recent tensions. Effectively responding to religious intolerance in Myanmar will take coordinated efforts on several fronts. Long-term efforts to redesign monastic and school curricula to promote peace and inclusion should be complemented by outreach programs in the short-term that counter misinformed rumors about Muslims that have circulated in Burmese society for decades.

Campaigns that seek to gradually change social norms can also bear fruit now as networks like Pan Zagar create safe spaces for people to stand up to their friends, neighbors and co-workers by challenging religious stereotypes or hurtful language. And of course, the Myanmar government will have to be a part of the solution, ensuring that law enforcement is ultimately empowered as a tool of justice, while being monitored and guided in the interim, as security forces and government officials navigate their roles in a new system that requires them to be compassionate and fair rather than patron-bound and fearful.

We know both the opportunities and the motivation to use religious identity for political gain will increase as the 2015 elections draw closer. Now is the time to ensure that we are doing our best to understand this rapidly changing political landscape and to put in place programs that will strengthen community resilience to withstand these inter-religious tensions and limit the possibility of violence in the short term while building a more tolerant and just Myanmar in which all communities feel secure and included.

Matthew J. Walton is the Aung San Suu Kyi Senior Research Fellow in Modern Burmese Studies, St Antony’s College, University of Oxford

Big agenda for ethnic groups in Myanmar | New Mandala

Big agenda for ethnic groups in Myanmar | New Mandala

 

YAW BAWM MANGSHANG, GUEST CONTRIBUTOR, 

14 NOVEMBER 2014

After enduring decades of brutal military dictatorship, the people of multi-ethnic Myanmar finally got their chance to try democracy. In November 2010, the people of Myanmar voted for the first time in twenty years. While the election was an important step toward peace, Myanmar’s military maintains a tight hold on political power, making progress difficult. The international community has supported the democratic transition, but has focused too narrowly on governmental reforms and economic development, while the demands of Myanmar’s ethnic minorities are marginalized. The fact remains that disenfranchising ethnic minorities will prolong armed conflict and possibly derail the democratization process. Thus, for Myanmar’s democracy to succeed, the international community must actively promote ethnic minorities.

The ethnic dimension of Myanmar is extremely complex, but the major anti-government players consist of seven groups, each possessing armed rebel forces. Among these dominant groups, the Kachin Independence Organization is yet to sign a ceasefire agreement with the government, and is a member of the United Nationalities Federal Council, the political alliance of ethnic rebel groups. While each ethnic group is distinct from the others, most find common ground in their mutual resistance to centralized rule. The political demands of Myanmar’s ethnic groups revolve around this issue of autonomy and the internal sovereignty they were promised by the Panglong Agreement of 1947, a treaty unifying Burma with several neighboring territories also under British control. The Panglong Agreement was signed in order to more effectively push for independence, but only under the condition of retaining autonomy. Without this agreement, minorities argue, there would be no unification in the first place and minority regions of Myanmar might today be separate and independent states.

The 2010 election renewed ethnic minorities’ hopes for negotiating adequate decentralization, but the winning party—the Union Solidarity and Development Party—is tacitly supported by the military and is dominated by former generals. This new, nominally civilian government led by President Thein Sein, also a former general, hasinitiated several widely praised (yet ineffective) reforms. The so-called civilian government has become a darling of the West, as evidenced by the lifting of most economic sanctions. In 2013, Myanmar’s military was invited as an observer to Cobra Gold, a major, regional military exercise led by the United States.

The warming relationship between the West and Myanmar’s government is based on the promise of reforms, but those reforms have not empowered the country’s ethnic minorities or granted them any meaningful autonomy — both essential conditions for ending armed conflict. However, the government’s actions demonstrate a reluctance to change.

President Thein Sein touted national reconciliation and reform after coming to power in 2011, and his government has engaged with Myanmar’s rebel ethnic groups in over a dozen peace talks. However, the May 2014 attacks and numerous battles against the Kachin Independence Army, the displacement of over 100,000 refugees, and continued military buildup in ethnic areas make ethnic groups and Myanmar analysts alike question the sincerity of the peace negotiations.

The unwillingness of the government to share power with ethnic minorities is reflected in the 2008 constitution. When the constitution was drafted, most armed ethnic groups participated and presented their demands to be incorporated, but ultimately none were included. Now, rebel, ethnic groups and the government are at an impasse. The government insists rebel groups first lay down their arms, then convert to political parties and participate in elections under the framework of the constitution. But rebel groups, such as the Kachin Independence Organization, want political negotiation and constitutional reform before agreeing to a ceasefire. Many Myanmar observers see the current constitution as the mechanism preserving the military’s political power instead of more appropriately devolving power to ethnic groups.

Additionally, the government has wrongly blamed poverty as the driver of insurgency and has pursued economic development ahead of political negotiation, further rankling Myanmar’s ethnic groups. Economic development may benefit government officials, but it will not solve the conflict unless the demands of ethnic minorities are properly addressed.

Unfortunately, Myanmar’s lucrative business in natural resources blinds the international community to ethnic minorities’ grievances. To bolster peace in Myanmar, the international community must step back from rapid economic development and refocus on political negotiation. Otherwise, civil war will continue and the military will remain a powerful actor in Myanmar politics for years to come.

International influence is crucial for democracy to succeed in Myanmar and there are several actions that can facilitate the peace process.

First, the international community should acknowledge rebel groups as legitimate political entities representing their respective ethnic groups. Without explicit support from the international community, rebel groups have no leverage to enter political negotiation.

Second, the international community should not prematurely encourage foreign investment in Myanmar. Instead, investment, engagement with the military (which is blocking the democratic reform), and debt relief should be used as incentive for tangible political reform.

Third, the Myanmar government should be pressured to implement the peaceprocess in good faith, to cease military buildup in ethnic areas and, to stop ongoing military campaigns which could derail the nationwide ceasefire negotiation process.

Fourth, the international community should offer mediation for this delicate stage of the peace process and provide minority groups an assurance of security for participation in political talks.

Fifth, the international community should recognize the importance of providing autonomy to ethnic groups and should pressure the government to implement federalism accordingly.

Sixth, the Myanmar government should be pressured to allow humanitarian aid to be distributed to internally displaced people in Kachin State.

Additionally, the international community should urge the government to amend the 2008 constitution, which both prevents Aung San Suu Kyi from running for president in 2015 and enshrines military power in Myanmar politics.

These steps are vital to foster Myanmar’s fledgling democracy, but above all, the international community must not turn away from the people of Myanmar. Without support the conflict will continue, and if the international community does not stand up for Myanmar’s ethnic minorities, who will?

Yaw Bawm Mangshang is co-founder of the Nau Shawng Education Network (NSEN) with a goal of cultivating democratic culture through civic education and higher education opportunities for young people. NSEN is based in Myitkyina, Myanmar, where Yaw Bawm worked as director until mid-2012. With a Fulbright Scholarship, he is currently studying for a Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy at the Fletcher School, Tufts University. He can be reached atwunpawng@gmail.com or mangshang.bawm@tufts.edu.

Review of Kingdom in Crisis | New Mandala

Review of Kingdom in Crisis | New Mandala

 

PATRICK JORY AND LEE JONES, 

12 NOVEMBER 2014

Andrew MacGregor Marshall, A Kingdom in Crisis: Thailand’s Struggle for Democracy in the Twenty-First Century.

London: Zed Books, 2014. Pp. viii, 220; note on names, map, notes, bibliography, index.

***

The long-awaited publication of Andrew MacG. Marshall’s book occasions two reviews, from very different angles, from Patrick Jory and Lee Jones.

***

Reviewed by Patrick Jory.

It is well known that Thailand has been in the throes of a debilitating political crisis since 2005. But what is the real cause of that crisis?This is the question that Andrew MacGregor Marshall attempts to answer in this provocative, much-awaited book, A Kingdom in Crisis: Thailand’s Struggle for Democracy. A clue to the argument is in the book’s title: it is a crisis of a “kingdom”, or, more specifically, Thailand’s monarchy.

Marshall, a former Reuters journalist, has for some years now been the foremost commentator on the taboo subject of the role of the monarchy in Thailand’s politics. He has been a particularly active user of on-line media to get his ideas across to the public. He “broke” the story of the Wikileaks cables that dealt with Thailand, in which senior figures in the Thai establishment discuss, among other things, the involvement of Queen Sirikit in the 2006 coup and their antipathy towards Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn. He has written and published on-line the extended essays, “Thai Story”and “The Tragedy of King Bhumibol”, which broach some of the material that is presented in A Kingdom in Crisis. His Facebook page is a go-to site for news on members of the Thai royal family, and he has a large number of followers on Twitter. A Kingdom in Crisis represents the fullest expression of the views that Marshall has been making known in recent years.

His argument is that at the heart of the political crisis that has convulsed Thailand since 2005 is a bitterly fought but undeclared struggle over the succession to the throne.

The remainder of this review is available here.

***

Reviewed by Lee Jones.

Andrew MacGregor Marshall’s A Kingdom in Crisis has been eagerly and long awaited by many Thailand watchers. Having resigned from a senior Reuters post in 2011 to publish a series of articles on Thailand’s political crisis based on leaked US diplomatic documents, “AMM” has become a vociferous critic of Thai elites and especially the monarchy, developing a wide following on social media. A Kingdom in Crisis was anticipated as the definitive statement of AMM’s most controversial thesis: that “an unacknowledged conflict over royal succession is at the heart of Thailand’s twenty-first political crisis” (page 3). However, despite its many merits, the book does not quite clinch this argument.

A Kingdom in Crisis is a bold, uncompromising and highly critical survey of Thailand’s ongoing political crisis. The focus, however, is squarely on the monarchy, rather than on its place within Thailand’s broader polity and political economy. The first nine chapters all relate to the period before 2000, delving into ancient history to underscore the brutality of the absolutist monarchy and the normality of power struggles over the succession. Only three chapters then deal with the current conjuncture and make AMM’s central argument. The background is, of course, interesting and useful, and although it may contain little new for Thailand specialists, to collate the truly damning history of the Thai monarchy in an accessible manner is a worthy endeavour.This is particularly true in a context in which even mere academic commentary on the monarchy’s ancient history risks prosecution and hefty jail sentences under Thailand’s deeply obnoxious lèse majesté laws.

The remainder of this review is available here.

Analysis: The frosty handshake that could thaw Sino-Japanese relations | Asian Correspondent

Analysis: The frosty handshake that could thaw Sino-Japanese relations | Asian Correspondent
 Michele Penna Nov 11, 2014

The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting seemingly worked its magic: Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe finally shook hands on Oct. 10, after two years of suspended high level visits and of deteriorating relations.

The graphic was remarkably unconvincing: against the flowery choreography of the Great Hall of People, a wary Mr. Abe looks at cameras with a barely visible smirk, while Mr. Xi seems to make no attempt to smile at all (see for yourself in the video above). But shake hands they did, and that is what everyone was waiting for.

Besides, by the time the widely expected meeting took place the real big news had already been out for a while. Last Friday, the two countries agreed to disagree on the disputed Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands, stating that they are willing to set up a crisis management system in order to prevent confrontations from escalating.

The dispute has been poisoning mutual relations between the two countries since 2012, when the Japanese government decided to nationalize the islands, which used to be property of a private family. Beijing argued that such a decision was an infringement on its territorial integrity and a crisis ensued, preventing the two leaders from holding meetings and causing some serious damage to business relations.

The agreement reached by China’s State Councilor Yang Jiechi and Japan’s National Security Advisor Shotaro Yachi – here is the version translated by Xinhua – includes four points. Two are fairly vague: the first affirms that Beijing and Tokyo will “continue to develop the China-Japan strategic relationship of mutual benefit,” while the second points out that “the two sides have reached some agreement on overcoming political obstacles in the bilateral relations.”

The really interesting stuff comes with the third, according to which, “The two sides have acknowledged that different positions exist between them regarding the tensions which have emerged in recent years over the Diaoyu Islands and some waters in the East China Sea, and agreed to prevent the situation from aggravating through dialogue and consultation and establish crisis management mechanisms to avoid contingencies.” The fourth, finally, states that “The two sides have agreed to gradually resume political, diplomatic and security dialogue through various multilateral and bilateral channels and to make efforts to build political mutual trust.”

“I think it’s monumentally important,” said William Choong, Shangri-La Dialogue Senior Fellow International Institute for Strategic Studies, in a phone interview with the Asian Correspondent. “They are the second and third largest economies in the world: because of their different opinions, the bilateral relationship has been bad and that has affected the whole strategic triangle between China, Japan and the United States. Besides, they have also affected Asia’s emerging security architecture.”

According to Dr. Choong, the institution of a mechanism to prevent crises from reaching dangerous levels – essentially a hotline to be used for direct contact in case of incidents – is an important bit of the deal. “What happened in the past – vessels being arrested, naval confrontations, etc. – all these incidents would be avoided with a crisis management system,” said Dr. Choong.

The APEC meeting might have provided a good excuse for the two statesmen to get together, but it would be simplistic to think that what was a fraught relationship yesterday was healed yesterday just for the benefit of the cameras.

According to Jim Nolt, Adjunct Professor of U.S.-China relations at New York University and Senior Fellow at the World Policy Institute, economic headaches might go a long way in explaining why this limited agreement has been reached now rather than earlier. “I think it is partly based on the fact that there is bad economic news in both China and Japan. They need to continue to do trade and business, it would be bad for both if that did not do so. Besides, the agreement would help restore confidence and benefit their respective countries,” he said in an interview with the Asian Correspondent.

It should be noted that China recorded a five-year low growth of 7.3 percent in the third quarter, raising doubts whether the government’s 7.5 percent yearly target can be met. In Japan, Abeconomics – the set of measures used by the Abe administration to kick-start the Japanese economy – has not stood up to the expectations it had raised. Against such background, warm economic ties would come as a relief. As Prof. Nolt put it, the two Asian nations “realize they cannot afford a dispute.”

It will be interesting to see what the two countries’ respective nationalists will make of the deal. According to analysts not much, as both parties can somehow claim victory: China has finally got Japan to agree that there is a dispute (even though the Japanese side reportedly said they merely acknowledge that Beijing has a different point of view.) Tokyo can also claim that it has managed to mend ties while not giving up territory.

Matthew Funaiole, a research associate with the Foreign Policy Centre, told us in an email interview that the agreement may in fact indicate that both sides are becoming increasingly attentive to nationalist movements. “In Japan, nationalists and conservatives (many of whom support Prime Minister Abe) may interpret the agreement as evidence of China backing down from its territorial claims,” Dr. Funaiole said. In China, “the agreement may afford the CCP the opportunity to reaffirm its legitimacy to the international community, in light of the recent crackdown on protestors in Hong Kong.”

Good as it may be, the handshake will hardly be the end of tensions. First of all, the ‘agreement to disagree’ does not per se rule out incidents, which could still aggravate the situation. Furthermore, no direct mention was made of the other significant irritant in Sino-Japanese relations: the Yasukuni Shrine, where the spirits of rank-and-file Japanese soldiers sleep next to those of World War II criminals. In 2013, a visit by Mr. Abe provided fuel to nationalistic debates in China and apparently supported the theory that Japan has not yet fully come to terms with its imperialistic past.

An end to official visits to the shrine – along with the recognition that a territorial dispute exists – were the preconditions set by China for meeting with Japanese leaders. Beijing must have shown some flexibility in that regard, because little appears to have changed: all that has been said, it seems, is that Japan “must look at history squarely and move towards the future.”

Sodomy and sedition: desperate times for democracy in Malaysia | New Mandala

Sodomy and sedition: desperate times for democracy in Malaysia | New Mandala

 

ASIA PACIFIC EDITOR, 

7 NOVEMBER 2014

Photo by udeyismail on flickr.

As Anwar Ibrahim’s fate hangs in the balance, Malaysia’s democratic chances are slipping further away, writes James Giggacher. 

Malaysia’s long-time opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s fate still hangs in the balance; his political future as tenuous as the sodomy charges brought against him.

Since October 27 he has been fighting a five-year jail sentence for allegedly sodomising an aide handed down by the nation’s Appeals Court in March – itself an overturning of an earlier acquittal by the High Court.

It’s the second time Anwar’s faced sodomy charges, the first being in 1998 during the failed ‘reformasi’ movement. If the Federal Court upholds this latest conviction, Anwar will also lose his status as an MP and not be allowed to engage in politics for years.

Anwar’s rejected the idea of living in exile to stay in Malaysia and face the charges. It’s his final appeal. A bold, courageous move; maybe a stupid one born from his unfailing naivety about the prospects for political freedom in his homeland.

It’s not the ‘crime’ he is charged with, or the evidence given in this final courtroom charade (underpants and KY jelly have featured), that is truly sordid. Rather, it is what the whole sorry saga says about the declining prospects for democracy in Malaysia.

Many inside and outside the country see the charges as nothing more than politically motivated and trumped up – the latest shot in a long running war against the most powerful threat to ruling coalition, Barisan Nasional.

“The ‘sodomy’ charges against Anwar Ibrahim are a blatant attempt by the Malaysian authorities to silence and undermine a critical voice,” said Amnesty International in a statement the day the court case started. “If Anwar Ibrahim is jailed, Amnesty International will consider him a prisoner of conscience.”

Anwar and his Pakatan Rakyat (People’s Alliance) coalition took incumbent Prime Minister Najib Razak and Barisan Nasional to the line in last year’s general elections, winning 51 per cent of the popular vote, but only 40 per cent of seats in parliament.

But while GE13 was billed as the democratic dawn many had longed for so long, Anwar once again found himself on the sidelines. With no one to take up the mantle, the 67-year-old still finds himself leader of Malaysia’s “rainbow” opposition.

The ‘gerrymandering’ of seats saw Barisan Nasional win the election by 133 seats to 89. The result, their narrowest parliamentary win and worst result ever, spooked those who have ruled Malaysia uninterrupted since independence in 1957 using a volatile mix of ethnic-based politics and emergency powers, all managed by the velvet glove of economic growth.

This was compounded by the election results of five years prior; Barisan’s eroding base is a trend which had begun in 2008, when it failed to win the ‘moral victory’ of a two-thirds majority in parliament. Yet, a general upswing in support since then, let alone winning the popular vote in 2013, wasn’t enough to see the opposition remove Barisan’s grip on power. It’s largely because the political deck is stacked in their favour.

While the elections were “partially” free, according to key regional think tanks, they were far from fair.

ANU political scientist Edward Aspinall points to gerrymandering, as well as the fuzzy line between the state and government as key reasons why Barisan held onto government despite losing the popular vote. More worrying, they are indicators of Malaysia’s increasingly less than democratic system.

His colleague Ross Tapsell has also highlighted how Barisan were able to maintaincontrol and domination over the mainstream media during the elections, even in the face of apparent freedoms brought in by online and social media.

GE13 also saw widespread claims of electoral fraud and irregularities; particularly around the integrity of the electoral roll, postal and early votes, and polling – all pointed out by Bridget Welsh at the Center for East Asia Democratic Studies.

Instances of vote-buying and fly-in voters corralled to cast their ballots for Barisan were clear on the day. Meredith Weiss, a researcher from SUNY monitored the election campaign as part of a research project funded by ANU.

“Today has been punctuated most notably by calls of Bangladeshis, Indonesians, Filipinos, and other migrant workers, allegedly gifted with identity cards, then transported by the plane load to wherever their votes (for Barisan Nasional of course)  are most needed,” she wrote for New Mandala last May.

But it’s more than dirty politics at play; at the heart of the Anwar case is a Malaysia where political freedom is in freefall.

Human Rights Watch says that since his shaky victory in GE13, Najib Razak has ushered in an era of deteriorating rights – including new and revised laws permitting detention without trial, arrests of opposition activists for peaceful protests, and attempts to shut down human rights NGOs.

Then there is the archaic Sedition Act.

Provisions of the sedition law are extremely wide-ranging, and as Human Rights Watch notes, the way the law is worded makes it almost impossible to refute in court.

“The Sedition Act prohibits vague offenses such as uttering ‘any seditious words’ without defining what constitutes ‘sedition’ or ‘seditious words’. It broadly outlaws any ‘seditious tendency’ that would ‘bring into hatred or contempt or excite disaffection against any Ruler or against any Government’,” reads an online statement.

Since May this year around 20 sedition charges have been laid or enquiries initiated, against opposition leaders, activists, university scholars, journalists and students – despite Prime Minister Razak promising in July 2012 to repeal this catch-all act from a “bygone era”.

Legal proceedings are also still ongoing against two politicians and one NGO leader charged with sedition last year. Amnesty Intentional point to scores of others under investigation. Others say the number is as high as 40.

One of those is Rafizi Ramli – a 37-year-old politician from the opposition’s People’s Justice Party who has gained widespread prominence after a series of high-levelcorruption exposes.

Ramli is currently under investigation for writing about Anwar’s second sodomy case, and has also recently been charged under the Penal Code over a statement he made in February alleging political attempts to create racial and religious discord in Selangor.

In a recent interview with New Mandala Ramli pointed out the dire times for Malaysia’s democracy, opposition and Anwar.

“Of course you have to be hopeful [for Anwar]. Being an opposition party that was born out of a personal tragedy that happened to him, we can only survive by remaining hopeful. So we remain hopeful that his ‘so-called’ legal problem orchestrated by the government will end very soon,” said Ramli.

“Yet at the same time we are very realistic that he will remain a galvanising figure against the ruling party, and so long as he is actively engaged with the public… we have to remain realistic that there is a high possibility he will be sent to prison again.”

Of course none of this touches on the economic stagnation that Malaysia is currently trying to beat off. Will the velvet glove finally slip? If Anwar and the broader opposition’s situation is anything to go by, it’s already been replaced by a clenched fist.

James Giggacher is Asia Pacific editor at the Australian National University’s College of Asia and the Pacific. His views do not represent the University’s or the College’s.