It is still a "prison state", in terms of a lack of basic human rights for most of the population, even if nowadays it is a bit more of a " lower category security prison" than the "highest security prison" but the prison guards are still all round the walls and can cancel the "freer association " currently allowed in the prison yard, any time they choose.
The view of the state and society , its oppressive role, and the almost complete lack of basic "democratic" rights, in its broadest sense, is going to be very different from the perspective of the average Burmese peasant or worker than it is from your middle class western foreigner perspective. How you think you can possibly have your finger "on the national pulse" of willingness to revolt or not I really don't know. No-one in the Western expat communities in Tunisia, Egypt, or Libya had ANY idea those revolts were about to break out before they did - any more than the middle class Londoners had any idea that last years riots were about to break out just down the road. I think middle class expats should be cautious about suggesting they have the "measure" of the mood of the masses in foreign countries at their fingertips - especially in a society as repressed and volatile as Burma.
You seem strangely willing to buy into all the Burmese Junta's "democratisation" roadshow - with very little evidence that this reflects any substantial shift in the Junta's dtermination to hold on to all effective power for ever. The Egyptian Military Junta has just demonstrated the reality behind cosmetic "democratisation" moves - by abolishing the new parliament the instant it threatened their power. The Burmese Junta will be no different. Removing sanctions simply strengthens the position of the Ruling Junta. The mass of the Burmese people will gain nothing from it in the long term.
Your ‘analysis’, whilst pretending to be informed, is so lacking in real engagement with Burma itself, is so one-dimensional, that you resort to embarrassing prison category caricatures to describe the lived experience of the whole populace (except for us middle-class expats, of course). Do you read any of the exile or Burma-based media, or do you just trust the view from your political panopticon to tell you what’s happening here? You appear to have no interest at all in what’s going on here.
Are human rights denied for the Burmese people? Definitely yes, but there have been genuine improvements – Tomas Quintana, UN Special Rapporteur for Burma, has cautiously welcomed and recognised recent progress, as have many others inside and outside the country. There’s a long, long way to go of course: rights are unevenly respected across the country and across institutions, especially within the judiciary & police. Is there an opportunity to address this? Yes I really think so, in the sense that the institutional space exists and that there’s an increasingly constructive dialogue going on between popular movements, some new MPs and parties, and the executive. Here is where you – as if Gramsci never lived – fail to engage with society and its emancipatory struggles. Human rights don’t fall fully-formed from the sky, they’re not a gift from the state, they have to be advocated and fought for.This is what is happening & that’s what I’ve tried to present in the thread: real everyday political issues and struggles, rather than the ahistorical, Burmese-as-permanent-victims narrative that still dominates the media, celebrity western politicians and the Burma Campaign et al.
Here are some successes in the past year:
1. Suspension of the Myitsone Dam project –monumentally pissing off China, and the Burmese generals who set up the deal a few years back, and a victory for networks of human rights and environmental activists;
2. Abandonment of the multiple exchange rate system, which allowed most of the proceeds of foreign investment (in extractive industries, mostly) to stay off the government books and go into military and crony pockets;
3. Release of hundreds of political prisoners, including 88 Generation leaders;
4. Successful by-election victories for the NLD in 44 out of 45 constituencies, in what were largely free and fair contests;
5. Proliferation of new media and new journals, relaxation of censorship;
6. New laws to legalise independent labour associations, tested almost immediately by strikes and protests for higher pay and better conditions, and an ongoing ‘long march’ to Naypyidaw by thousands of individual ‘gold panners’;
7. Re-engagement by the government with Europe and the USA, and IFIs. A double-edged sword, of course, but it would not have been permitted by the xenophobic old guard;
8. Ceasefire agreed with the KNU;
9. Land rights campaigns by peasant farmers, supported by released political prisoners and increasingly socially-engaged young lawyers.
Here are some failures and remaining dangers:
1. Escalating conflict in Kachin State and large numbers of IDPs;
2. A properly implementable new taxation system for a proper redistribution of wealth yet to be seen;
3. A constitution with major shortcomings in terms of the powers it formally grants to the military, protection of the former regime from future justice, etc;
4. No solution in sight to the ‘ethnic issue’, with discussion of a fully federal system looking like it’s off the table;
5. IFIs, multinationals and development agencies waiting to start their massive projects, with the usual lip service towards local ownership, consultation, inclusivity and so on;
6. Ugly nationalism / racism displayed by even the most enlightened of folk during the recent violence in northern Rakhine;
7. An education and health system that is, at best, woeful due to almost zero spend in recent decades;
8. Still several hundred political prisoners (nobody’s quite sure how many) behind bars.
There are huge obstacles but the hope is that they’re now achievable. Those that tend to occupy attention are similar to problems faced by other developing countries. They’re little to do with a shadowy clique playing puppet-master with the new administration, ‘the regime’, the ‘military elite’ etc. For the past two or three years, since Cyclone Nargis perhaps, there were real tensions within the regime anyway and significant elements were ready to quit. The constitution was their last gasp, their get-out-of-jail free card, and although it reeks of injustice few could have believed we’d be in this much more positive situation today.
The shortcomings of parliament and the corruption of the USDP are well-known, and I presented all of this in earlier threads. But the 25% military in parliament now appears a side-issue (they sometimes voting the wrong way anyway) and even the parliament to some extent is unimportant because the state, beyond its military capacity, has been so weakened over the years. Should it be strengthened?Yet another point for debate. And engagement with these issues and those outlined above, is where politics sits for many Burmese today. Massive challenges but ones which the non-elite are increasingly able to engage with.
As for myself, since you’ve made this somewhat personal from your first post onward and show no sign of letting up: I’ve been visiting here since 1996, working here since 2005, and see people from the 88 Generation (whom you seem to have no idea about) and other activists from 96, 98 and 2007 protests, as well as the NLD, pretty much every day. So I tend to be interested in the discussions and objects of attention which they are interested in. I’ve lost many friends to arbitrary detention and imprisonment over the years that I am perhaps overly happy to see them out and doing what they want to be doing: mobilising workers for better pay and conditions, representing small farmers and collectives who’ve had their land confiscated by the state or big companies, delivering political education initiatives in the farthest flung regions of the country... but, as you say, I know nothing about this. That could have something to do with my parents owning their own semi-detached in Grimsby and us occasionally holidaying abroad, making me middle class
Help me to understand why you are better able to empathise with peasant farmers or garment trade workers than anyone else: are you a Kazakh shepherd, whose livestock occasionally wander close enough to the suburbs for you to get a signal on your iPad, or a 15-year old Filipino in an SEZ posting during your 30-second toilet breaks perhaps?
