Nationalism as Political Paranoia in Burma: An Essay on the Historical Practice of Power [Reissue ed.] 0700709819, 9780700709816

Table of contents :
BOOK COVER......Page 1
HALF-TITLE......Page 2
TITLE......Page 4
COPYRIGHT......Page 5
CONTENTS......Page 6
MAPS......Page 7
PREFACE TO THE 1993 EDITION......Page 8
PREFACE TO THE 1999 EDITION......Page 10
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS......Page 13
ABBREVIATIONS......Page 15
INTRODUCTION......Page 18
1. THE COLONIAL CLUB: ‘NATIVES NOT ADMITTED!’......Page 22
2. THE VIOLENT ‘PACIFICATION’ OF BURMA......Page 26
3. BUDDHIST COSMOLOGY AND POLITICAL POWER......Page 32
Royal Power......Page 34
4. THE COLONISATION OF BURMESE IDENTITY......Page 38
Christian Intervention......Page 39
Karen Nationalism......Page 43
5. BUDDHISM, XENOPHOBIA AND REBELLION IN THE 1930S......Page 50
The Hsaya San Rebellion......Page 52
Nationalism......Page 56
6. TWO VERSIONS OF NATIONALISM: UNION STATE OR ETHNICISM?......Page 60
The Panglong Agreement......Page 66
The Legacy of Aung San......Page 68
7. BUDDHISM AND MILITARY POWER: TWO DIFFERENT STRATEGIES—TWO DIFFERENT THAKINS......Page 72
U Nu......Page 74
Enter Ne Win......Page 76
ONE PARTY, ONE STATE, ONE NATION......Page 78
8. NE WIN’S CLUB......Page 86
9. AUNG SAN SUU KYI’S STRATEGY......Page 92
10. NATIONALISM AS THE PRACTICE OF POWER......Page 98
11. THE RULES OF THE MYANMAR CLUB SINCE 1993......Page 104
12. BUDDHISM AND THE RELIGIOUS DIVIDE AMONG THE KAREN......Page 106
13. U THUZANA AND VEGAN BUDDHISM......Page 116
14. BUDDHISM, PROPHECIES AND REBELLION......Page 120
15. AUTOCRACY AND NATIONALISM......Page 134
Forestry: teak and other hardwood......Page 139
Rice prodnction......Page 140
16. HISTORICISM, HISTORICAL MEMORY AND POWER......Page 144
17. A FINAL WORD—BUT NO CONCLUSION......Page 152
EPILOGUE......Page 160
Model......Page 166
Cosmology......Page 167
Identity......Page 168
Ethnicism......Page 169
Social/Historical Memory......Page 170
APPENDIX 2: KAREN ORGANISATIONS......Page 172
BIBLIOGRAPHY......Page 178
Documents in the Oriental and India Office Collections (formerly India Office and Recards), British Library, London......Page 185
Newspapers......Page 186
INDEX......Page 188

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NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

Nordic Institute of Asian Studies Recent NIAS Reports 28. Christopher E. Goscha: Vietnam or Indochina? Contesting Concepts of Space in Vietnamese Nationalism, 1887-1954 29. Alain Lefebvre: Islam, Human Rights and Child Labour in Pakistan 30. Mytte Fentz: Natural Resources and Cosmology in Changing Kalasha Society 31. BØrge Bakken (ed.): Migration in China 32. Donald B. Wagner: Traditional Chinese Iron Industry and Its Modern Fate 33. Elisabeth Ozdalga: The Veiling Issue, Official Secularism and Popular Islam in Modern Turkey 34. Sven Cederroth: Basket Case or Poverty Alleviation ? Bangladesh Approaches the Twenty-First Century 35. Sven Cederroth and Harald O. Skar: Development Aid to Nepal 36. David D. Wang: Clouds over Tianshan. Essays on Social Disturbance in Xinjiang in the 1940s 37. Erik Paul: Australia in Southeast Asia. Regionalisation and Democracy 38. Dang Phong and Melanie Beresford: Authority Relations and Economic Decision-Making in Vietnam 39. Mason C. Hoadley (ed.): Southeast Asian-Centred Economies or Economics ? 40. Cecilia Milwertz: Beijing Women Organizing for Change 41. Santosh K. Soren: Santalia. Catalogue of Santali Manuscripts in Oslo 42. Robert Thörlind: Development, Decentralization and Democracy. Exploring Social Capital and Politicization in the Bengal Region

NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA An Essay on the Historical Practice of Power

by Mikael Gravers

CURZON

NIAS Report series 11 First published in 1993 by the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” Second edition, revised and expanded, published in 1999 by Curzon Press 15 The Quadrant, Richmond Surrey TW9 1BP © Mikael Gravers 1993, 1999 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Gravers, Mikael Nationalism as political paranoia in Burma : an essay on the historical practice of power. - (NIAS reports ; no. 11) 1 .Nationalism - Burma 2.Buddhism - Burma 3.Burma - Ethnic relations 4.Burma - Politics and government I.Title 320.9'591 ISBN 0-203-63979-0 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-67899-0 (Adobe eReader Format) ISBN 07007 0980 0 (Hbk) ISBN 07007 0981 9 (Pbk) ISSN 1398-313x

CONTENTS

Preface to the 1993 Edition

vii

Preface to the 1999 Edition

ix

Acknowledgements

xii

Abbreviations

xiv

Introduction

1

1.

The Colonial Club: ‘Natives Not Admitted!’

5

2.

The Violent Pacification’ of Burma

9

3.

Buddhist Cosmology and Political Power

15

4.

The Colonisation of Burmese Identity

21

5.

Buddhism, Xenophobia and Rebellion in the 1930s

33

6.

Two Versions of Nationalism: Union State or Ethnicism

43

7.

Buddhism and Military Power: Two Different Strategies —Two Different Thakins

55

8.

Ne Win’s Club

69

9.

Aung San Suu Kyi’s Strategy

75

10.

Nationalism as the Practice of Power

81

11.

The Rules of the Myanmar Club since 1993

87

12.

Buddhism and the Religious Divide among the Karen

89

13.

U Thuzana and Vegan Buddhism

99

14.

Buddhism, Prophecies and Rebellion

103

15.

Autocracy and Nationalism

117

vi

16.

Historicism, Historical Memory and Power

127

17.

A Final Word—But No Conclusion

135

Epilogue

143

Appendix 1: Theoretical Concepts

149

Appendix 2: Karen Organisations

155

Glossary

157

Bibliography

161

Index

171

MAPS

1.

Burma

xv

2. 3. 4.

Exduded Area 1946 Karen and Mon States Myit Szone

28 60 92

PREFACE TO THE 1993 EDITION

This essay is an elaborated version of a paper presented at a seminar in honour of Nobel Prize winner Daw Aung San Suu Kyi at Lund University, Sweden, on 9 December 1991. It is part of a research project aiming at an identification and analysis of those historical processes in Burma which have made ethnic opposition escalate into an unending nationalistic struggle—a struggle that has reduced politics in Burma to extreme violence. ***** As preparation for anthropological fieldwork in Thailand from 1970 to 1972 I spent two months in intensive learning of the Pwo Karen language at the Baptist mission in Sangkhlaburi near the Burmese border. I had three teachers. One was Ms Emily Ballard, a long-time missionary in Burma and a brilliant linguist. The other two were a wellknown Christian Karen politician Saw Tha Din and his wife. They came to Thailand as refugees and worked for the mission. After the sessions with the Pwo Karen spelling book and grammar, Saw Tha Din explained Karen nationalism during the colonial era and after independence. He gave a vivid and strong impression of how potent the mixture of ethnic self-consciousness, religious affection and nationalism can be in a colonial situation. The endeavours of the Karen National Union, a visit to one of the Burman guerrilla camps belonging to forces loyal to U Nu and under the command of Bo Yan Naing (one of the famous thirty comrades), and a meeting with Mon leader Nai Shwe Kyin came to mind whilst I was working at the India Office Library and Records in London (now called the Oriental and India Office Collections) in May 1988. Amnesty International had just published a report on Burma, documenting the torture and killing of Karen civilians, and Rangoon was about to explode in anger and repression. Whilst reading secret reports on religious and ethnic rebellions in the middle of the last century, it struck

viii

me how the conflict and the violence in Burma have been ingrained in social relations and their cultural expression during the last two centuries. History in itself cannot explain the violence of today, but the tragic developments since 1988 have made the need for an analysis of the roots of Burmese nationalism even more urgent This essay is, however, a preliminary contribution based primarily on the works by renowned scholars on Burma and its focus is more on theoretical explanation than on a detailed historical account. Except for information collected during my stay in Thailand and a short visit to Burma in 1972, I have relied on written sources and documents, mainly in English. Hopefully, I have not misappropriated the insights of the valuable works on Burma to which I am referring. I am grateful to NIAS for inviting me as a guest researcher in May 1992—it was a very stimulating visit. I am indebted to the India Office Library and Records, London, and especially to dr Andrew Griffin for his kind and valuable assistance in locating important documents. The Department of East Asian Languages at the University of Lund inspired me to continue this work by the very timely celebration of a genuine non-violent nationalist (Aung San Suu Kyi). Last but not least, I must express my thanks to the Research Foundation at Aarhus University, Denmark, for financially supporting the English-language editing of this manuscript. May peace soon strike the peacock in Burma!

PREFACE TO THE 1999 EDITION

Since the initial publication of this book, I have been pleasantly surprised by the interest and the positive assessments that it has received, although it was—and remains—a brief and incomplete sketch of Burma’s history and a preliminary analysis of nationalism. I was even more surprised and delighted when the Journal of Asian Studies (vol. 5, no. 3, 1994) published a review of the book by Professor James F. Guyot. He rightly concludes that my analysis of nationalism does not come through clearly in the text. Nationalism and theories of nationalism are indeed difficult to handle in a brief presentation, especially when the history concerned is as complex as Burma’s. I have added six new chapters in an attempt to take the analysis one step further. But it is clear, as I stated in the first edition, that my view is one from afar. Although I have recently collected additional information along the Thai-Burmese border and have had intensive discussions with Burmese people living in Europe as well as with colleagues, this book is not an attempt to write a history of modern Myanmar/Burma or to assess the complexity of the changes since 1988. It is an analysis of nationalism, ethnicity and power in the history of Burma from an anthropological perspective. A Burmese friend, Brenda Pe Maung Tin (Daw Tin Tin Myaing), has kindly drawn my attention to the term kala (‘South Asian’, ‘Indian’) which I have used to mean ‘foreigner’ or ‘Westerner’. In the beginning of the colonial period the term was used for everyone who came from India, including the British. This usage is found in English literature written during and immediately after the colonial period and has a highly problematic connotation in the modern context. Today kala refers to a person of South Asian ethnic origin. But it was also used as a derogatory term for Aung San Suu Kyi in an article in the official New Light of Myanmar entitled ‘Feeling Prickly Heat, Instead of Pleasant Cool’: Pretty little wife of the

x

white kala (U Phyo 30 May 1996). I apply it metaphorically as a simplification of cultural differences within a nationalistic discourse. However, this simplification and the negative connotations are misleading when interpreted as a common modern expression. In the first edition, the term appears as a historical concept as well as an analytical concept. I should have emphasised this. In this revised edition I shall replace kala with more appropriate terms when necessary. In her review published in the journal Crossroads (vol. 8, no. 2, 1994), Mary Callahan rightly criticises my use of the word kala. Dr Callahan states that I have used the term to comprise the ethnic minorities. That is, however, not true. Although the Christian Karen, in the opinion of many Burmese, became a divisive force allied to foreigners, and lost their original identity through adopting a foreign religion, they were not collectively called kala. Dr Callahan fails to recognise that the aim of my book is to analyse nationalism and power in their historical context. I did not argue, as Dr Callahan states, that the xenophobic rhetoric of the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC, renamed the State Peace and Development Council, SPDC, in 1997), is shared by the majority of the population. However, the rhetoric, still applied by the SLORC, cannot be dismissed as a mere bravado having no effect on civil society. The often xenophobic language contains a strong symbolic violence. It is the strategy of the SLORC to gain support and simultaneously to create fear by this dominating discourse of nationalism. It is unfortunate that in this context resistance releases more repression in the name of the Myanmar nation. As another Burmese friend, Dr Khin Ni Ni Thein, explained to me: ‘During Ne Win’s rule, I did not think of the difference between Burma as the nation, as the state, and as the military regime.’ The three elements melted into a single identity not to be questioned. This is precisely how the interpellation of xenophobic propaganda works in Burma and in other places where nationalism is appropriated by autocratic regimes. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991) has a clear understanding of this mechanism and its effects: it derives from fear and it generates fear. The memory of past resistance generates fear and releases violence; the memory of past violence is the fear of new violent acts, ad infinitum. The result of the nationalistic policy and its repressive character is that social practices in Burma move into a grey zone of dissemblance: neither compliance nor genuine participation; neither direct dissent nor open resistance. The grey zone is ruled by fear, distrust, rumours and gossip. It is probably filled with secret imaginings that are beyond the reach of this analysis; we cannot know

xi

who listens to the rhetoric, what is internalised by whom and who remains indifferent. A dialogue between the military and the opposition seems extremely difficult after ten years of confrontation. Dialogue without a belief in compromise and reconciliation is futile. I have not had the opportunity like Dr Callahan to study the Myanmar military (Tatmadaw) and its history from inside its archives in Rangoon. However, the SLORC seems to control the Tatmadaw and also has supporters outside the army. Although the SLORC suffered a spectacular defeat in the 1990 elections, they obtained about 25 per cent of the votes (albeit a mere nine or ten seats) in the countryside. The open economy may also have turned some of the new entrepreneurs into at least tacit supporters. Otherwise, without some support amongst civilians as well as within the army, it would be difficult for the SLORC to preserve its totalitarian control. Of course, a tacit support in performing daily duties to earn a living and out of fear of reprisals is not the same as ideological consensus. Further, in her review Mary Callahan claims that there is a ‘Gravers pro-democracy project’ in the book. However, it has to be appreciated that the democracy project belongs exclusively to the people of Burma! As regards the fate of democracy in Burma since 1948, the reviewer, perhaps unintentionally, confirms my point that even during the democratic period after independence, politics turned violent due to the complexity of ethnic conflicts, religion, nationalism and rivalries within the Myanmar political parties. Despite the turmoil, the Burmese have participated in four elections between 1948 and 1962. No one, including the present author, would blame the violence and all other misfortunes in Burma on the colonial era. On the other hand, no one would deny that the colonial policy and practice are extremely important to selfperception and historical interpretations in Burma. The new chapters include an update of events and an assessment of the role of Buddhism in recent developments, which also include the split within the Karen National Union and the formation of a Buddhist Karen organisation. The analyses of nationalism, ethnicity, resistance and violence are related to a recent anthropological discussion of social and historical memory to demonstrate the importance of the past on the present. I have made a few changes to the original text; I have also added new references and data.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

By courtesy of His Royal Highness Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark, who awarded me a grant from his Research Fund, I was able to visit the Karen people in Thailand and collect information on the role of religion in the present context. I am very grateful for this support. It was with great kindness and and with patience that many Karens in Wa Ga Gla of Uthaithani province and in the town of Sangkhlaburi in Kanchanaburi province, as well as in other places, answered the questions posed by the anthropologist. I shall always be indebted to them for their friendship and help. Unfortunately, I arrived in Sangkhlaburi six months after Saw Tha Din died in 1995 at the age of 99. His daughter, Olivia, kindly received me in his house and shared her memories of her father since 1970. Saw Tha Din was a genuine representative of the Karen nation as it developed in colonial Burma and in the days of Independence when cooperation and mutual tolerance were still possible. At the British Library Oriental and India Office Collections, London, Patricia Herbert, the Curator, helped me to locate interesting documents and shared her profound knowledge of Burma and its history. Suggestions and advice from Brenda Pe Maung Tin, a former lecturer in French at the Foreign Languages University, Rangoon, have been crucial to the revision. Dr Khin Ni Ni Thein, Executive Director at the Water Research and Training Centre for a New Burma, Delft, Holland, has supplied valuable information to update the book. I am, as well, indebted to Thomas Lautrup from the Department of Ethnography and Social Anthropology at the University of Aarhus for his critical review of the manuscript. Thanks are also due to the staff of NIAS Publishing who helped to bring the present revised edition to its completion.

xiii

Last but not least, I am grateful to Anders Baltzer JØrgensen for his cooperation and the exchange of knowledge and anecdotes during our fieldwork in 1970–72, and in 1996, because [in doing fieldwork] a high level of linguistic competence is obviously an advantage but a flair for friendship is more important than an impeccable accent or a perfect lexicon (Edmund Leach 1982:129).

ABBREVIATIONS

ABKNA AFPFL ASEAN BIA BNA BSPP CPB DDSI DKBA DKBO DSI GCBA KCO KNA KNDO KNLA KNU KYO NLD OIOC PVO SLORC SPDC UKO USDA YMBA

All Burma Karen National Association Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League Association of Southeast Asian Nations Burma Independence Army Burma National Army Burma Socialist Programme Party Communist Party of Burma Directory of Defence Services Intelligence Democratic Karen Buddhist Army Democratic Karen Buddhist Organisation Defence Services Institute General Council of Burmese Associations Karen Central Organisation Karen National Association Karen National Defence Organisation Karen National Liberation Army Karen National Union Karen Youth Organisation National League for Democracy Oriental and India Office Collections People's Volunteer Organisation State Law and Order Restoration Council State Peace and Development Council United Karen Organisation Union Solidarity and Development Association Young Men's Buddhist Association

xv

Map 1: Burma

xvi

INTRODUCTION

Since 1988 Burma has gained notoriety for the extreme violence used by its military regime. The country has long been in Amnesty International’s spotlight, while refugees tell of unimaginable torture, rape and killing of civilians. The Nobel Peace Prize of 1991 was therefore a well-placed tribute to Aung San Suu Kyi and the fight for democracy through non-violent methods. Unfortunately, it was also a reminder of the widespread breaches of human rights which take place in Burma. We are sadly reminded of George Orwell’s description of the colonial era in his 1936 novel, Burmese Days, which includes scenes that point prophetically to the present situation with foreboding accuracy. But why has this beautiful country, synonymous with Oriental exoticism, turned away from the world and isolated itself in gratuitous violence which, in the media, has been compared to Sadam Hussein’s Iraq, Pol Pot’s Kampuchea and Ceausescu’s Romania? In many of their reports, observers have referred to the fact that the country’s problems are self-created. These problems are defined in such stereotypical terms as military dictatorship, socialism, and totalitarian one-party rule. The comparison made with the above-mentioned regimes is telling and simple, yet explains nothing about the specific conditions in Burma’s historical, social and cultural development that have brought about the current situation. Many wondered how Buddhists, with non-violence as their ideal, could perpetrate so many acts of cruelty. Typically, reporting has focused on pseudo-psychological explanations in the treatment of how nonviolence and non-confrontation bring about an accumulation of aggressive feelings, which in turn find expression in an almost volcanic eruption of violence.1 On the basis of such theories and superficial comparisons with other violent regimes, there is a pressing need for a detailed examination of the background of this development, especially at this point in time when nationalism,

2 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

ethno-religious conflict, and the division of states capture our attention through the carnage left in their wake. The initial explanation of Burma’s present situation must be sought in the legacy of the colonial era, or rather in the nationalistic paranoia which was generated by developments following independence in 1948 —a politically orchestrated paranoia linking fear of the disintegration of both union and state with the foreign takeover of power and the disappearance of Burmese culture. In this way the legacy of the colonial era has been used as the rationale for isolation and the use of violence. Burma has been gripped by a strong, almost religious nationalism which has retained the expunging of the colonial heritage as its key motivating force. This belief, which has legitimated the army’s autocratic regime under General Ne Win since 1962, has not allowed the creation of a more democratic society. Foreign influence must be kept out with force and violence. Thus, the colonial era’s model of society seems to have stunted the country’s development since the regime has focused on this model in a manner bordering on paranoia. During the last thirty years of military rule, this strategy has equated all foreign presences with colonialism and imperialism, as reflected in state propaganda. At the same time the regime has sought to keep Burmese traditions within what could be called a modern version of the traditional autocratic political structure. This strategy has generated fear of change and fear of all foreign influences and imported ideas. Aung San Suu Kyi describes this deadlock: ‘[the] fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it’, and adds that the population’s fear and feelings of humiliation must be counteracted if change is to be possible. She uses Buddhist concepts in her criticism of the regime, such as the four selfish qualities (agati) which corrupt thought and thereby obstruct ‘the correct path’: corruption by desire, hatred, aberration due to ignorance, and fear. Corruption and fear are important elements in the relations of power in Burma, and Aung San Suu Kyi says that these negative qualities must be fought by all and in all individuals. She tries to inculcate civil courage in a population that has been subdued by 3,000–5,000 killings, imprisonment, violent torture, and the forced removal of entire areas of

1. For example, D. D. Gray’s article in the Danish newspaper Information (9 September 1988), entitled ‘De fredelige buddhister kan vaere både politisk aktive og voldelige’ [The peaceful Buddhists can be both politically active and violent] (Associated Press).

INTRODUCTION 3

Rangoon.2 She is therefore seen as the politician who stands purely in her nationalism in opposition to Ne Win ‘the Culprit’ (as she describes him) who is the symbol of corruption, the abuse of power and violent oppression. She symbolises the spirit of her father, Aung San. The regime accuses her of being in collusion with ‘foreigners’, namely the British colonial power amongst others. In this book I shall attempt to identify the relationship between some of the factors contributing to this complex historical process: Burmese nationalism’s fear of foreigners; a colonial era marked by violence; the role of Buddhism in nationalism; the ethnic minorities; and an autocratic political tradition. In analysing these historical conditions, I intend to apply a simplification in the form of abstract models and condensed descriptions. (The theoretical concepts are outlined in Appendix 1.) This is at the risk of repro ducing colonialism’s and nationalism’s one-sided understanding of the ‘essence’ of development. Essentialisation is precisely the primary function of nationalism by producing a simplification of a historical process. Its theory and historical memory collapse complexities into a monolithic and primordial model of the past in the present. Repeating the rhetoric of nationalism runs the risk of making the same simplification. But there is need for a more abstract, theoretical analysis of the generative elements and contradictions of the processes. Such analyses are often absent in the typically voluminous works on Burma, wherein the dominant elements of Burmese development tend to be buried by detail.3 Whether or not it is possible to pin down some of the ingredients of nationalism and the strategies of power will become evident on closer examination of the country’s history. Initially the social hierarchy can be considered by using ‘the club’ as a symbol of colonial society. The club was not only a representative symbol, it was also a model of the fundamental properties of the colonial system: a division of labour and power based on race, class and culture as natural criteria of division.

2. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:180–185). 3. See M. Smith (1991:492)—an extremely important and very detailed document.

4

1. THE COLONIAL CLUB: ‘NATIVES NOT ADMITTED!’

In any town in India the European club is the spiritual citadel, the real seat of the British power, the Nirvana for which native officials and millionaires pine in vain.1 Whilst one of Orwell’s characters in Burmese Days says that he hates Orientals and that any hint of friendship towards them is an instance of horrible perversity, the Burmans themselves were not too fond of these ‘foreigners from the West’2 who had conquered them and excluded them from any share of power. In Rangoon, which the British had transformed into the capital with straight streets and Victorian architecture, there were three influential clubs: the Pegu, the Boat and the Gymkhana. The Pegu Club was dominated by senior officials from the Civil Service and the other two by the mercantile establishment. Neither money nor high status could assure a Burman’s access to one of the leading clubs in the capital. Race was the unavoidable criterion.3 To the male colonisers the club and not the home was the centre of social life.4 When Burma closed its borders to the outside world following the

1. G. Orwell (1977:17). 2. Kala pyu, ‘white kala or ‘English kala’. The term was used in the beginning of the colonial period and referred to the fact that the colonisers came from India. See Ni Ni Myint (1983:42) and Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:4). A modern term for ‘foreigner’ or ‘foreign national’ is nyaing-gan khar thar, ‘alien’ or ‘outsider’ is ta zein. 3. See N.F. Singer (1995) on the clubs in Rangoon, and C. Allen ed. (1987: 116), for a broader discussion of the relevance of club life for the colonial power. There were clubs which admitted native members, but this always created controversy. As a criterion, class was subordinate to race. Anglo-Indians had their own clubs.

6 THE COLONIAL CLUB: ‘NATIVES NOT ADMITTED!’

military coup of 1962, this logic was turned on the foreigners from the West: ‘The club is only open to Burmese.’5 British colonial policy was based upon the notion of the colonial power’s determining role in keeping the country together with its many different ethnic groups: Burmans, Mon, Shan, Karen, Kachin, Chin, Rakhine, and immigrant Chinese and Indians—a multi-ethnic society which the British believed that their Pax Britannica had served to gather and save from despotism and ethnic conflict. In Orwell’s book, the Indian doctor Veraswami praises the Pax Britannica which Flory, the book’s main character, dismisses as ‘Pox Britannica’. ‘We steal from Burma’, says Englishman Flory, whereas the Indian admires ‘the white man’s burden’. The Burman protagonist in Burmese Days, U Po Kyin, is portrayed as a parasite who exploits the system through unbelievable intrigues. The Englishman has lost his innocence and has become ‘the reluctant imperialist’, whilst the Indian doctor and the Burman aspire to membership of the club with the pukka sahib (the real gentleman). The Indian states (with his kala accent): ‘In the club, practically he is a European, no calumny can touch him.’ A club member is sacrosanct.6 He considers the Orientals to be inferior: ‘we have no humour; the British on the other hand modernise the country.’ But he loses the battle for membership in the local club to the unscrupulous scoundrel, U Po Kyin, who sees the Indian as a foreigner hindering Burmese participation in the struggle for power. This cocktail of apartheid, ambivalence and unscrupulous use of all avenues of power has never been portrayed with more precision than in Orwell’s masterpiece. The tragedy of Burma is that these contradictions still occupy centre stage, long after the British went home. Pukka sahib and his white man’s burden continue to haunt Burma—or more correctly, are used as a spectre to legitimate tyranny and isolation. A couple of grotesque examples illustrate this. Ambivalence in attitudes to the English language, which was absent from the school 4. Furnivall (1956:307). 5. The term Burmese is used here to signify a citizen of the Union of Burma, regardless of ethnic origin. A Burman is a member of the ethnic majority group. See Glossary for further explanation. 6. G. Orwell (1977:45). Flory’s pessimistic view of Burma does not offer the Burmese much hope for the future, and in fact strikes a chord with those who blame all problems on the colonial era: ‘In fact, before we’ve finished we’ll have wrecked the whole Burmese national culture. But we’re not civilising them, we’re only rubbing our dirt on to them.’ (Ibid: 40.)

NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA 7

curriculum for many years until reintroduced in 1981 when Ne Win’s daughter Sanda failed an English university’s entrance exam - if the rumours in circulation are true—is one such case. Foreign culture, especially Western, is largely kept out. This applies also to individual persons, for example Aung San Suu Kyi’s husband, who is English. The regime dismisses the claim that Burma can be ruled by someone married to a ‘foreigner’, one whose children therefore cannot be considered Burmese.7 The constitution of 1982 defines citizenship as one-dimensional: one has to prove that his/her ancestors lived in Burma before the colonisation began in 1824, and that they belonged to one of the indigenous ethnic groups. Indians, Chinese and Eurasians can only obtain ‘associate citizenship’ and cannot hold high office. This attempt to exploit the fear of foreign influence and the ambivalence still found in relation to the former colonial power and to ethnic or national identity form one clear symptom of Burma’s problematic condition. Important incidents in Burma’s history show how the fear of losing cultural identity, combined with the use of violence in the battle against colonialism and for independence has developed. However, in order to place these examples in the context of modern nationalism and the present regime, it is necessary to outline how the Burmans regarded the intrusion of colonialism into their lives. They saw the British as a threat not just against their culture and religion, but also against the unity and totality of the universe itself with its central tenents based on Buddhist cosmology. Within this view of the world, to lose one’s religion, language and culture is symptomatic of a loss of control of political, economic and social relations. The universe is literally thrown askew. In other words, Burman ethnic identity is not only culturally defined, but also refers to an existence in a cosmological totality and in accordance with its laws. This is a unified model, where all parts are largely mutually dependent in direct relations of cause and effect. Without central control there would be chaos. The British colonial model—‘plural society’—was based on the principle of ‘divide and rule’, where racial, ethnic, religious, social and economic differences and contradictions were allowed to develop. The central power controlled these contradictions via India, and the unity in this world was found in the Empire and its global market. The local

7. In the colonial era it was considered almost treason for a British person to marry a Burmese.

8 THE COLONIAL CLUB: ‘NATIVES NOT ADMITTED!’

society and culture were rendered subordinate to a common division of labour. These two models and their collision connect some of history’s most important generative contradictions. Such models can also function as heuristic aids in analysing and identifying the central tendencies in Burma’s nationalistic strategies.8

8. In the description above, there is, of course, no suggestion that all Burman and British actions in practice were and still are governed by reference to such ‘models’ and their rationale. The ‘models’ are analytical tools to explain strategies—and strategies are expressions of the rationale in the producdon of practice and in the perception and representation of historical processes (cf. Bourdieu, 1990:131).

2. THE VIOLENT ‘PACIFICATION’ OF BURMA

The confrontation between the Burman world and British imperialism, which escalated through incompatibility and intransigence, culminated in the British conquest and ‘pacification’ of the last remnants of the kingdom. Pacification’ was an important concept in the language of colonisation. The British believed that the country could only become civilised and attain a democratic constitution, through which the population would learn how to rule themselves, if the colonial power was successful in introducing ‘peace’ to the country and in quelling all armed resistance. This was brought about by the abolition of the ‘Oriental despotism’ in 1886, exemplified by the kingdom according to the colonial power. King Thibaw and his family were driven into exile in India. He and his queen Supayalat - nicknamed ‘soup-plate’ by British soldiers—were taken in a narrow bullock carriage to the navy steamer Thoorea whilst the British soldiers waved cheerfully and sang.1 Thibaw remained in exile until he died in 1916. Great Britain had already conquered half of the kingdom in 1826 and in 1852, and had taken over trade in rice, teak, precious stones, etc. During the 1824–26 war, the British took over the great Shwe Dagon pagoda in Rangoon and permitted their soldiers to enter while still wearing their boots—a blatant act of profanity as Buddhists remove their footwear when entering religious areas and their homes as a mark of respect. In 1852 the British again attacked the fortified pagoda—the central and unifying symbol for both Buddhism and the kingship. As the soldiers swept across the countryside they ransacked pagodas for their gold and silver Buddha statues.

1. E.C. V. Foucar (1946) gives a detailed, although somewhat antiBurmese, description of the humiliating end of the monarchy.

10 THE VIOLENT PACIFICATION' OF BURMA

The British continued to insist on wearing shoes when entering monasteries and pagodas, which they used to garrison soldiers during ‘pacification’. In 1886, the palace in Mandalay was renamed Fort Dufferin and part of the palace, which had been a Buddhist monastery, became the Upper Burma Club for the British officers. In the words of Foucar: The hall of audience would serve admirably as the garrison church…[the] altar before the Lion throne’ (1946:160). A monk who proclaimed himself as ‘the ruler of the universe’ (setkya mìn), in accordance with the Burman tradition of resistance, attempted to overthrow the foreign occupation of the palace, but to no avail. The centre of the state had now ceased to exist and the peacock throne was transferred to Calcutta and placed on exhibition in a museum there.2 The British thereby concluded the political and cultural humiliation of the Burman people, whose conceptual system was endorsed by the all-dominating Buddhist cosmology. The removal of the king and his throne signalled the end of the Burman kingdom and of Burman Buddhist culture as everlasting and universal entities. According to the cosmology, Buddhism and dhamma rule will decline before the new Buddha arrives. The lack of recognition given to a leader of the Sangha (thathanabaing) by the British was an obvious sign of imbalance in the sacred-profane universe. During the ‘pacification’ programme of the 1880s the British met with tough resistance from the guerrilla forces, which in some cases were led by monks. The monastic orders (Sangha) did not participate directly in the rebellion, insofar as monks are not permitted to circumvent the principle of non-violence. A monk, as a member of the Sangha, must refrain from taking part in secular activities. But restraint was not possible in situations where the monastic order was left without influence due to a lack of royal protection and regular gifts from the royal court and officials. The rebelling monks were therefore seen as defending Buddhist teachings and the world order against collapse.3 Hence the Burmans considered them to be legitimate rebels. This cosmological order was, as we shall see, based to a large degree upon harmony between the religious and political spheres. The colonial 2. The peacock is still an important national symbol. It was used by the rebels on their flag in 1886; the nationalists used the flag in the 1930s; and it is still used by demonstrating students. Originally the dancing peacock was a symbol of royal authority and an emblem on the throne in the informal audience hall whilst the lion was the emblem on the throne in the official hall (Htin Aung, 1965: xi).

NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA 11

forces regarded the rebel monks as criminals, so-called dacoits, an Anglo Indian term for gangs of armed robbers. In the colonial perception the resistance was not a planned or even conscious act of rebellion but dacoity: The Burmese had a traditional and hereditary love of desultory fighting, raiding, gang robbery; and their inordinate national vanity preserved vivid recollection of the time when they were a conquering race.4 If the monks had to reject the ideal of non-violence in order to resurrect the cosmos, then the British in turn employed the scorchedearth policy in order to bring about ‘pacification’. Villages and stocks of rice were burnt daily and the rebels were executed. A single military unit was able to report the burning of forty-six villages, 639 houses and 509 Ibs of rice. Rewards were given for the capture of the monks leading the rebellion. The rebels’ relatives were rounded up and interned. The colonial power used the Christian minority, amongst others the Christian Karen, to fight against the rebels. The Christians presented the heads of monks and pocketed the reward.5 Hundreds of dacoits—resistance fighters—were executed, including women and children, in a village near Bassein. Rudyard Kipling visited the British troops in 1889 and narrated the atrocities in his poem The Grave of a Hundred Heads’. It is based on the soldiers’ recollections of the massacre in the village of Pabengmay. These selected verses should suffice to give an impression of the barbarism of the head-hunting during ‘pacification’: They made a pile of their trophies High as a tall man’s chin, Head upon head distorted, Set in a sightless grin, Anger and pain and terror Stamped on the smoke-scorched skin.

3. The opposition between the withdrawn holy order of Buddhism and its secular political dimension is thoroughly analysed in Tambiah (1976) and Ling (1979). The main work on the Sangha and state in Burma is Mendelson (1975). 4. Frontier and Overseas Expeditions from India, 1907, vol. 5, p. 176. Oriental and India Office Collections, British Library, London. 5. The ‘pacification’ has been described by Chief Commissioner Sir Charles Crosthwait (1968 [1912]), who participated; see also D. Woodman (1962), M. Adas (1982), and M. Aung-Thwin (1985).

12 THE VIOLENT PACIFICATION' OF BURMA

Subadar Prag Tewarri Put the head of the Boh [‘chief] On the top of the mound of triumph, The head of his son below With the sword and the peacock-banner, That the world might behold and know. Then a silence came to the river, A hush fell over the shore, And Bohs that were brave departed, And Sniders squibbed no more; For the Burmans said That a kullah’s head Must be paid for with heads five score.6 The Christian participation is certainly an element in the explanation of many monks’ active participation in the rebellion. The colonial power believed that its primary assignment was to thwart the rebels, whom they considered politically illegitimate. The Burmans fought not only against a foreign occupying force but also against the disintegration of their entire social and cultural order, as defined by Buddhist cosmology. A proclamation from the Royal Council of Ministers (Hluttaw) of 7 November 1885 makes this clear: Those heretics, the English kalas, having most harshly made demands calculated to bring about the impairment and destruction of our religion, the violation of our national traditions and customs, and the degradation of our race, are making a show and preparation as if to wage war upon our state. To uphold the religion, to uphold the national honour, to uphold the country’s interests, will bring about threefold good—good of our religion, good of our master, and good of ourselves, and will gain for us the important result of placing us on the path to the celestial regions and to Nibbana [Nirvana].7 Thus the Burman resistance leaders regarded the war as religious. This is demonstrated in an order issued by the Myinzaing Prince:

6. See Htin Aung (1965:210–211). Kullah is used by Kipling to mean white man, i.e., British. Kipling made a single very brief visit to Rangoon and Moulmein.

NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA 13

The heretic, savage, and lawless kalas have now entered Burma and are destroying religious edifices, such as pagodas, monasteries. And the kalas are using in the profane way the white umbrellas and other insignia which belong only to royalty.8 This period entered Burman historical representation as the complete humiliation of their society, a literal trampling upon their religion and culture, and the distortion of their universe. Religion and violence combined as a representation of colonial subjugation. This violence in the broad sense of the word is both the destruction of life and property by force and the act of intervention using the freedom of some to deprive others of their freedom and identity. The memory of the historical experience from the colonial ‘pacification’ is crucial to an analysis of the present nationalism. It is thus relevant to compare the above-cited proclamation with a recent one from the SLORC. Although the context is different, the rhetoric points indirectly to history: Not only the Tatmadaw [army] but also each and every citizen is dutybound to safeguard independence, sovereignty—Myanmar exercising basic rights most suited for custom, culture of [the] national peoples.9

7. See Ni Ni Myint (1983:42). She writes from a Burmese point of view and emphasises the invasion not merely as a territorial and political annexation but as an attempt to destroy culture and society. 8. Ni Ni Myint (1983:194) shows that the resistance was organised before Thibaw was exiled. Myinzaing Prince, a son of King Mindon, included Shan, Kachin, Palaung and Karen in his force and fought under the peacock banner around Mandalay. Monks were crucial in organising his resistance. 9. New Light of Myanmar, 6 June 1997.

14

3. BUDDHIST COSMOLOGY AND POLITICAL POWER

In Buddhist cosmology, secular power protects Buddhism as a religious order. The monastic order (Sangha) cannot exist without the state’s protection and gifts. In return, the monks secure king and laymen access to religious merit—the accumulation of which improves their kamma (karma). This is realised through ceremonies and gifts to monks or, better still, through the building of pagodas. However, the ruling power is ‘hot’1—it may be necessary to use violence in the defence of the country. The king might autocratically order the execution of rebellious relatives and officials. In return, the monks must keep the precepts regarding ahimsa (non-violence); that is, they must not kill living creatures. Then, like now, monastaries and monks protected against arbitrary tyranny. Monasteries were a source of sanctuary, and monks could intercede for someone who was condemned or who had to pay an inordinately large amount of tax. The cosmos is thus divided into a sacred and a profane sphere, which are closely linked and mutually dependent. Both are subordinate to dhamma2 or the law or teaching of existence, its beings, its order and its physical and metaphysical powers, as recognised by the Buddha. But it is important to emphasise that the state and the exercise of power do not in themselves have a religious character. On the contrary, they can be seen as being antithetical to Buddhist ethics, expressing one of the worst evils of existence.

1. Secular power can be described as ‘hot’ compared with the religious sphere, where Buddhism is a means to avoid violence and anger. 2. Dhamma covers several different conceptual areas and can only be translated in context. Its content embraces the following: ‘correct behaviour, morality, doctrine, the law of nature and its conditions’, as related in the teachings of the Buddha.

16 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

Buddhist cosmology is a total model, which covers all aspects of existence, including ethical and ontological principles.3 But in the process of institutional elaboration, the Sangha is, in a manner of speaking, a sanctuary from secular society. Here, men live in celibacy and obey the 227 disciplinary rules and the optimal practice of ethical rules. Laymen, on the other hand, can make do with five to eight basic rules. The monks within the Sangha maintain justice so that the monasteries do not become sanctuaries for criminals, swindlers or usurpers. However, it was quite normal that a new king would try to secure control of the Sangha. This took the form of the application of more stringent rules, whereby disobedient or opposing elements were purged. The next step was to build pagodas and raise spires on the top— forming an umbrella-like crown (htì). This is a sign of glory (hpòn) and power and can be compared with the king’s crown. But the concept of hpòn is also included in the Burman word for monk (hpòngyi- ‘great glory’). In this case the word implies, on the contrary, a spiritual and moral honour achieved through asceticism and knowledge of dhamma. The monastic order and kingship were thus two separate parts of the cosmos. The king’s hpòn, as a sign of great kamma, can be read in his personal abilities and behaviour. This also applies to political leaders to this day. The monastic order, on the other hand, is an unchallengeable and open zone with equal access for all laymen who seek to attain religious merit (kutho) regardless of rank, wealth and power. The Sangha is divided up into different sects with different views on dhamma and rules for their monks, whilst each separate monastery possesses a great deal of autonomy.4 Prior to the colonial era the monastaries functioned as schools where boys learnt to read and write. Learning was synonymous with learning dhamma and being indoctrinated in the Buddhistic cosmological and ontological principles. Earlier, monks enjoyed great respect locally. They were wise men who knew astrology, alchemy and medicine. Such a hsaya (teacher) was an important person in the local society.

3. See Appendix 1 concerning the following concepts: cosmology, ideology, model and ontology. 4. Mendelson (1975:58) describes the Sangha as an aggregation of individual ascetics rather than a church. Monks belong to monasteries (kyaung) and branch monasteries (taiks) dominated by six main sects.

BUDDHIST COSMOLOGY AND POLITICAL POWER 17

Royal Power The monarchy was absolutist and dynastic. It was based upon endogamy; the queens were often the kings’ half-sisters. There was also a harem, where daughters of officials and tributary vassals lived. Some of the concubines came from minority groups. Accession to the throne was often accompanied by a palace revolution which tended to be a very bloody affair, where queens and concubines sought to get their sons into power.5 The king and his council (hluttaw) controlled trade in all important produce such as rice, timber and precious stones. They also made decisions on war, peace and the moving of the capital. But to gain and retain power, the king had to administer his absolutist monarchy in accordance with Buddhistic cosmology and ethics which dictate a number of attributes. He must be a dhammaraja and rule in accordance with dhamma and the ten royal attributes.6 The king’s most important task was to protect Buddhism, to ensure welfare and prosperity, and to show charity. Peace, prosperity and the absence of natural catastrophes depended upon the laity and monks being content with their lot. Harmony in the universe provided the laity with the possibility of accumulating religious merit. As mentioned earlier, this underlined the view that the king possessed honour (hpòn-daw—‘royal glory’) as an expression of good merit both in earlier incarnations and his present existence. A person became a mìn (king or leader) because he had a kamma (kan) which made him leader. The king was ‘Lord of glory and Lord of Kamma’ (hpòn-shin-kan-shiri). Through his prestigious status as a cakkavatti (‘ruler of the universe’ or setkya mìn in Burman), the king could maintain law and order in the cosmos. Conversely, dissension and lack of welfare were indicators of declining hpòn and kamma. The

5. The last king, Thibaw, executed eighty members of the royal family on his accession to the throne in 1879. In 1884 he executed the rest of the royal family (around 200), who had been imprisoned. In this way European historical representations of ‘oriental despotism’ were confirmed. The Burmans gained a reputation as a gruesome and violent people. See for example Jesse (1946). 6. The ten rules, or rather ideals, relevant for a dhammaraja are as follows: almsgiving, observance of the Buddhist precepts, liberality, rectitude, gentleness, self-restriction, control of anger, avoidance of the use of violence in the relationship with the people, forbearance, and non-opposition against people’s will (Maung Maung Gyi, 1983:21; Michael Aung-Thwin (1983:54); Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:171–173).

18 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

driving force of the cosmos was not conceptualised as an autonomous, self-centred ego, but rather kamma was the result of earlier and present interactions. These human interactions are in turn connected with individuals’ knowledge of dhamma, their intention and practice in relation to the ethical rules. Whilst kamma follows on from earlier incarnations, it can be increased/decreased in accordance with changing conditions. The state, the king, officials, peasants, men and women are all subordinated to the law—but in a hierarchy of accumulated reward. Kamma is thus the central ontological principle. Nevertheless, a stable economy and peace were the fundamental criteria ensuring the collective possibilities for the individual accumulation of kamma. The king was at the top of the hierarchy, a natural auto crat, but, as with everything in the cosmos, he was subject to its law of impermanence. Furthermore, the king was the lord of the land and the water’, that is the lord of all living things. He also stood at the head of the thirty-seven nats—spiritual ancestors, often of royal descent and including a Shan king and a prince from the Mon people. These spirits, which also include the victims of the palace revolutions, can disturb the living if they are not included in the sharing of religious merit. The nats presided by Thagya Mìn (Indra) are guardians of the royal household (the state) and of the households of commoners. The Shwezigon Pagoda in Pagan is the ceremonial headquarters of the thirty-seven nats and thus the most important royal symbol.7 By including local spirit cults and their leaders in some instances, Burmese dynasties maintained a formal hegemony over the minorities. Conversely, these local cults and their leaders often borrowed elements from the dynastic model and Buddhist cosmology. In times of decline, princes, monks or peasants could claim to possess the royal attributes—as long as they could convince others of the righteousness of their claim. These pretenders to the throne, called mìn laùng (‘king in the making’), sought to prove that they had potential as cakkavatti, dhammaraja and kammaraja, that is, that they possessed the necessary religious merit. Burma’s history is alive with individuals calling themselves mìn laùng and seeking to legitimate rebellion by applying Buddhist cosmology and its rules. The model thus contains two genealogical principles, both of which incorporate relations with spirits/forebears and kinship relations with persons of dynastic birth. And yet it is important to stress that ethnic origin was not a significant factor in relation to a mìn laùngs credibility.

7. Htin Aung (1959).

BUDDHIST COSMOLOGY AND POLITICAL POWER 19

Mon, Karen and Shan have all performed this role. The important factor in relation to power was whether or not the individual declared himself to be a Buddhist, namely one who pays respect to the Buddha by trying to live in accordance with ethics (sila) and the giving of alms (dana).8 The cosmology could always credit or discredit a ruler or a rebel. A situation with deteriorating welfare as well as higher taxes, conflicts and violence, or famines and natural catastrophes can signal the end of a dynasty and the approach of a new era of peace and prosperity. The concepts and ideals of the Buddhist cosmology are universal and everlasting, and they constitute a total model of the society and for its future development. The cosmology implies a utopian vision of a coming Buddha (bodhisattd), who is to appear approximately 5,000 years after Gautama (i.e., within the next 2,500 years). The coming Buddha is called Ariyametteya. During the last part of this era the Buddhist ethics of sila and dana will degenerate, and war and misfortune will prevail. A setkya mìn has to clean the immoral and chaotic world and prepare the revival of dhamma before the coming Buddha can enter the world. Both kings and mìn làung rebels have ascribed to themselves the attributes of setkya mìn and bodhisatta. Secular power and the universal ethics of Buddhism are thus closely interrelated in this model. These elements could be interpreted as support for an autocratic ruler who has the ability to re-establish the world order of dhamma, including ethics and communal welfare. The autocratic element in this model inhered in the fact that all central practice of power can in principle be legitimised as necessary for the maintenance of the dhamma kingdom as a unified entity, with regards to kamma and harmony, so that the kingdom can receive the coming Buddha. Individuals, regimes and their attributes can thus be brought into dispute, whereas the above-mentioned regularities, which both connect and disconnect the sacred and profane parts of existence, legitimise the use of violence when the dhamma kingdom is threatened.

8. Until recently, most of the scholars writing on Burma’s history have maintained that ethnicity was the main contradiction in pre-colonial society, and that Burmans were becoming culturally dominant. Analyses by Lieberman (1978) and Taylor (1982) have shown that ethnic oppo sitions were subordinate to that between Buddhist and non-Buddhist, i.e. whether or not the population in question held a position in relation to religion and state, or were not included in these tributary relations. However, there were some cultural differences in ceremonies and rituals between ethnic groups in their practice of Buddhism.

20 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

This model for a total cosmic-ontological-political unity has survived despite the attempt by a foreign power to destroy it, thereby making it the quintessence of both Burman (ethnic) cultural identity and a part of modern Burman nationalism. We shall return to this at a later point. The British made radical inroads into the universe of dhamma, as they abolished the monarchy and withdrew official support for Buddhism and the Sangha. Thus, a foreign power intervened directly in dhamma and kamma and therefore in the conditions that facilitated the existence of society, culture and individuals, as laid down through cosmology and ontology. Colonialism usurped not only power but also the order of the world itself. This intervention was a key influence on the construction of Burma’s modern social identity.

4. THE COLONISATION OF BURMESE IDENTITY

To be Burman (bama) today refers to language, literature, tradition, history, etc. This summarises a modern sense of nationality more or less in the form of an imagined community (Anderson 1991). But in the old state and kingdom the dominant identity was determined by (a) whether one was a Buddhist, and (b) whether one was a member of an alliance with the ruling dynasty, that is, the place one occupied in the tributary hierarchy. This could be as part of the king’s court (officials, craftsmen and soldiers), or as supplier of tribute via local officials, or as a more distant vassal, who supplied a symbolic tribute from afar. Finally, a large part of the population were bonded ‘slaves’.1 Most were bonded (indentured) labourers, who could buy their freedom, unlike the prisoners of war. The population around the capital was often ethnically mixed: Burmans, Shan, Mon and other minorities, as well as prisoners of war from Siam (Thailand). Identity and status within the tributary system were inseparable. The character of the regime was experienced by the population entirely through local officials and how these officials patronised their clients amongst the peasants. Most of the king’s men liable to corvée lived around the capital whilst, for example, the Karen in the mountains paid tribute only occasionally in natural resources or as suppliers of provisions to the army. They held a peripheral position but not because of ethnic identity; the Buddhist Pwo Karen held a prominent position in the southern kingdom dominated by the Mon people until 1750.

1. Hierarchy of commoners (following Aung-Thwin, 1984): Ahmudan: ‘bearer of duty’, conducted Crown service, which included military service (corvée); Hpaya kyun: glebe bondsmen working for the monasteries; Athi: non-bonded; they paid capitation tax in natural resources or money; Kyun: bonded individuals (‘slaves’).

22 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

The individual’s place in this system was therefore dependent on the following criteria: kamma from earlier lives and present accumulated religious merit, combined with tributary status and rank. As stated above, there was a connection between kamma and status in this life. Therefore status as a Burman would be unthinkable without acknowledging Buddhism as a shared frame of reference. How—and how much—one practised one’s religion was, on the other hand, not as decisive as accepting the Buddhist dhamma and subjecting oneself to cosmology and recognising its legitimacy. But what of culture as a criterion for identity? Culture was apparently subordinate to religion and tributary status. This did not prevent Burmans from considering certain minorities such as some of the Karen, as wild and uncivilised, but this status was assigned predominantly to non-Buddhists. The teachings and cosmology of Buddhism are universalistic and, to my knowledge, do not discriminate on the basis of ethnic differentiation. It is a modern phenomenon to elevate culture as the dominant and exclusive marker of identity. In Burma, the Buddhist cosmology was decisive for social, political and cultural identity. This identity was revealed when threatened by external forces, namely when the harmony between the sacred and the profane worlds was broken and when a foreign religion (and power) contested the indigenous model of the universe. Therefore, the important role of Buddhist cosmology in defining the dominant identity as based on Burman cultural values is best explained through the confrontation with the Christian missionaries. Whilst Buddhism and Christianity both claim to be universalistic systems of ideas, their confrontation in the colonial context expressed a particularistic cultural clash. This paradox seems to be extremely important in understanding the present xenophobia in Burma. Christian Intervention American Baptist missionaries came to Burma in 1813. They did not receive permission to convert Burmans and had no success until the intervention of the British. King Bagyidaw would not allow conversion because the Baptists demanded a total break with Buddhist thought, not just with ceremonies and the monks’ and Buddha’s teachings but also with cosmology and ontology themselves. In such circumstances, Christian Burmans were not simply people who broke with Burman culture and religion—they were disloyal citizens of the Buddhist kingdom of Burma. Foreigners could certainly practise their own

THE COLONISATION OF BURMESE IDENTITY 23

religion but on condition that they did not intervene in the dhammaruled universe. This is extremely important for understanding the Burmans’ selfidentification in relation to the surrounding world, not because the notions of the last century persist unchanged but because reference to this tradition is woven into present political strategies and models. According to Father Bigandet, Christian Burmans were labelled kala (‘foreigners’); the comparatively few Burmans who converted were permanently placed outside of society as aliens: they lost their nationality after they turned away from the religion of their ancestors.2 The king asked the Missionary Judson about the Christian Burmans: ‘Are they real Burmans? Do they dress like other Burmans?’3 The king quickly perceived that Christian fundamen-talism and its absolute demand for subjugation were a forewarning of attempts to conquer Burma by both usurping the cosmological order itself and changing the culturally defined content. The Baptists would not allow any reverence for monks, be it in the form of gift-giving in return for religious merit or education in the monasteries. This was regarded as idolatry and meant expulsion from the Baptist sect. For missionaries, Burma was controlled by an idolatrous despotism and tyranny, which inhibited salvation and civilisation. They did not hide their intention to convert the whole world into the disciples of Jesus. Whilst demanding total subjugation, the missionaries also began to reorganise everyday life and work. Work was measured by time and the sabbath was to be observed. This was followed by the teaching of European culture, from learning the English language to ideas on order and cleanliness and ‘shaking hands’—an important part of the Christian, civilised identity.4 This identity was based on an auto nomous self, subjugated to a belief in salvation, and marked by morality and hard work. In this way, Burman culture became synonymous with paganism and something less civilised, which was incompatible with Christian identity.

2. ‘The few natives that became converts … were called Kalas, because in the opinion of the Burmese they had embraced the religion of the Kalas and had become bonafide strangers, having lost their nationality’ (Bigandet, [1887] 1996:4). See also H. Trager (1966). 3. Baptist Missionary Magazine, 1823, vol. 4, p. 215. 4. See Comaroff and Comaroff (1989), where a similar process in South Africa is portrayed and precisely analysed; and Asad (1993), who ties together Christianity and power.

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Seen from a Buddhist Burman perspective, Christianity was, and still is, intolerant, arrogant and absolutist. Christian conversion thus generated fear of estrangement from what defined Burman identity as well as the foundation of the kingdom and its subjects among other ethnic groups (Shan, Mon, Karen and others). If large sections of these minorities now became like the foreigners, the Europeans could easily assume power. This is exactly what happened in the three colonial wars of conquest in 1824, 1852 and 1885. Even though the king forbade missionaries from handing out books and missions from operating in the areas of the country he controlled after 1826, this could not prevent the conversion of those Karen who were not well versed in Buddhism. These Sgaw Karen from the delta of the Irrawaddy River in the south of Burma held the lowest position in the dynastic hierarchy. Apparently they had no direct protectors amongst state officials and as such they saw not only deliverance but also advancement through the ranks of power in their alliance with the Baptists. When the British invaded the kingdom in 1852, which was an event brought about in part by intrigues created by some missionaries, the Christian Karen aided the army, killing or capturing many Burmans.5 The Burmans took revenge by burning many of the Christian villages and crucifying a Karen pastor. Such events prefaced a religious war—an important part of the colonialisation process. Thus religion was brought into politics as something irretrievably connected with ethnio-national identity, and which had to be protected through the use of violence. The anti-colonial struggle developed into a fundamentalistic nationalism, and a struggle for survival which legitimised the use of violence. The following decades bore witness to constant clashes between Christians and Buddhists. Missionaries disrupted Buddhist cere monies by arrogantly undermining the monks’ authority and entering into arguments with them, while Christians were abducted and their villages were ransacked. In 1856 a large rebellion was started around Bassein in the Irrawaddy Delta by a Karen mìn laùng (‘king in the making’). The rebellion spread and thousands of Buddhist Karen from the mountains in the Salween area joined forces with some Kayah and Shan. The Karen built a pagoda 5. See Pollak (1979). Immediately before the war the Burmese governor of Rangoon and the American missionary Kincaid had a flerce argument. The governor said: ‘Christianity is aimed to destroy every other religion. You are getting all people over to your side, for you make them think well of you and your doctrine’, Baptist Missionary Magazine, 1852, vol. 32, p. 69.

THE COLONISATION OF BURMESE IDENTITY 25

in the mountains on top of which they raised the symbol of royal power, the spire (htì). It was to be the end of foreign rulers—a Karen was to be king. According to prophecy, a Karen king would come to rule over Pegu, an old royal city northeast of Rangoon—a king who would, it must be stressed, follow dhamma and the cosmological principles. The British were thus forced to enter a difficult and bloody guerrilla war against the Buddhist Karen and their allies, who also attacked the Christian Karen. The colonial power described this mìn laùngas an ‘adventurer and evilly-disposed person’,6 a bewildered and ignorant Karen who exploited the weakened state of the Burman kingdom in order to achieve personal power (see Chapter 14). The religious violence culminated in 1887 during the final conquest. As mentioned previously, an exceptional event occurred after King Thibaw was sent into exile: monks in their yellow robes engaged directly in the organisation of guerrilla troops. The foreign element was to be hunted and driven out. In return the missionaries requested and received weapons from the British: ‘We are belligerent’, ‘God is with us, tyranny and Buddhism are a dying monster’, they enthusiastically exclaimed. The rebels killed Christians and burned villages. The army reciprocated and Christian Karen captured monks or delivered their heads for a reward of 25 rupees. Many heads were delivered, including that of a leading monk (Mayangyung hpòngyi), whose head alone fetched a reward of 5,000 rupees—a small fortune. ‘It is Buddhism in arms against Christianity’, a missionary said.7 This mixture—expressing itself as a religious war with ethnic connotations—constituted a monstrosity that in later years, right up until independence, was a permanent element of Burmese nationalism. Religion and ethnicity were, as mentioned above, not excluded from the Burman understanding of self-identity prior to the arrival of the British and the missionaries; however, they were not exclusive criteria. Furthermore, ethnicity was not connected with political independence

6. Burma Gazetteer, 1910, Salween District, vol. A, p. 2. The same source calls the rebellion ‘a most formidable insurrection’. On the other hand, some missionaries and officials denounced the leader as yet another Karen prophet—a vulgar impostor, making a lot of noise. There was no evidence supporting the notion that the Burman king was behind the rebellion, or that there was general discontent in relation to the tax system. Only the most insightful of colonial officials and missionaries located the roots of this strategy in the cosmology and understood the meaning and seriousness which was underlined by a simultaneous rebellion in India, the so-called great Sepoy mutiny.

26 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

as in the European construction of ethnic and national identity, synonymous with an autonomous and nation-state. However, colonisation in Burma brought with it the developments occurring within European nationalism. Karen Nationalism The Karen National Association (KNA) was founded in 1881 as an association of Baptist churches.8 It was the forerunner of the present Karen National Union (KNU), and sought the leading role in a panKaren nationalist movement. It played a key role in the run-up to independence, with the aim of attaining an independent state protected by the colonial power. The KNU organised the 1949 rebellion, which now seems to have entered its final phase after fifty years of fighting. During the 1880s, Christianity gained a foothold amongst the Kachin of northern Burma. This was the beginning of the Kachin independence movement. Following ‘pacification’, the British began to govern Burma in different areas, whereby Kayah’s small principalities were conceived of as independent states (called Karenni)? formally placed outside the colonial administration; Shan, Kachin and part of the Salween district came to be known as the ‘excluded area’ in relation to ‘Ministerial Burma’ (see Map 2 overleaf showing excluded frontier areas in 1946). This model was based on ethnic pluralism, that is to say, joint economy and politics in conjunction with the British Empire, but with cultural segregation as the criterion of internal political administration. This division was argued by reference to indirect rule via the Shan princes (sawbwas) and Kachin duwas (chiefs). In 1922 the Shan princes agreed to combine their principalities (möng or muang) to form a federation. By entering into a federation, the sawbwas lost control over education and the police. Nevertheless they agreed because they were

7. See Baptist Missionary Magazine, 1886, vol. 66. 8. See Appendix 2 on the Karen organisations. See further Gravers (1996b), on the history of Karen nationalism. 9. According to Crosthwaite (1968:202), who headed the administration of ‘pacification’ in the 1880s, Eastern Kayah had to accept a tributary status under the British queen, ‘in accordance with established custom’. The territories classified as ‘excluded’ by the British previously enjoyed a high degree of independence, although they were part of the Burmese kingdom at the time of annexation, and thus considered part of the royal domain. The British still regarded these as independent states.

THE COLONISATION OF BURMESE IDENTITY 27

worried about losing their hereditary rights and being totally integrated into Burma proper. The colonial power thus divided the country according to a mountainvalley dichotomy, which was both political and cultural. The mountains comprised ‘the frontier areas’ with their ‘tribal’ peoples, who had not yet reached a sufficiently civilised state to be included under the same administration policy as ‘Ministerial Burma’, which was a part of India. The mountain peoples were under the direct rule of the British governor.10 Following ‘pacification’, the flow of immigrants from India and China increased significantly. The Indians were soldiers (sepoys), moneylenders and casual labourers. The Indian moneylenders increased their landownership in the rich Irrawaddy Delta during the 1930s world crisis, as low prices on the world market forced the Burmans into irrevocable debt. Prior to the Second World War there were approximately one million Indians in Burma and over half of the population of Rangoon was Indian.11 Between one-third and a quarter of the Indian population fled from the Japanese whilst those remaining adjusted themselves to their new sahib, with a willingness not approved of by the Burmans.12 The Chinese population, in turn, numbered approximately 350,000 prior to the war. They were involved particularly in trade. Thus the Burmans could easily ascertain with bitterness that other ethnic groups dominated many areas of employment: doctors, nurses (often Karen women who were also preferred as nannies), soldiers and seasonal farm workers. British firms employed Indians and Karen rather than Burmans. This trend in immigration, together with the colonial power’s use of Indians in many of the lower administrative positions, created yet another ethnic and—in part—religious opposition, which can still be felt, for example, in the great upsurge of anti-Muslim agitation and conflict in Arakan since 1991, which sent 300,000 people into Bangladesh as refugees. Constant strikes and demonstrations against the colonial power took place in 1938. Tensions between Indians and Burmans also appeared in

10. See Silverstein (1980) on the British policy of divide and rule. 11. Taylor (1987:127). 12. According to U Maung Maung (1989:69–70), a general feeling of delight pervaded the country on the forced departure of the British and their Indian ‘servants’ in 1942.

28 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

Map 2: Excluded Area 1946 (Source: Tinker, 1983–1984)

THE COLONISATION OF BURMESE IDENTITY 29

the form of an unpleasant mixture of religious and racial/ethnic opposition. Newspapers expressed the fear that mixed marriages between Indian Hindus or Muslims and Burman women would lead to the women being forced to renounce Buddhism. Such marriages came to be regarded as a threat to religion and ‘racial identity’. However, inter-marriages were quite rare, but the mixture of economic exploitation by Indian chettyar or chetti-kala (moneylenders), race, religion and culture challenged the population with an alarming force and during the ensuing riots more than 1,000 people died.13 In 1931 Burmans numbered approximately 17,000 in the public administration while there were 14,800 Indians and 1,644 Eurasians. The Indians and Eurasians (descendants of the British and Burmese) dominated the middle ranks under the British in the rail and post services. The Karen played a comparatively prominent role within the military, police and health services, and as teachers -especially the Christian Karen, who comprised approximately 15 per cent of the Karen population. Eurasians numbered approximately 20,000 and were dependent upon the charity of the British to procure education and employment. On the whole they were better educated than Burmans but they were nevertheless social outcasts. Orwell describes these ‘halfcastes’ and their social position in Burmese Days (p. 117), when Flory has to answer to whether or not one socialises with them: ‘Good gracious, no. They’re complete outcasts.’ They could be used to guard Burman prisoners or as clerks but they were looked down upon by both sides. This multi-ethnic colonial model has been labelled the ‘plural society’ and has been defined and critically assessed by colonial official J.S. Furnivall: Each group holds by its own religion, its own culture and language, its own ideas and ways. As individuals they meet, but only in the market-place. There is a plural society, with different sections of the community living side by side, but separately, within the same political unit. Even in the economic sphere there is a division of labour along racial lines…the union cannot be dissolved without the whole society relapsing into anarchy.14

13. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:10) has commented upon the significance of this fear. She says that mixed marriages were a blow against ‘the very roots of Burmese manhood and racial purity’. See also KhinYi (1988:96).

30 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

Thus, the colonial power established its hegemony with an inbuilt doomsday prophecy: when the colonial union model disintegrates, everything collapses into chaos. It is precisely this fear which has fuelled the last thirty years of military rule. This model contained an acknowledgement of cultural differences, due to different stages on the evolutionary ladder, leading necessarily to a division of labour based on race. As we shall see later on, race still plays a role in nationalist political rhetoric. The pluralistic model’s division of labour was also reflected in class relations. The middle classes were dominated by Indians, while prominent Burman political leaders in the 1930s were often dependent on Indian financial backing of their political ventures. These leaders were usually lawyers and rarely independent businessmen. In addition, the Indians were interested in allying themselves with Burman politicians in order to assure their influence in banking and trade circles.15 The wholesale trade in provisions and medicine was dominated by Indians (as was banking and moneylending). Obviously the Europeans controlled the large oil, timber, mining and transport firms. This unequal class relationship can be proved by examining the taxation system in Rangoon, where the Indians contributed 55 per cent of all taxes, the Europeans 15 per cent and the Burmans 11 per cent.16 The rest came from all other groups. This distorted development is an important factor that has augmented the ethnic race-related oppositions and emphasised that the kala controlled everything. This was also demonstrated by the composition of the student body. The educational system favoured Christians via the mission schools. In the 1930s twothirds of university students came from the minority ethnic groups, including Indians, who, for example, comprised one-third of the medical students.17 In the nineteenth century, the British attempted to use the monastic schools to teach English, geography and mathematics, but many monks were opposed to this as they considered these subjects as anti-Buddhist.

14. Furnivall (1956:304, my emphasis). Furnivall’s Fabianism inspired some of the young Burman nationalists. He was U Nu’s advisor in the 1950s. 15. Taylor (1981, 1987) proves the political importance of the poorly developed Burman middle class and the Indian influence on Burman politics, at times underlined by economic support. The disclosure of this connection cost Ba Maw his position as prime minister in 1939.

THE COLONISATION OF BURMESE IDENTITY 31

The primary goal of the Christian schools was to promote conversion to Christianity and only thereafter to educate and civilise. The colonial power, however, wanted education to be a part of the division of labour and colonial rule. The missionaries created deeper ethnic divisions by favouring those minority groups they converted, namely the Karen, Kachin and Chin. In the 1930s, they realised that if Buddhist Burmans acquired greater influence or even independence, this policy could work against their interests. Futhermore, educational policy became the fundamental issue of the Burman national movement, which was led by students. Thus the colonial power realised quite early on that the division of labour along racial lines resulted in unintended opposition. In order to create a united identity out of this plurality, a ‘committee to ascertain and advise how the imperial idea may be inculcated and fostered in schools and colleges in Burma’ was founded in 1917. This consisted of eight British senior officials, four missionaries and only two Burmans. Symbols such as the Union Jack and the national anthem were to be promoted, as was Burma’s own history and literature—as part of the Empire. A sense of ‘unity of Empire’ was to be created: one Empire—many cultures; one hegemonic identity above the many. This political and economic policy of divide and rule, with its total opposition between the club mentality notion of ‘segregation’ and the unification of the pluralistic society within a single union, expressed itself in the form of a hegemonic set of conventions and stereotypes whereby ethnic, religious and cultural differences became the yardstick of national identity and political power. Some examples taken from the period preceding the Second World War will show how xenophobia and fear ingrained themselves in the ruling mentality.

16. Taylor (1987:133–36). 17. The division of students in Rangoon University according to religion indicates the following: Buddhists 32.2%, indigenous Christians 14.5%, Europeans and Anglo-Burmans 9.9%, Hindus 29.8%, Muslims 5.3% and others (encl. Sikhs) 8.0% (Bless, 1990:252). His book includes a well-documented analysis of the division of labour under colonial rule.

32

5. BUDDHISM, XENOPHOBIA AND REBELLION IN THE 1930S

Following the ‘pacification’ and its humiliation of the Burman social order, Buddhism returned as a political medium in 1906 when the Young Men’s Buddhist Association (YMBA) was established in response to Christian dominance.1 The YMBA was an imitation of the YMCA but it was a political organisation meant as an alternative to Christian influence. It was especially attractive to young Burmans who had been educated in the West. The YMBA’s goal was to halt Western influence and to regain respect for Burman culture as well as for Buddhism. This was achieved through ‘no footwear in the pagodas’ campaigns, for example. However, the Buddhist and anti-Christian content was soon reinforced with agitation against foreign power and presence. At first, the movement’s founders, who were mainly young barristers, were careful not to provoke the colonial power nor to be accused of sedition in the event of securing employment for themselves. These young men, with Ba Pe at the fore, were legislators and reformers who demanded Burmese participation in government. U Maung Maung has described the YMBA as an alternative to the most powerful of the British clubs: ‘The Rangoon YMBA had become by 1908 not the Buddhist counterpart of its Western archtypical association but really the Burman equivalent of the British Pegu Club.’2 The YMBA was the first sign of a political awakening in Burma after 1885 but with time the organisation became more radical and internal conflict arose between the reformists and the boycott movement led by

1. It was probably modelled after the YMBA established in Sri lanka in 1889 as part of the Buddhist revival lead by Dharmapala and influenced by the Theosophical Society. YMBA was anti-Christian and nationalistic. 2. U Maung Maung (1980:4).

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the monks. The monks became active yet again. The best known was U Ottama, who had lived abroad for a number of years. Whilst in India he had been inspired by Gandhi’s strategy of non-violence and boycotts. In the 1920s he agitated for the implementation of this strategy, playing upon the fear that Buddhism would disappear under foreign rule. He pointed to the fact that taxes were used to finance Christian schools, whilst the monks lost prestige and were going through difficult times because of a diminution in the size of gifts in the form of food, clothing and money given to the monastries. Many young monks sought to follow in his footsteps. On seeing that monks were again acting politically, the British became afraid and accused U Ottama of inciting violent revolution.3 He was imprisoned on a number of occasions and died a martyr in prison in 1939. The Sangha openly demonstrated its support for U Ottama when he was imprisoned for the first time in 1921. His boycott strategy gained great public support and people were encouraged to wear homespun clothing. It is not difficult to imagine the contrast between these outfits and the lawyers in their European attire, attempting to construct a form of self-determination on British territory. This example of contrast between the ‘traditional’ and the ‘modern’ has left a deep impression on Burmese nationalism. These developments emphasised an important theme: ‘Out with all foreign influence’, which according to Buddhism generates greed, hatred, drunkenness and theft. Christianity was said to initiate inequality, which again implied that Buddhism placed all as equals in relation to dhamma and kamma, The Burmans saw the Indian moneylenders of the chettyar caste (chetti-kala in Burman) as exemplifying this inequality, comprising a special category of landlords in the 1930s. As the monks reminded the public, there had been no landlords prior to this.

3. There was some confusion amongst the British in relation to the politicised monk. A romantic wave, inspired by the official and author Fielding-Hall, regarded Buddhism as a humane and relatively equal alternative to Christianity: ‘a very beautiful religion’ (Fielding-Hall, 1906:250). In contrast, others, such as the colonial official J.G. Scott (Shway Yoe), regarded Buddhism as an obstacle to pure economic goals and the rational accumulation of profit, namely more in line with the later Max Weber-inspired analysis of Buddhism. Sarkisyanz (1965: 115) compares Fielding-Hall with Johann von Herder, the German philosopher who is the father of romantic cultural relativism.

BUDDHISM, XENOPHOBIA AND REBELLJON IN THE 1930S 35

The regression of Buddhism—organisationally and in terms of content—paralleled the economic crisis, where up to 75 per cent of the peasants in the rich rice-exporting Irrawaddy Delta were in debt and 30– 40 per cent had lost their land, mostly to chettyars. According to dhamma, this chain of cause and effect is self-reinforcing, in that hate creates violence, which in turn creates more hate, which cannot disappear when people cease adhering to Buddhist ethics. Therefore the source of the disintegration of the universal order can only be located in foreign intervention, as apparent in Christian culture and the capitalist world market. During the 1920s and 1930s there were multitudes of Buddhist and nationalist groups and associations which gathered under the umbrella of the General Council of Burmese Associations (GCBA). These associations (known as wunthanu athin—‘patriotic associations’4) were often based at local level and involved many monks, who amongst other things called for the boycott of legal proceedings against U Ottama and of elections to those councils controlled by the colonial power. More than 10,000 village associations were formed all over Burma as a reaction to the headmen appointed by the government since 1887 as a part of the ‘pacification’ programme.5 The Hsaya San Rebellion Burma was administered as a part of India until 1937. The colonial power did not consider the Burmese to be mature enough to participate in the government as was the case in India (called dyarchy).6 Although the dyarchy was introduced in India in 1922, self-determination was definitely not on the cards in Burma. Christian Karen supported the colonial power in this view. An internal crisis and the lack of tangible results of the boycott, coupled with reform strategies, led to riots and rebellion.

4. U Maung Maung (1980:14) and Taylor (1987:193) translate wunthanu as ‘supporting own race’ i.e. the upholding of Burman tradition by buying Burman and boycotting British goods. 5. Herbert (1982:8). 6. Under the dyarchy the British appointed the governor, who with his council controlled defence, law and finance, whilst executive au-thority with respect to areas such as health, agriculture and education was partly transferred to selfgovernment.

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The most significant rebellion after 1885 took place in 1930 and was also associated with both an economic crisis and religious agitation. The rebel leader, Hsaya San,7 a member of the YMBA and of a local Buddhist organisation under the GCBA, used the attributes and symbols of a future leader (mìn laùng) found in the cosmology. He is said to have been a crowned king on a ruby-inlaid throne in a ‘palace’ with all the symbols of royal power, and used tattooing as a medicine aimed at rendering his soldiers invulnerable. He acted as one who would reestablish the order of dhamma in the universe and prepare for the coming of the next Buddha. But first, foreigners and non-Buddhists must be driven from the land. The colonial authorities focused on the royal proclamations and symbols. However, some of the proclamations appear only in Western sources although based on a notebook and diary claimed by the police to have been written by Hsaya San. He denied that it was his diary. The use of concepts such as mìn laùng (king-to-be), cakkavatti (universal ruler), and dhammaraja (righteous king) is not literally the same as proclaiming to be royal or king of Burma. Hsaya San used the title of president of his Galon Association.8 The 1930 rebellion is portrayed in many books and articles, mostly because of its exotic features visible in the form of symbols and magic, but also as a pre-revolutionary peasant uprising. The British considered the rising to be a clear sign of superstition and the power that ignorance exerted upon these uncivilised peasants, and believed the monks to be its instigators. The motivating force of the uprising was, however, still thought to be the resurrection of the traditional order of things, with Buddhism and an autocratic rule existing side by side yet separated into spheres of sacred and profane. In order to achieve this, all foreign influence must be erased. In a prayer for the soldiers following a parade, Hsaya San proclaimed: In the name of our Lord [Buddha] and for the Church’s [Sangha] greater glory I, Thupannaka Galon Raja [Hsaya San’s royal title],

7. The title hsaya is translated as ‘teacher’, ‘lord’, or ‘doctor’, i.e. a learned and respected man, who is both well versed in Buddhism and traditional medicine, and in some cases also in alchemy. 8. Patricia Herbert has shown in her important and critical reappraisal of the rebellion in 1982 that Hsaya San made no claim to royal descent. The colonial power focused on the leader figure and not on the real causes of the rebellion.

BUDDHISM, XENOPHOBIA AND REBELLJON IN THE 1930S 37

declare war upon the heathen English who have enslaved us. Burma is for the Burmans—the foreigners removed the king and destroyed the religion, they are usurpers; we have never taken another country.9 Other proclamations are more direct: All the inhabitants who reside in Burma: it is for the economic prosperity of Rahan [monks] and inhabitants, so also in the interest of the religion of our Lord that I have to declare war. English people are our enemies.10 Although the model was based on the traditional cosmology it encompassed the modern nationalist essentialism: ‘Burma for Burmans.’ This ethnic-national content was not dominant in the historical mìn laùng rebellions, where locality, tributary patronclient relationships with local officials, dynastic kinship and the ideal royal attributes were more important than an exclusive and bounded, ethnically based state power. However, as important as the traditional cosmology was for Hsaya San, an equally decisive cause of the rebellion was economic misery. The rebels first attacked the British-appointed village headmen who collected taxes and fines and often appropriated the possessions of villagers who were unable to pay. The British were very quick in attributing the rebellion to the Burmans’ ignorance and superstition, as perceived to be mirrored in their culture. The colonial power denied the Burmans a subjective practice based on their historical experience and reduced the causes to pseudo psychological explanations: As regards the causes it is well known: 1) that the Burman is by nature restless and excitable; 2) that in spite of a high standard of literacy the Burman peasantry are incredible ignorant and

9. Collis (1938:274). Collis was a judge in Burma. He was a good observer who possessed sympathy for the Burmese and a critical attitude vis-à-vis the inequalities created by colonialism. In his account of the Hsaya San rebellion, U Maung Maung (1980) has corrected those representations of the resurrection inspired by cultural relativity, representations which portray it solely as an expression of Burman traditionalism. See Glossary for the meaning of Galon in Hsaya San’s title. 10. Cited in Herbert(1982:6).

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superstitious, the belief in the efficacy of charms and tattooing as conferring invulnerability being still widespread.11 The causes were not only purely cultural, although the strategy was formulated in terms of the cosmological rules. The rebellion was mediated through cultural symbols and concepts whilst economic crisis and political desperation fuelled it. In 1929 Hsaya San had participated in a survey of the peasants’ living conditions which had been carried out by the GCBA. He recommended that the peasants should resist the taxation system, which did not allow any reductions during economic crises. In addition, he claimed that the peasantry should have free access to timber and other forest produce for household use.12 When the GCBA refused to recognise these demands, Hsaya San began to plan the rebellion. It was the demand for aid to repay debts and for simple survival that mobilised thousands living off the land to support him. The peasants would often rather the than to live in such a hopeless situation, where they were exploited by all sides and where the authorities had closed access to cheap loans. The peasants were victims of sales by official order, whereby arrogant officials (Burman) met up with Indian soldiers and auctioned off the land to chettyars, who thus controlled more than a quarter of the most important rice-producing areas. But of course they only did this in order to appease the banks, to whom they themselves owed money. It is not difficult to understand the demonstration of power and humiliation that this constellation of foreign forces represented in the eyes of the peasants. When the GCBA, weakened by corruption and division, would not support a violent rebellion, the initiative was taken up by local leaders. It is also significant that the monks’ political, ‘worldly’ activity led them to break the rules of celibacy and use of money, thus bringing about the collapse of the GCBA. The rebellion spread quickly and comprised a number of local insurrections without much intermediate coordination. The army sent 10,000 infantry soldiers against the peasants, who had few guns and who, to begin with, trusted in the magic protective power of their tattoos and so allowed themselves to be mown down. Entire villages were

11. Government of Burma 1931, Report on the Rebellion in Burma up to 3 May 1931, p. 10. 12. See Bryant (1998:136) on the role of the forest in the Burmese resistance.

BUDDHISM, XENOPHOBIA AND REBELLJON IN THE 1930S 39

forcefully transferred to concentration camps and the leaders of Buddhist groups were arrested, even if they were not involved in the rebellion (only one monk in a yellow robe was reported to have been involved). What is significant, however, is that it became a religious war when a unit comprising 1,600 Christian Karen and Chin were party to quelling the rebellion. Hsaya San was hanged along with 127 others, allegedly at least 3,000 rebels died or were wounded and 9,000 were interned.13 Hsaya San’s symbols were used by politicians who were responsible for the introduction of an autocratic political system. Prime minister Dr Ba Maw allowed himself to be proclaimed ‘sole ruler’ (adipadi) with titles such as ‘lord of the power’, ‘great king’, ‘dictator’ (anashin mingyi kodaw), when the country came under Japanese occupation. He was Hsaya San’s lawyer during legal proceedings. At least the nationalists had now learnt that symbols and amulets were not enough for the fight against the colonial power. Nationalism The political nationalism that existed up until the Japanese occupation bore the mark of Buddhist influence and was mixed with Marxism and Fabianism by the students. In 1937 they formed a book club called Naga-Ni (The Red Dragon’) and acquired Western literature on nationalism, national socialism and Marxism. The students came to play a leading role in the Dobama Asiayone party—‘We the Burmans Association’ was founded in 1930 immediately before the rebellion and included among its membership Aung San, U Nu and other Thakins (‘masters’). This title, which was otherwise reserved for the British colonial masters (Sahib in India), was thereby symbolically repossessed by the young nationalists. According to Aung San Suu Kyi, the term ‘race’ became associated with Thakin, ‘a race of masters’.14 In part, this was in keeping with the spirit of the 1930s and is unpleasantly echoed in the language of today. In fact, one could talk of a direct counterimage to the English racial hierarchy as manifested by the ‘club’. The young nationalists sought a synthesis between Burman tradition and

13. Diverging figures are given, however: U Maung Maung (1980:261) reports that 580 were executed and 890 deported; Herbert (1982:2) says that 1,389 were deported; and Sarkisyanz (1965:163) writes that 12 were decapitated. Official British figures were lower. 14. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:130–33).

40 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

modern Western political thought. This synthesis also included ideological oppositions (socialism and fascism), which mirrored the political developments in Europe. Dobama Asiayone, which became the gathering place for up-andcoming political leaders, was founded following intense disturbances in Rangoon in 1930, when Indian dockers and their families were killed by angry Burman workers enraged by the fact that these kala took jobs from Burmans. The clashes cost 250 lives and more than 2,000 were injured. The crisis of the 1930s started a war of survival between a growing Burman proletariat and the Indian workers. The Burman dockers broke strikes and allowed themselves to be exploited by the British, moving through the streets shouting ‘dobama’—‘we the Burmans’. The students took up the battle-cry and the Dobama Asiayone’s first slogan ran along the lines of ‘race, language, religion’. According to Aung San Suu Kyi, language, culture and society needed to be saved from extinction. In the beginning, the movement bore the mark of Buddhism and nationalism, but developed more in the direction of a left-wing organisation up until the split in 1938. During the strikes, slogans such as the following were used: ‘Burma is our country, Burmese is our literature and language. Love our country, cherish our literature and uphold our language.’15 They also shouted: ‘Master race we are, we Burmans’, a clear provo cation, and the leaders were often interned on charges of ‘sedition’. One of the most significant political actions was the student boycott of lectures and examinations in the 1920s and in 1936. They protested against the Western-oriented, elitist and authoritarian educational system. With U Nu as leader of the student organisation, the tyrannical university college principal was successfully removed. The students gained both public sympathy and experience during these activities. Whilst Thakins had at first been regarded as too radical and arrogant, they were now seen as heroes. In 1938 a serious split took place within the ranks of the Dobama, the cause being the question of whether or not the leaders should participate in elections and accept an allowance for their political work. This, of course, was regarded as total collaboration with the colonial power, 15. The history of the Dobama movement is described in detail by U Maung Maung (1980) and Khin Yi (1988). Slogans are quoted in Khin Yi (1988:5, 63). The movement encompassed all ethnic groups despite its nationalistic overtones and racial preferences. Thus some Indians were also included in its membership.

BUDDHISM, XENOPHOBIA AND REBELLJON IN THE 1930S 41

which did not believe in the Burmans’ capacity for self-government. The British Chamber of Commerce dominated political decisionmaking so much that democracy in the Western sense of the word became seriously undermined during this period. When one reads of the 1938–39 strikes and demonstrations, the number of similarities with the events of 1988–89 is striking, despite the fact that conditions have changed over the years: students bearing the peacock flag and monks standing side by side with workers and peasants; police violence whereby seven monks were murdered in Mandalay in 1939; and finally the storming of the Dobama’s headquarters, situated near the Shwe Dagon pagoda, by the police. Again the police marched into the pagoda with their boots on. This profanity unleashed yet another wave of strikes and protests in defence of the religious essence of Burman identity and against foreign invasion. Through this growth in nationalism, freedom and independence became directly associated with the expulsion of all foreign influence. The aim was to free what was Burman from foreign capitalist and imperialist dominance. However, a clear alternative model and strategy —which could have functioned as an antidote to xeno phobia and ethnic division generated by the colonial administration—were not formulated. The Dobama movement’s socialism dealt mainly with nationalising the economy and boycotting the National Assembly and British products. The Japanese, with their notions of Asia as a greater East Asian coprosperity sphere, and an autocratic government, added to the more problematic side of nationalism. And yet the Japanese delivered the powerful alternative which the Thakins lacked.16 The young Burman nationalists used the Japanese to gain training, weapons and power with the aim of achieving total independence, although they later rebelled against the Japanese. How much influence Japanese political thought and fascist ideology have had is difficult to ascertain, but there are at least three areas where such influence is likely

16. The history of the political parties and the Japanese occupation encompasses many important details that cannot be dealt with here. I refer the reader to an English and a Burman portrayal of the situation, the two most important sources published in recent years. With their opposing views, they provide a good picture of the complex conditions of this period (Tinker, 1983–84 and U Maung Maung, 1989). U Maung Maung himself participated in the events as Aung San’s aide-de-camp.

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1. in the rule of the ‘lord of power’ (Anashin Mingyi) Ba Maw with his catchphrase of ‘one blood, one voice, one command’; 2. in the militant organisation of state and society; and 3. in the idea of the corporate state, within which all oppositions between classes and ethnic groups are removed to form one nation. Aung San did support an autocratic state whilst he was in Japan in 1941, and he reached the rank of major general in the Japanese army.17 The effect of the various nationalist strategies and the search for a genuine shared identity in this period can be summarised as follows: nationalism was ingrained in all spheres of social life, resulting in all parties, including communists and socialists, having to deal not only with the special Burman ethnic and religious identity, but also with the foreign threat against this identity, before discussion of alternative political models could commence. The nationalist politicians were thus caught in the trap of nationalism: that the preservation of the cultural past as eternal and natural even if this has to be achieved by the use of violence and bloodshed - inhibits the creation of a new pluralistic consensus.

17. Silverstein (1972:14).

6. TWO VERSIONS OF NATIONALISM: UNION STATE OR ETHNICISM?

When Burma was close to independence, Aung San, the then leader, nationalist and champion of liberty, said that monks must desist from taking an active part in political life. They must concentrate on the Buddhist message of charity and non-violence; this must be their contribution to the country. He preferred this traditional role, where religion as an institution (the Sangha) looked after religious functions, kept its own ranks in order and refrained from politicising: We must draw a clear line between politics and religion, because the two are not one and the same thing. If we mix religion and politics, then we offend the spirit of religion itself.1 Also he warned against integrating animism, astrology and alchemy into Buddhism. His ideal was a philosophy and ontology containing the ‘great truths’ as a universal religion, free from political intrigue, superstition and fraud. Demands for Buddhism to be made the state religion were rejected. This was clearly addressed to politicised monks and sects—also to politicians who plotted to harness the Sangha for their own political ends. In a speech in 1946 Aung San addressed ‘the reverend Sanghas’ thus: You are inheritors of a great religion. Purify it and broadcast it to all the world … [carry the message] of love and brotherhood, freedom of religious worship, freedom from fear, ignorance.2

1. Cf. Donald Smith (1965:118). Aung San’s attitude to Buddhism is discussed by his daughter Aung San Suu Kyi, 1991:8.

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Aung San also had the clear goal that all ethnic groups should be included in a united Burma, even if this involved positive discrimination. Aung San’s definition of national identity is therefore interesting since the present regime has followed it and it is cited in the Burma Socialist Programme Party’s manifesto from 1962: A nation is a collective term applied to a people irrespective of their ethnic origin, living in close contact with one another and having common interests and sharing joys and sorrows together for such historic periods as to have acquired a sense of oneness. Though race, religion and language are important factors, it is only their traditional desire and will to live in unity through weal and woe that binds a people together and makes them a nation and their spirit a patriotism.3 This representation is—including its bombast—a reply to British policy, where race/ethnicity and national identity were coupled together. But Aung San did not view a unitary state as feasible; he favoured a union of the different ethnic groups as equal participants and with special rights accorded to the national minorities. Aung San’s definition was also a direct reply to the Christian Karen who, during a visit to London in 1946, attempted to convince the British to grant them an independent state.4 They stressed at that time that they were a nation with its own pure ethnic culture and civilisation, as the following passage written by Saw Po Chit, a member of the Karen delegation to London, depicts:

2. Silverstein (1972:55; emphasis added). Freedom from Fear is the title of Aung San Suu Kyi’s book. 3. Quoted in the Burma Socialist Programme Party: The System of Correlation of Man and his Environment’ (1963:50; emphasis added). Aung San quoted Stalin’s definition of a nation from a speech of 1947: ‘A nation is a historically evolved, stable community of language, territory, economic life and psychological make-up manifested in a community of culture’. Aung San considered that only the Shan and the Burmans met all the criteria for a nation as a community according to this definition (Silverstein, 1972:96; 1980:142). 4. See Appendix 2. During the Round Table Conference in 1931–32, the Karen representative Thra Shwe Ba claimed that the Karen were the aborigines of Burma and had arrived before the Burmans. See document (CMD 4004 vi 233) in the Oriental and India Office Collection, British Library, London. On the making of Karen nationalism, see Gravers (1996b).

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It is a dream that Karen and Burman can ever evolve a common nationality, and this misconception of one homogeneous Burmese nation…will lead Burma to destruction. Karens are a nation according to any definition. We are a nation with our own distinctive culture and civilisation, language, literature, names, nomenclature, sense of value and proportion, customary laws and moral codes, aptitudes and ambitions; in short we have our own distinctive outlook on life. By all canons of international law we are a nation.5 This is an especially particularistic definition in clear opposition to Aung San’s definition which emphasises the unifying and universal features. By ‘civilisation’, the Karen meant emphatically that they were more civilised or rather educated in the modern, Western understanding of the term, as well as being Christian. They pointed out, moreover, several serious episodes during the Second World War where the Burman army and young nationalists had killed many Christian Karen near Papun in the Salween district and in the town of Myaung Mya in the Delta. These confrontations increased the existing mistrust between the Karen and the Burmans, and the current of events demonstrated clearly the mix of ingredients which unleashed the conflict. It was the Burma Independence Army (BIA) under Aung San and the young nationalists that helped the Japanese army drive the British out. The BIA, trained by the Japanese, led the country to occupation in the hope of an impending independence. However, they harboured suspicions that the Karen still supported the fallen colonial power. The Karen had contact with the British Force 136, the Far Eastern branch of the SOE (Special Operations Executive) that carried out weapons drops. It has been suggested that in the Salween district bordering Thailand alone, some 12,000 Karen received weapons during the course of the war. Moreover, almost half of the Burma Rifles in the 1930s were Karen (ca. 1,500–2,000 men).6 Most returned to their villages with their weapons after the British had retreated back to India. 5. Karen’s Political Future, (1945–47:170; emphasis added). The term Karen originates from Burman (Kayin) and Mon and is a shared reference for several ethnic groups: Sgaw, Pwo, Kayah, Pa-o, and a number of smaller groups. There are both similarities in language and culture and large local variations between and within these groups. 6. The British recruited amongst the ethnic minorities. At the close of the war the British Burman Army was 22,000 men strong. of these 3,000

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Therefore, the Karen were suspected of plotting uprisings with British help. The British Major Seagrim and two other British officers from the Burma Rifles hid in the Salween district and tried to organise a Karen guerrilla unit as part of Force 136. Helped especially by Christian Karen, Seagrim’s presence unleashed violence and terror from the BIA and the Japanese army against all Karen in the area until ‘Grandfather Longlegs’, as the Karen called Seagrim, surrendered to the Japanese and was executed. He is still a legend because the Karen saw him as the younger white brother of their mythology,7 who returned their lost book of wisdom. He appealed to Karen millenarian expectations and for many Karen in the mountains he reflected all the ideals of a traditional leader. This ideal lives on in spite of Christian influence. The Salween district was in fact the centre for one of the most extensive mìn laùng uprisings in the nineteenth century (see Chapter 14).8 But for the Burmans, Seagrim’s presence confirmed fears that foreigners would still prevent the formation of an independent nation and state. In the Irrawaddy Delta city of Myaung Mya, rumours of paratroopers and an uprising amongst the Karen generated a conflict which cost the lives of 1,800 Karen and an unknown number of Burmans and Indians. In this region around half of the population were Karen and a majority of these were Buddhist Pwo. This is where most of the Karen elite came 6. [cont.] were Chin, 2,000 Kachin, 2,000 Karen and only 200 Burman. The rest were Indians and Gurkhas. The Karen had relatively more officers. The Burman Indepence Army (renamed the Burman National Army in 1943) under Aung San had around 12,000 armed men. Around 1,000 Karen participated in the Anti-Fascist Alliance of Aung San (M. Smith,1991:440, n. 26). Compare with figures from 1942 in Taylor (1987:100). 7. In a Karen myth of creation, brothers from other ethnic groups preserved their copy of the book of knowledge, given by the creator of the universe, while the Karen lost his in a swidden field. The Karen expects that his white brother will return with this golden book. See Gravers (1996b, 1998) on the missionary interest in this myth. 8. One can ask how Christianity and the younger white brother match up with the strong emphasis on national and ethnic oneness in the definition quoted above. The prominent Karen politician Saw Tha Din gave me the answer during a discussion in Thailand in 1971: ‘We regard Christianity as our rediscovered religion—not as foreign.’ According to the Christian Karen, the British gave the Karen law and order whilst the American Baptist missionaries gave them back their religion. Tradition and modern civilisation are therefore of compatible dimensions. Saw Tha Din was with the Karen delegation in London in 1946 and present to formulate the quoted definition of the Karen nation. On Saw Tha Din, see Gravers (1996b).

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from, especially from the Christian Sgaw. They were educated as lawyers, administrators, officers and teachers. The well-known Karen politicians, including Sir San C. Po, lived here. There were in turn more class divisions than in the mountains, as some of the large landowners in the Delta were Karen, and thus shared pro-British interests with many Indians who had not fled.9 The BIA attempted to tone down the contrasts with calls like: ‘Karen, we are of the same flesh and blood— but the Chinese and Indians are kala [foreign].’ All ethnic groups were promised protection if they handed in their weapons. However, the Karen did not dare hand in their weapons on account of rumours of rape and murder of other Karen. Rumours that the Karen hid British soldiers unleashed retaliatory attacks, killings and the burning of Karen villages. The BIA was undisciplined and led by officers who were young, inexperienced and poorly armed. Amongst the Karen, the older and more moderate leadership had to accept being pushed to one side in favour of a new, more militant leadership. A Buddhist Pwo Karen (Shwe Tun Kya) attracted a large following by appearing as cosmology’s ‘ruler of the universe’ (setkya mìn) with the sarne tattoos as Hsaya San. Another well-known Karen politician, San Po Thin, started a group named after one of the Karen cultural heroes, Tho’ Mèh Pha (Toh Meh Pah), a ‘Moses’ who would return to lead the Karen to their promised land. According to the myth, Tho’ Meh Pha walked ahead, while his family attempted to cook and eat snails. They took their time and lost the trail and contact with their leader. For the Karen, the myth symbolises their position metaphorically as orphans, that is, a people without a leader.10 Following rumours that the Karen were to be exterminated, two leaders launched an attack on Myaung Mya. The Burmans replied by murdering those Karen who sought sanctuary in the town’s Catholic churches. A former Karen minister and his English wife were amongst those killed. The Japanese ended the bloodbath by murdering more than 1,000 Karen. According to the then prime minister, Ba Maw, this was Japanese revenge for the killing of one of their officers.11 He suggests racial conflict as the cause, brought about by the British colonial system. In 9. Dorothy H. Guyot in McVey (1978:206), gives the following numbers for Myaung Mya: 50,000 Sgaw, of whom half were Christian; 101,000 Pwo, including 9,000 Christians; 28,000 Indians; and 289,000 Burmans. She mentions, moreover, that Aung San Suu Kyi’s maternal grandfather, Po Nyein, who attempted to mediate together with other elder Karen, was Pwo Karen and Buddhist.

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his memoirs he wrote that the Burmans were aggressive, and the minorities never forgot such actions because of fears of extermination. Even today such memories of ethnic vendetta poison any attempts at a dialogue. Ethnic differences were marked by rumour, mistrust and the dominance of a political strategy central to which was the anticipation and forestalling of the others’ conspiracies and insurrections. There was, however, some substance to several of the rumours, for instance the dropping of paratroopers and the murder of Karen people. The Christian Karen leaders have since referred to these events as evidence that they cannot live together with the Burmans, who have such barbaric tendencies.12 In this way the image of enmity was cemented: the Karen as the fifth column for the ‘white foreigners’ with their colonialism and Christian missions; the Burmans as uncivilised barbarians. This enmity developed despite cooperation between Christian and Buddhist Karen leaders and the Anti-Fascist Peoples Freedom League (AFPFL) during the war. However, ethnicism ultimately overcame this cooperation across class, ethnic and religious lines leading up to independence. Violent events of this kind are inscribed on the collective memory and have an unfortunate tendency to be retrieved to justify revenge. A bond literally inscribed in blood is a condition not easily reversed, as for example could be seen in the Serb-Croat relationship during 1992–93.

10. This myth still plays a large role among the Christian Sgaw Karen in the KNU, who use the myth to define what a Karen is, namely a descendant of this legendary figure. See Jonathan Falla (1991:11–12); Gravers (1996b: 253). 11. There is disagreement with this ending of events. According to Guyot, 1978, it was a Burman force led by an otherwise admired Colonel Zuzuki who wantonly murdered before requesting that the Karen behave themselves. According to the Christian Karen leader, Saw Tha Din, he contacted the Japanese and stopped the killings. But Zuzuki, who had been a spy in pre-war Burma, often covered his tracks through the use of his Burman nom de guerre (Bo Mo Gyo) and there seems to be a lack of evidence of his participation in the events. Confusion and imprecise sources have added the massacre to other gruesome Burman actions. Guyot (1978:227) interviewed Zuzuki, who counted 1,000 dead. See also Morrison (1946), who portrayed Sea-grim’s heroics and has interviewed one of the leaders of the uprising. Jan Becka (1983), casts light on the affair seen from Burman sources, while Ba Maw (1968), gives a balanced account. The suggestion is that the Japanese gave the Burmans a free hand to kill—and stopped the bloodbath when the Karen unconditionally threw themselves at their feet.

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The Panglong Agreement When independence came, the Shan and Karenni states (and from 1950 the Kayah state) acquired the status of autonomous states within the union, with the right to withdraw from the union. Kachin was a similarly autonomous state, whilst Chin acquired the status of a ‘special division’. However, the Karen initially acquired Salween district alone as a special region. In return they received a comparatively large number of mandates in the constituent assembly (twenty out of 210 seats). Although the different Karen groups were very much in disagreement over the conditions for a state, the Karen National Union (KNU) continued to persevere with demands for larger areas and claims on districts where the majority of the population were Burman or Mon (see Appendix 2). They could have struck a deal with Aung San if some of the Baptists had not been so implacable in their demands.13 During the negotiations in Panglong in the Shan states, the British tried to the last to secure Burma’s status as a dominion within the Commonwealth—or at the very least to ensure control in Frontier Areas’ and with the minorities. The power behind this aspect of the negotiations was the director for the Frontier Areas Administration, the ethnographer H.N. C. Stevenson. He attempted to mobilise the proBritish leaders against Aung San’s young supporters and the AFPFL in the border states. He intervened time and again in Burma and England until he was recalled from his position. Maung Maung relates of one of many incidents which occurred in the Kayah states on their national day in 1946. Aung San and Saw Ba U Gyi (leader of the KNU) were guests. Stevenson appeared unannounced and asked Aung San what he was doing there, since a Burman in an independent state required British permission to enter. He received the answer: ‘to take these people from you.’ This story was reported in a newspaper.14

12. Discussion with Saw Tha Din in Sangkhlaburi, Thailand, 1971–72. See M. Smith (1991:63), where Saw Tha Din repeats his version of the events in an interview. It seems impossible to ascertain the correct version. 13. See Tinker (1983–84) and U Maung Maung (1989). Here, documentation from the negotiations is presented from different angles. The documents marked Karen’s Political Future in the India Office Library (M/4/3023) show that the Karen were not only split on account of religion and political allegiance (for or against the AFPFL), but that the local differences meant just as much as to be classified as Karen by the outside world. The Karen in the Delta often had completely different experiences to the mountain dwellers in Salween.

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Regardless of the reliability of such accounts, a situation like this is symptomatic of British intervention in the negotiations and the relations between the ethnic groups. Stevenson and the Frontier Area Administration are remembered by Burmans as demons, who sowed dissent and destroyed Aung San’s ideas of a union state. Amongst the Christian Kayah and Kachin he is remembered as the one who advised them to stay out of the union.15 Support for ethnic nationalism and separation caused a split between and within the Kayah, Karen and Kachin, both among Christians and Buddhists and across political or local allegiances. To complicate the problems, the Kayah and Shan princes (sawbwas) claimed that the pre-colonial relationship with the Burman monarchy had been personal and tributary between the king and the princes and not one of national interdependence. The Burmans argued that these tributary states were ruled by the British as part of Burma and India. This divisive process can be called ethnicism (for the term, see Appendix I): the process of state formation which not only emphasises ethnic groups but creates further internal differentiation of ethnic groups or generates completely new ethnic categories, for example using religious criteria as a base. During the negotiations in Panglong, the British played upon the Pax Britannica there and used divide-and-rule tactics, which previously had secured the Shan princes their positions. The Burmans’ fear of foreign intervention and control was soundly based. Only the great confidence instilled by Aung San ensured an agreement in 1947.16 When the Panglong conference took place in February, the Karen were absent—they convened for an All Karen Congress in Rangoon and were not subsumed under the ‘spirit of Panglong’. The Conference agreed to cooperate on the political freedom of internal administration amongst the minorities, and Aung San promised to secure cultural and democratic rights for the ethnic groups. However, the conference also confirmed the politics of ethnic difference, and when independence came in 1948 the inconsistencies in

14. U Maung Maung (1989:252). 15. See S. Carr in Bangkok Post, 13 October 1985. The following account from the social anthropologist, Edmund Leach, who worked amongst the Kachin during the beginning of the Japanese occupation as an ethnographer and British officer, is part of the legend of Stevenson: ‘I got shunted into a crazy cloak and dagger outfit run by H.N. C. Stevenson.’ Stevenson is described as a parody of a 007 agent ‘who had had some training in anthropology under Malinowski’ (Kuper 1986: 377). Stevenson wrote a monograph on the Chin people in 1943.

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the different conceptions of national identity and political union were brought sharply and implacably into focus. Differences in ethnicity and religion had been so deeply ingrained into nadonalism that every political action had to be placed in reladon to past stereotypes and violent events. This is fundamental for understanding the developments up to the coup of 1962 and leading to the violence of 1988. Fear that someone is planning to take revenge or taking undue advantage is enough to bolster xenophobia and provide a fertile ground for political paranoia. The Legacy of Aung San With the murder of Aung San in July 1947, Burma probably lost the politician who most clearly understood the dangers of making ethnicity and religion the cornerstones of nadonalism and of incorporating this mixture in the state apparatus. Both ethnic divisions and fear of foreign influence had grown during the war and just before independence, not least through the many British attempts to keep the country within the Empire. The role of the Karen, especially the demands of the Christian Karen (including continued British protection of a Karen state), created anxiety. On top of this came disclosures abut the complicity of British officers in Aung San’s murder. Several high-ranking officers had allowed the murderers access to ammunition dumps. The opportunist politician, U Saw, was convicted and hanged for murder. The British officers were convicted of having supplied weapons but managed to slip away during the Karen uprising in 1949. The whole case left a foul stench of conspiracy in its wake. The soldiers who carried out the shooting down of Aung San and six other politicians came from a regiment where Ne Win17 was a major and second-in-command to a British officer. However, there is absolutely no evidence that Ne Win had anything to do with the case.18 On the other hand, one suspects the British of exploiting the political contradictions between Burman leaders and the Burmans suspected that British business interests were behind this exploitation.19 In this way independence did not lead to any genuine liberation from the past; rather, it heralded the arrival of a paranoia, where every occurrence reeked of foreign involvement. This found clear expression in the Karen

16. The agreement is cited in Saimong Mangrai (1965:309). This work is a detailed study of the history of the Shan states during colonial times.

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uprising of 1949 commanded by Christian Karen; the communists’ uprising of the same period; the remnants of the Kuomintang army on the rampage in the 1950s; the influence too of the Chinese, the Indians, the USA/CIA, and the former colonial power. The latter great mix of foreign elements in the country’s political life is, in my opinion, an important reason why Burma failed to develop an alternative model which could have reconciled an ethno-religious plurality. The Karen uprising only confirmed to the Burmans that the foreigners were behind all the misfortunes that plagued the country. The British had handed over leadership of the army to Karen officers (several of whom were Sandhurst graduates) and allowed the setting up of the Karen Defence Organisation. The older Karen leaders, including Saw Tha Din, and neutral Buddhists had, however, warned against the uprising. Many of the Karen officers stayed neutral, even though a majority of Karen battalions took part in the uprising, including a Kachin battalion. The result was an internal division amongst the Karen, but at the same time every Karen was categorised as a potential rebel. This picture has not changed even though it was primarily the Christian Karen who gave the impetus to the uprising after 1955. The Christian Karen entered an alliance with the Kuomintang army, but they were cheated out of promised weapons. British officers who sympathised with the loyal Karen also sought to help them with weapons but without great success.20 The KNU was consequently in collusion with foreigners after independence.

17. Ne Win was chairman of the Revolutionary Council 1962–74, President of Burma 1974–81, and Chairman of the Burma Socialist Programme Party (BSPP) 1962–88. 18. U Maung Maung (1989:315–29) says that the British counted on U Saw splitting the AFPFL and isolating Aung San. They supplied all the evidence against U Saw and his contacts to officers and a member of the British Council. Intelligence officers had U Saw under surveillance prior to the murder. See the Rance Papers (Mss Eup. F. 169/ 20e OIOC, London). U Saw, a rich industrialist and owner of the newspaper The Sun, clearly hoped that the British would install him as leader. Many in Britain maintained that Aung San and his colleagues amongst the Thakins were fascist collaborators and not real nationalists. A recent book by Kin Oung (1993) does not offer any substantial new in-formation. 19. In his personal account, J.F. Cady (1983:75) says that the atmo sphere was tense amongst the British: ‘Members of the revived AllEuropean Gymkhana and Pegu Clubs were critical of both the Governor and London, and their evaluation of Mountbatten bordered on anathema.’

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After Aung San’s murder, Thakin U Nu took over as leader of the AFPFL, the anti-fascist organisation which included the Communist Party, the Socialist Party and independent nationalists.21 The communists were excluded from the AFPFL in 1946 on account of their unwillingness to promote a negotiated settlement with the British. The communist rebellion in 1948 was joined by almost half of the People’s Volunteer Organisation (PVO), an organisation formed by Aung San to absorb and control 15,000–20,000 resistance fighters. They were armed by the Burma National Army in 1945 to fight the Japanese army. The PVO and regular soldiers, who were not enlisted in the post-war army, posed a security threat to the state. After the death of Aung San, half of the PVO joined the communist rebellion, together with three battalions from the army. Significantly, the 4th Burma Rifles, commanded by Brigadier Ne Win, remained loyal to the government when the army was divided by complex political and personal disagreements.22 Aung San and U Nu had both been interested in Marxism. Aung San is considered to have been one of the co-founders of the Communist Party of Burma (CPB) in 1939, although he withdrew from the party after a few months. U Nu supplied the first Burmese translation of Marx in 1937; at that time, U Nu, like other nationalists, believed that Marxism was compatible with Buddhism. This compatibility was a basic element in the Socialist Party’s ideology, primarily in that Buddhism and Socialism both oppose greed and exploitation. The communists, on the other hand, considered that Buddhism was an opiate of the worst kind for the masses. Marxism, as expressed by the Communist Party, was thus a threat against religion. The socialists, however, discussed socialism in the form of general welfare, as the material base which would realise the ethical ideals of Buddhism, and whether it was mind or matter which was decisive. This debate, which can still be traced through Ne Win’s Burma Socialist Programme Party’s ideology, appears somewhat confusing to Westerners, but in fact covers the important question of

20. See Martin Smith (1991) for details on the Karen uprising and foreign involvement. The Karen force was estimated at 10,000 at the beginning of the revolt. See also Tinker (1967:47); ‘Burma and the Insurrections’ (1949 Government report). 21. This is a necessary simplification, as many individuals held competing affiliations. Aung San was the leader of the AFPFL and was not aligned to the parties which established the League.

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how religion and the state institutionally and ideologically should relate to each other in the social order. The nationalists sought to put together a political model and a theoretical base which could unite the traditional order with a modern national state in a peculiar synthesis. The military has since attempted to expound this synthesis as something genuinely Burmese and something with which everyone was in agreement. I shall return to this problem later.

22. See interview with Colonel Chit Myiang, Burma Debate, vol. 4, no. 3, 1997, pp. 11–24.

7. BUDDHISM AND MILITARY POWER: TWO DIFFERENT STRATEGIES—TWO DIFFERENT THAKINS

After independence the army and the Buddhist order became the two decisive institutions and opposite poles in developments. In the beginning the army and the Sangha were partners in the bulwark against communism, foreign influence and ethnic divisiveness. They thus became synonymous with nation, state and national identity for the Burmans; however, this interlinking did not create unity, rather the opposite. The two different models and strategies that were dominant after independence can now be compared in an attempt to show how the above contradictions were played out. The following presentation is a simplification focused on Aung San’s two ‘heirs’. Essentially, the aim here is to draw attention to the important differences. VlSIONS OF A BURMAN NATION U Nu, who was Prime Minister in 1947–58 and 1960–62, allowed Buddhism and the Sangha to participate directly in the exercise of political power. The aim was a democratic welfare state based on the Buddhistic utopian vision of a general condition of plenitude.1 Socialism and nationalisation were therefore necessary means to realise Buddhist cosmology and ontology in the form of religious merit and kamma. Buddhism would be the state religion, thus running a clear risk of placing other religions held by various minorities outside of Burmese national identity. U Nu, like U Ottama and Hsaya San before him, played the role of a monk as political leader. He observed memorial services for those two

1. The Burman version can be seen in Shway Yoe (1882, vol. 1:106–116). See also Gravers (1986:55).

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religious nationalists. Special rights for ethnic minorities appeared to him as a continuation of the divide-and-rule policy of imperialism.2 Ne Win gave the army the leading role in the exercise of state power, combining a centrally planned economy with a welfare state economy. This system incorporated both socialist ideas and echoes of the traditional autocratic model and its redistribution of wealth via the patron-client relationship. However, elements of the corporate state appear to have entered the model. In this model Buddhism is institutionally separated from the state apparatus but is still under political control when its own self-discipline slackens. Ethnic and religious differences are totally subordinated. The Burma Socialist Programme Party (BSPP) proclaimed both the central control of the economy and that only man, the living being of reason, plays a determining role in changing the history of society. The slogan ‘Man Matters Most’ was proposed in the programme of the BSPP in 1963, as well as a study of the interaction of material and spiritual life. This can be seen as an attempt to include the ontological principles of Buddhism. All people are subject to the same natural and historical laws and material conditions. The law of impermanence in Buddhism is referred to in the programme and seen as a correlation of material and spiritual forces, but change should not end in exploitation and chaos. It has to be guided and controlled by the BSPP and the Revolutionary Council. State, nation and society are one and patriotism will prevent that unit from being fragmented by internal differences. Both these models of the national state have used the army in their strategies to protect the social order and Buddhism against communist, foreign intervention and the dissolution of the Union. The combination of nationalism and military organisation began even before the creation of the Burma Independence Army (BIA) and the Japanese occupation. Perhaps then, it is not so strange that Ne Win, as commander-in-chief of the army, came to be Burma’s autocratic ruler, a situation similar in other post-colonial states. However, what became of the more pluralistic, democratic model that Aung San attempted to include in his union state?

2. U Nu attempted to negotiate with the Karen, whom he found both intransigent and undiplomatic. He deemed that there must be cooperation or the conflict would continue: ‘Any controversy on the mistakes of each other will be endless’, he said in an almost prophetic statement in a 1949 radio broadcast (Nu 1949:191).

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U Nu In 1954 U Nu inaugurated the Sixth Great Buddhist World Council. The Fifth Council had been held by King Mindon in Mandalay. The year 1956 was considered to be the 2,500th year since the death of the historical Buddha—and therefore halfway to the coming of Ariyametteya (bodhisatta), the next Buddha. The period was repleted with signs, not least the many uprisings in the country and the tumult of the Cold War in Europe, China, Vietnam, etc. All these effected a strengthening of religious myths and meanings of pro phecy. According to prophecy, before the next Buddha’s arrival the world would disintegrate into greed and violence. U Nu approved the building of a World Peace Pagoda in connection with the World Council’s meeting. The Council met in an artificial cave with room for 10,000 people in imitation of the first meeting from the time of the first Buddha.3 Texts of the Buddha’s discourses were translated and re-released by 1,129 senior, learned monks. Relics were collected from Sri Lanka, and 2,000 prisoners released in a collective amnesty. In all, this was a large and expensive enterprise which would bring prestige for both the country and its leader, U Nu. But it also promoted strong demands from some leading monks (hsayadaws) to make Buddhism the state religion. Already in 1950 the Sangha had achieved great influence and was being delegated an advisory role to U Nu. An anti-communist propaganda war organised in a cooperative move between monks and the army, with support from the Ford Foundation. Missionary work was carried out amongst the minorities, although U Nu feared that the monks’ direct participation would be dangerous for the state. Buddhism also became part of the school curriculum. The aim of making Buddhism a superordinate political ideology was to promote unity, peace and progress, and to counter what U Nu considered the root of all conflicts: selfishness and greed. Inspired by Fabianism, he had earlier noted similarities between Buddhism and socialism; now he rejected Marx’s materialism and revolution. In speeches and at ceremonies U Nu blended Buddhism and Burman belief in spirits (nat) with politics.4 At times U Nu was a monk; indeed, the administration itself, according to critics, could not be distinguished from one long Buddhist ceremony. The biggest problem, however, was

3. Dalton in the Far Eastern Economic Review, 5 March 1970.

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that the monastic order, the Sangha, was divided into different sects. The young monks began to organise themselves along political lines on the right-left spectrum, where sect and ethnic allegiance (Burman, Mon, Shan, Karen) also played a part. This brought the monks into conflict, especially when they had to respond to political decisions and advise the government, for example on religious education. In the name of pluralism, U Nu had allowed the teaching of Christianity and Islam, to which the Sangha leadership very much opposed: 8,000 monks had demonstrated in Mandalay against this decision. There were violent episodes among the monks themselves, and several were arrested whilst in possession of weapons. In the politicised atmosphere of the 1950s the discipline within the Sangha was poor. This was probably because the state did not restrain, but on the contrary breathed life into activism in the name of religion and nationalism. Several monks held communist attitudes but many more were on the opposite wing—the extreme right which defended class-ridden society as a consequence of differences of kamma. Politicisation awoke dissension within the army and the Socialist Party (within the AFPFL) and U Nu had to hand over power to the army and General Ne Win from 1958 to 1960. The Christian Karen and Kachin were naturally worried and Muslim Indians in Mandalay were attacked by monks. The 1947 constitution said (paragraph 4, 2) that the abuse of religion for political purposes is forbidden and any act which is intended or is likely to promote feelings of hatred, enmity or discord between racial or religious communities or sects is contrary to this constitution and may be made punishable by law.5 When U Nu subsequently changed course in his policy towards minorities and began to promise independence to the Arakan and the Mon, as well as greater independence for the Shan and the Kayah, there 4. The commander-in-chief, Ne Win, asked the elder monastic leaders (hsayadaws) their advice on offerings to nats. They answered: ‘Give presents to the monks instead.’ This was an indirect criticism of U Nu, who was also criticised in the newspapers for ‘primitivism’. But animism figured as a religion in line with Buddhism, Christianity and Islam in the preliminary draft of the 1947 constitution, in paragraphs 20–21 on religious freedom. 5. Maung Maung (1961:260f).

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was yet again a feeling of division and disintegration. Ethnic and religious contradictions increased and enhanced nationalistic contradictions, and two mosques were destroyed. The year 1961 saw the start of the Kachin uprising; one reason for it was that the Christian Kachin saw the proposal for Buddhism to be made the state religion as further evidence of the Burmanisation of the country. There was also dissension in the Shan states where an uprising had begun in 1959. Both the Shan and the Kachin reacted against military high-handedness. Meanwhile, the Karen were still in rebellion.6 In these circumstances, the army and Ne Win feared that the Shan states would be taken over by communists. Enter Ne Win This policy change split the AFPFL and created the base that allowed the army to take power in 1962 with support from the Socialist Party. The coup occurred witth the closing of a ‘Federal Seminar’, the aim of which was precisely to solve the edinic problems. All participants were arrested.7 U Nu had won the election of 1960 with only 52 per cent of the vote, but Ne Win now stood as the nation’s saviour—almost as a cakkavattin or a mìn laùng—the one who had stopped the growing religious and edinic split and who had stemmed foreign influence. Ne Win had demonstrated the latter in fighting the invading Kuomintang army but he went further and laid down prohibitions against all foreign cultural dominance, from beauty contests and horse racing to the Ford and Asia Foundations and English language teaching. Films, books and magazines were purged of un-Burman influences. Another important action to halt foreign influence was the limiting of the Christian missions. After 1963 foreign missionaries were no longer welcome in Burma; their schools and hospitals were nationalised and they could not maintain connections with foreign missionary societies. The Baptists moved to Thailand and continued their unofficial support of the Christians in the Karen National Union, which for a period also contained a socialist group.

6. A Karen state had been established in 1951 by an amendment to the constitution. A large part of it was occupied by the rebels. Its main town, Papun, was retaken by the army in 1955. 7. Lehman (1981:2).

60 NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA

Map 3: Karen and Mon States (Source: Amnesty International 1988)

BUDDHISM AND MILITARY POWER 61

Ne Win sought to press the minorities to give away their constitutional right to autonomy and to stop their many rebellions. He believed that this could be achieved partly by taking over more of the local administration in the states and by installing his party organisation and the army, and partly by establishing a shared social and cultural identity through a national day, publications, etc. A new constitution in 1974 made clear the unity within the territory, where all groups could move freely.8 The constitution endorces Aung San’s definition of a nation as a historic community (as quoted earlier). This definition was used by Ne Win to legitimise a centralised regime as a base for a unitary state. ONE PARTY, ONE STATE, ONE NATION Before returning to Ne Win’s model of society, let us examine the sequence of events that triggered off the political violence of the 1950s: • It could be argued that the 1947 constitution merely extended the colonial state. • The union government continued to be the government of former ministerial Burma; the upper chamber of nationalities (fifty-three Burman seats and seventy-two minority seats) had no power; the administration relied upon former colonial officials or persons appointed politically. • Corruption was widespread. • The AFPFL was a coalition of parties and groups ridden with factionalism. • The government had no means to control the many armed groups and the escalating warlordism. • The Second World War had caused extensive damage and hampered economic restoration.

8. The first constitution gave citizenship in the union to all ‘indigenous races’, but a special right of residence in the specific states on ethnic criteria, if one could prove birthright in the area during British colonisation. This connection gave further rights to seek full citizenship (see Maung Maung, 1961, Ch. 2, iv). But this complicated rule did not evidently give a Burman immediate right freely to reside in, for example, the Shan states.

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It is clear that there was no single determining cause, but that the ensuing chaos facilitated the rationale and ideology of a strong corporate state, organised in a manner similar to, and governed by, the military. Thus the obstacles to reintegration were identified as liberal democracy and Western culture—the works of the British became the main target ten years after independence. In this way, the constitution itself was not the real problem. The ‘culprit’ was located in the practice of politics, where the use of force and violence became a cultural and natural part of every action. The dreadful thing is that several generations have experienced only such a way of life. Today, freedom is still considered possible through the use of violence as a means to limit the freedom of others or to take their lives. Democracy has become a strange, foreign concept that is totally unrelated to any form of practice. Parliamentarianism was quickly done away with. According to Ne Win, it was not suitable for Burma and was being misused. Socialism, combined with Buddhist concepts, was presented in the book Systems of Correlation between Man and His Environment.9 Here it was underlined in the text that there was no suggestion of a religious programme. Politics and religion should exist separately but in correlation. According to the programme, spiritual life and man’s reason play a determining role in changing the history of society. ‘Matter and mind’ (rupa and nama) are identified as the central correlations. The book applies the cause-effect principles (nidanas) of Buddhism, which are a chain of mutually dependent, ontological elements (spiritual-material; ignorance-wisdom; birth-death; etc.). Despite this placing of man in focus, reason and man must be ruled from the centre, otherwise negative qualities such as hatred and greed are released in a destructive chain reaction. The programme rejected egalitarianism and declared it an impossibility. Many have attempted to see Buddhism and socialism in this programme as a union of religion and politics10—but there is in fact discussion of a clear separation of state and religion in accordance with the ideas of Aung San. Buddhism applies here purely ontologically, that is, formulating principles for a shared way of living to which we are all subordinated,

9. Burma Socialist Programme Party (1963). 10. See Sarkisyanz (1965,1978). I have attempted to analyse Buddhism as a medium for political models and models of identity, while maintaining that religion and politics are separate fields (Gravers 1996a).

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but not in the functional or institutional sense as in the monarchist period. On the other hand, critics who looked for Marxism in the programme were amazed that dialectic had been substituted by chains of cause and effect, which did not identify the main contradictions within a hierarchy. Even though the model seems to be an attempt at a syncretism of traditional autocracy and a modern political centralism, it must be understood as a modernist version of the Burmese way. Those who suggest that this model is just the old autocracy, or pure and simple Leninist communism, can find both pros and cons for their argument. It is important, however, that critics do not overlook intentions. This model was largely believed to be a genuine Burman attempt to stop what had already developed into a maze of conflicts. In fact, central to the programme seems to be corporate thinking: a middle road between bourgeois democracy and communism, between right and left, where all classes and ethnic groups unite and function under a central leadership controlled by the army. This would create harmony between individual and social forces. After the coup, Ne Win removed a number of religious-based prohibitions, for instance against pest eradication and eating meat from old cows. He also stopped the official worship of spirits. More importantly, he attempted to control the Sangha. He gave his support to the most ‘fundamentalist’ sect, Shwegyin, from the old royal city of Amarapura. This sect was known to support strong discipline, and in 1965 convened a meeting of all the sects. The purpose was to hinder rebels, especially members of the banned Communist Party, from hiding behind the monks’ yellow robes. For Ne Win, every politicised monk was a communist and every communist a representative of foreign influence. This intervention brought about demonstrations by monks in Mandalay which ended with several hundred arrests. Ne Win expressed the view that he did not need the support of the Sangha to improve living conditions; monks ought not to get involved in politics. Peace was made, but without much satisfaction amongst the monks. Ne Win only succeeded in implementing a limited registration of monks, nevertheless the Sangha’s role in politics was sharply reduced until 1988–89. In 1980, following advice from the Shwegyin sect, he held a Sangha convention. Here, the full registration of monks was implemented and a number of ‘false’ monks were thrown out. In addition, amnesty was granted to 4,000 people, including many rebels (Karen amongst others) and to the exiled U Nu who, with foreign help, had fought Ne Win from bases in Thailand since 1970.11 Now U Nu was engaged to edit

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Buddhist texts and Ne Win openly gave gifts to the monks and began a large pagoda-building project behind the Shwe Dagon pagoda. The new pagoda (Maha Vizeya) was not yet finished when Ne Win raised a htì (spire), which symbolises power. In so doing, he appealed to the Buddhist cosmology and, like the kings, he attempted to purify Buddhist teaching, perhaps to accumulate religious merit. Even though Ne Win is hated, there are probably many who would attribute his political power and long survival as leader to the possession of a large and robust kamma. I have, however, not come across the term hpòn (glory; honour) in any discussions about Ne Win. In Ne Win’s case, power is synonymous with a personalised form of autocracy. However, he has not built a modern personality cult like Stalin and Mao. On the contrary, he has lived a secluded life, like a king, yet without using the symbols and titles connected to a royal person, as Ba Maw did in his position as a dictator during the war. Ne Win has not openly assumed the guise of a ‘ruler of the universe’ (cakkavatti) or a ‘righteous ruler’ (dhammaraja)—probably intentional since such claims could easily backfire and intrude on his exercise of power. Nevertheless, he has ruthlessly eliminated his rivals in the Thakin group. Economic policy has similarly been based on a centralism which has more in common with the corporate state’s management than with northern European welfare socialism.12 Foreign firms had to leave the country, and the production of oil, minerals and gems was nationalised together with trade, especially in foodstuffs. The nationalisation of land and the currency reform of 1965 drove approximately 200,000 Indians out of the country. Burman peasants, however, acquired the right to use the land which could not be sold, rented out or mortgaged. The reason was to help one million tenants who were Burmans, while half of the big landowners were kala, especially Indians. Later in 1970, cooperatives were established.

11. Amongst the homecomers was the communist and rebel, Thakin Soe, who was decorated, and also Brigadier Hanson Kya Doe, a Sandhurst-educated Pwo Karen who had cooperated with Aung San in the resistance against the Japanese and had not participated in the Karen rebellion in 1949. In the 1960s he had joined U Nu’s rebel forces in Thailand. Arch-enemies and old Thakin comrades returned home as a sign of Ne Win’s reconciliatory intentions. However, they all had to refrain from political activity! 12. The economic system and its development are described in Silverstein (1977, 1989) and Taylor (1987).

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While the country sought to keep foreign economic influence out, the unofficial market thrived and kept Burmans supplied with material goods smuggled in from Thailand. This made up perhaps as much as four-fifths of domestic consumption and had a turnover equal to, or even higher than, official trade. This type of economy favours those corrupt bureaucrats who accept bribes and have the means to buy. The system has been compared with the old monarchic tributary relationships where the client gives presents (let-saung) to the patron, that is the official, in order to receive protection or a service of some kind. However, the modern patron-client system is based on a much more tightly controlled system of surveillance by the military intelligence services of a modern autro cratic regime. The state now has much greater control over all sections of society than before colonialisation. The similarity probably lies in the fact that the patron-client relationship was a pervasive system of exchange of favours and protection, and was fundamental to maintaining the prevailing conditions of power, whereas modern conditions also constitute a kind of system of redistribution, whereby benefits supposedly trickle down to all in the hierarchy of power. On the other hand, Ne Win has used greed as a reason to dismiss close associates and to reveal their wide-scale smuggling operations and waste. This autocratic style obviously invites a comparison with the monarchist autocracy. Surveillance under Ne Win became more and more widespread with the addition of various secret intelligence services.13 Others have also used the informal market to their advantage, especially the Christian Karen on the border with Thailand. The Karen National Union (KNU) financed its battle for a state by taxing smuggled goods on the border crossings under its control. This source of income has now vanished, however, since the army destroyed the Karen bases in Burma and allied itself with Thailand. In return, Thailand’s army has itself acquired lucrative contracts on valuable teak and other timber concessions in Burma. The Burman army has swallowed an estimated 35–50 per cent of the national budget in recent years, and there is conjecture that the regime is now involved in opium smuggling to pay for an expansion of the armed forces. Burma is one of the world’s largest producers of opium and heroin despite years of help from the USA to eradicate poppy cultivation.14

13. See Lintner (1989).

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With Burma in debt and in the pockets of Japanese and American firms, and the Thai army and China who bartered weapons for timber, Ne Win continued to speak of foreign influences which threatened independence. He stepped down and disbanded the Burma Socialist Programme Party, yet he still was ‘the culprit’, as Aung San Suu Kyi called him. Anecdotes were rife in the international media, not least concerning his belief in astrology and numerology. He was presented as a quick-tempered mystic, close to being irrational and despotic. He did not execute associates, but punished the disobedient and took the relatives of fleeing associates as hostages. He also retired many leading military figures. The army’s violent conduct and its use of forcibly conscripted porters to transport supplies are also among the features reminiscent of the pre-colonial past. But here the problem is rather the soldiers’ minimal education and their contempt for ‘foreign traitors’, Karen and others, who are forced to work as military porters and pushed on until they the of exhaustion.15 The BBC, among others, has claimed that the army used methods learnt from the Japanese during the Second World War. Ne Win granted amnesty to prisoners in connection with religious events, whilst he also allowed widespread use of torture. Nevertheless, these despotic traits alone do not explain this extreme nationalism and violence. Certainly he was eccentric but he was also a wily and harddriven politician who worked behind the scenes with a hard-nosed ‘logic’. This ‘logic’ must be viewed in relation to the colonial period and independence in 1948. The anecdotes which emphasised his irrational traits were rather a symptom of the reigning paranoia and the difficulties of getting rid of the brutal military dictatorship and its everpresent secret service.16 It is thus tempting to see Ne Win’s regime as a continuation of the traditional autocracy. Maung Maung Gyi even tries to show that Ne Win bases his rule on ‘the mediaeval Burmese mind’, which has not changed in spite of British colonialisation. He thus makes Burman culture an eternal, unchanging mental substance and an inheritance they can never escape: ‘General Ne Win’s authoritarian political style merely

14. On the economic situation see Steinberg in Silverstein (1989). Burma acquired the status of a ‘Less Developed Country’ (LDC) in 1987. 15. Amnesty International (1988, 1991). 16. The anecdotes were retold in Linter (1989) and Badgley (1989).

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cashed in on this vast store of built-in attitudes and values of the Burmese society that are supportive of this rule pattern.’17 Maung Maung Gyi’s analysis is based on the assumption that the Burmans can be subordinated to one definite mental archetype. The same construction can be seen in Lucien Pye, who divides the political world into two levels: ‘One level is characterised by gentleness, religiosity and a compelling need to elucidate the qualities of virtue. The other is characterised by violence, malicious scheming and devious thinking.’18 This type of representation ends with reducing the Burmans to an almost schizophrenic mental essence. That the past plays a role as one of the models for current politics is clear but that does not mean that the past continues and determines everything in the present. Maung Maung Gyi overlooks discontinuity in the process: the showdown between colonialisation and ‘feudalism’, which is Ne Win’s and his generation’s declared nationalist objective. Therefore, it is important to point out the complex syncretic elements in the post-colonial development; there is no singular explanation based in culture and tradition. Jon Wiant warns against such a historicist interpretation of the use of symbols: The study of political symbolism skirts along the edges of historicism and carries with it the danger of seeing the old in everything which purports to be new or revolutionary.’19 Even though there is reference to the past, and old terms are applied, this is not synonymous with Burmans being trapped in a culture and a mentality from the past which appears as pure atavism. What is significant is the ambiguity in the use of the past—both as a positive search for ‘the Burmese way’ and as evidence of the present regime’s negative behaviour. Both positions are closely linked to the continued confrontation with colonialisation and everything foreign, and act as important concepts in the discourse on power and opposition. The past is an enormously complex picture for the present and is full of

17. Maung Maung Gyi (1983:3). 18. Pye (1969:136). Spiro (1992:202) takes this theory to its psychocultural extreme: These four types of behaviour (political violence, crime, insurgency and political factionalism) are symptomatic of a disposition to hostility that is found in the Burmese male personality.’ 19. Wiant (1981:71). See also Keesing (1985) for an important analysis of language, culture and tradition as modern constructions which refer to the colonial past, and where in the analysis there is a need to distinguish between these models, including the use of the categories of the past and the past-inpresent the models represent.

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ambivalence. It is not necessarily a direct agreement between the use of cultural expressions (conventional metaphors and models) and social form. This also applies to ideological stereotypes. Ne Win was fond of calling all his opponents communists, for example. On the other hand, the outside world has attempted to label the regime and its political and economic system - but is it socialism, Marxism, traditional autocracy, or a syncretism? There is no meaning in calling the economy syncretic if this implies a harmonising of oppositions between a planned economy and an informal economy.20 Syncretism may be found in the ideology and the model, but in reality it is a centralised, autocentric political economy where contradictions are increased in spite of intentions towards welfare and harmony. There is not much doubt that opposition to the regime in the last few years has been largely provoked by the economic crisis, which in turn is connected to the cost of beating down rebellion. A radical demonetisation in 1987 renewed 70 per cent of the currency, and the loss of savings enraged people, especially the urban population. Simplified summaries of Burma’s development involve a risk of reductionism and should be viewed with due caution. This applies also to the following comparison, where I shall return to Orwell and the Colonial Club. This example is used as a summation because all sources are in agreement about the great importance attached to the clash with colonialism. The colonial order has stood as a direct antithesis to the present order in the political discourse.

20. Hoadley (1991:14).

8. NE WIN’S CLUB

Perhaps it is an exaggeration to compare Ne Win with Orwell’s protagonist, U Po Kyin, the Burman opportunist in Burmese Days, who spared no means in achieving his goals. And yet Ne Win is said to express both the ruthlessness and ambivalence encapsulated in this character, who was refused membership in the white Thakins’ club. He takes such a delight in hating the club and not having access to it that he must form one for himself and his people. Burma’s dilemma is perhaps that Ne Win persuaded many to join this ‘club’, whether they were members of the party or not. Since then it has been impossible to leave the club without being called a traitor to the country and a non-Burman. Peasants and the kin of soldiers have probably been the strongest supporters. Officers have acquired positions in all sectors of trade and bureaucracy. At least ten million have been members of the different organisations of the party and surely not all of these could have been forced into this, but studies of social life are lacking which could illuminate the nature of the regime’s support.1 Clearly the strategy has been to banish the conflicts existing during the colonial era, to create a link with the past and to create harmony. The price of all of this has been the emergence of total control of plurality and individuality. Ne Win’s state model as an absolute, corporative entity was most likely a mixture of traditional dynastic practice of power, Leninism and the Japanese autocratic mode, which he learnt during the war. First and foremost, however, it was meant as a Burman alternative and the complete antithesis of the colonial order. That is to say, we must take statements such as ‘we the Burmans’ and ‘the Burmese way’ at face value. This is the essence of the model. The ‘club’ provided proper members with advantages while those who were against it were labelled aliens and outsiders. And finally, the entire foreign world entered a conspiracy and bestowed the Nobel Peace

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Prize upon Aung San Suu Kyi. On its borders twentythree minority groups, Burmans in exile, and representatives of the Sangha have formed a Democratic Alliance for Burma. Here again the foreigners’ influence can be seen. Everything that has occurred in relation to this regime in recent years has merely served to consolidate the following self-fulfilling prophecy: unless one controls foreign influence in the economy, religion and the ethnic minorities, there will be an imbalance in the universe and ‘without centralism society will tend towards anarchism’.2 Ne Win’s problem was that he used up the symbolic capital he inherited from Aung San and which he ought to have transformed in the interest of the state. Incidentally, he was not chosen as the heir just the opposite in fact, as other Thakins warned Aung San against making Ne Win his highest commanding officer.3 The administration of this legacy, his kamma and control of the universe have crumbled. Not only have the monks demonstrated in the streets of Rangoon, they have refused gifts from military persons and their families, which in effect is the same as refusing them access to the accumulation of religious merit and thereby securing their kamma. The military killed many monks during these demonstrations and numerous new pagodas have been constructed to balance out the negative religious merit which such murders cause. The greatest problem faced by the regime, however, was that a welldeveloped, democratic tradition to form an alternative to fundamentalist nationalism was not to be found. In this context it is perhaps possible to prove Maung Maung Gyi right when he says that the traditional Burman concepts pertaining to power as personal attributes, rather than attributes of systems, have been retained since independence.4 Democratic possibilities, which could perhaps have been developed via the party, the local councils and in the new constitutions, were

1. ‘Military influence in national life means not only the influence and weight of the military in the technical sense, but the influence and weight of the social stratum from which the latter (especially the junior officers) mostly derives its origins’ (Gramsci, 1971:214). 2. Burma Socialist Programme Party (BSPP) (1963:31). Note that the prophecy pertaining to anarchy could also be found in the plural society model. And yet individual freedom and initiative as prerequisites of development were mentioned in the BSPP’s programme. Notions of creating harmony between different social forces are present in all statements but are seldom successful. 3. U Maung Maung (1989:86).

NE WIN’S CLUB 71

annihilated by repression as a result of fear of division and foreign influence. More than a hundred political parties went forward into the 1990 election; many of them came from ethno religious backgrounds. As is common knowledge, the parliament never met and all opposition politicians have either been arrested or fled the country. Thirty elected members of parliament from the National League for Democracy (NLD) went into exile in 1990 and formed the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma, which includes an alliance with ethnic minority organisations. The leader is Dr Sein Win. A special indicator of the paranoiac nature of this development is to be seen in relation to Burmans married to foreigners, such as Aung San Suu Kyi. They are not regarded as being proper Burmans and, worse still, their children are of mixed race and their loyalty to the state is put in doubt. In 1991 the regime asked politicians and officials to answer more than 300 questions in order to test their loyalty. Included was the question of whether or not a person married to a foreigner could be Burma’s leader. About 15,000 civil servants were dismissed after the upheavals. Is this racism? Yes, there is a very close connection between fear of what is foreign on the one hand and racism (allowing blood relations combined with cultural factors to be the deciding factor) on the other. Aung San Suu Kyi writes, as mentioned in her interesting analysis of Burmese literature and nationalism, that the Burmans regarded their ‘racial survival’ as being threatened by Chinese and Indians—not just because of the differential favouritism of the colonial powers, but because they married Burmans.5 But where has all this talk of race come from, whereby commentators say the regime has ‘rediscovered’ a political weapon?6 From Burman culture and ethos, as maintained by Aung San Suu Kyi, or from colonialism? Or is it perhaps a mixture of both, whereby race is made synonymous with culture and ethnicity? Let us turn yet again to the Colonial Club and quote Maurice Collis: Rangoon society was wholly English and it was composed of the members of the three great clubs, the Pegu, the Boat and the

4. To the Burmans, awza (authority), gon (prestige) and ah-na (power) reside in a person and not in the laws (Maung Maung Gyi, 1983:174). 5. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:104). 6. Steinberg (1992:147).

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Gymkhana. Nobody but a European could be elected to these clubs. Wealth or attainments or character was irrelevant; only race counted.7 The distinctive feature of the club was loyalty; no fraternising with the others. A parallel is clearly to be seen in Ne Win’s mixture of national identity, race and political loyalty. The following quotation is from a speech he made in 1979, the content of which he recently repeated: Today you can see that even people of pure blood are being disloyal to the race and country but are being loyal to others. If people of pure blood act this way, we must carefully watch people of mixed blood. Some people are of pure blood, pure Burmese heritage and descendants of genuine citizens. Karen, Kachin and so forth are of genuine pure blood. But we must consider whether these people are completely for our race, our Burmese people: Our country, our Burma.8 Xenophobia combined with racism expresses not only something traditionally Burman/Burmese or even something natural and inherent in humanity. In this particular context it expresses the colonialised subject’s feeling of powerlessness and fear of losing all control of his universe. This presentation, which uses a terminology derived from European race theory, has been inculcated within the collective memory and experience via the club model;9 it is a racism and fear of otherness created in history and as part of a social process. But it is dangerous to justify a subjective application as a natural part of an ethnic group and its essential cultural substance. In recent years, more than ever, this linkage and its essentialism legitimised war and massacres of other ethnic and religious groups. A tendency to see the ethnic-national as linked to the natural bonds of blood can also be traced in the rhetoric used by supporters of the Karen National Union: ‘Perhaps the genes of

7. Collis (1938:68; emphasis added). Likewise, the Anglicised Karen had their club in Rangoon: the Karen Social and Services Club. The president was Saw Tha Din. 8. Quoted in M. Smith (1991:37; emphasis added). In this case I must trust that the translation is correct. 9. See E. Balibar’s essay ‘Racism and Nationalism’ Balibar and Wallenstein (1991:37–69).

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the Karen babies in their mothers’ wombs had undergone so drastic a change that a Karen born of woman [sic], naturally had an ingrained sense to be wary of a Burma (n) (quoted ad verbatim).’10 The politics of ethnic difference is also explicit in a recent pamphlet from the KNU: ‘It is extremely difficult for the Karens and the Burmans, two peoples with diametrically opposite views, outlooks, attitudes and mentalities, to yoke together’11—an echo of the statements from 1946. Whilst repeating the national virtues, to which the missionaries were party with their emphasis on high morals, truth, hospitality, etc., the KNU’s rhetoric stresses the fact that ethnic differences are absolute and fundamentally irreconcilable in that they are almost genetically determined. Yet, it would appear that the KNU has also begun to understand that it will be difficult to realise an independent state. Therefore federalism is now discussed intensively among Burman students who have fled the country. Nationalism, as it is thought of by the Burmans and some of the minority groups (particularly the Karen), is a form of self-indulgence, whereby the use of power and violence is merely its media. One is continuously referred to the past, not least to the colonial legacy with its corpses and ghosts. It is precisely the fight against this past which fuels the military dictatorship and it was with just such a war in mind that Aung San warned against ‘wasting time and energy attacking and blaming the imperialists for all the ills of the nation now that power was back in the hands of her people’.12 In a speech given in 1946, Aung San emphasised that Burman nationalism did not imply isolation from the world: The one fact from which no nation big or small can escape is the increasing universal interdependence of nations.’13 To open the ‘club’ for all in Burma, also for foreigners, and to destroy this paranoia will be Aung San Suu Kyi’s tough legacy. She is obviously conscious of the problems arising due to the plural ethnic hierarchy:

10. ‘The Origins of the Karen: An Official History’, Appendix 1 in Michael Lonsdale, The Karen Revolution in Burma (undated) quoted from Ananda Rajah (1990:130). Lonsdale was probably the forest officer who helped the KNU during the insurrection. See M. Smith (1991:114). 11. The KNU, The Karens and Their Struggle for Freedom (July 1992:14). 12. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:34).

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We cannot have the attitude of ‘I’m Kachin; I’m Burman’…we must have the attitude that we are all comrades in the struggle for democratic rights…like brothers and sisters. If we divide ourselves ethnically, we shall not achieve democracy for a long time.14 The question is how to evade the hierarchism of the past. This is perhaps the key to mental and ideological ‘decolonisation’. In the meantime the horrors continue with the expulsion of Muslims from Arakan and the attempts to raze the Karen bases to the ground.

13. Silverstein (1972:91). This warning was neglected by Ne Win and also by the present regime. Since 1962 the earlier pro-Japanese speeches of Aung San have been quoted extensively. 14. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:231). Speech in Kachin state in 1989.

9. AUNG SAN SUU KYI’S STRATEGY

When nations fail, the woman’s influence again appears. She leads, she drives, and the men follow (Fielding Hall 1906:268). Ethnicism is a serious problem which must be solved. But it is quite clear that Aung San Suu Kyi’s primary objective is to bring demo cracy to the fore. To this end, she has appealed to the army ‘which my father formed’ and which, as Aung San emphasised, is to serve the entire nation and the people. This leads Ne Win to reply that the army has held the nation together and saved it from dissolving into chaos. Aung San Suu Kyi wants the monks to support demo cracy but, like her father, she would probably not make Buddhism the state religion. Ne Win could have objected to this by drawing attention to the fact that the democratic parties incited the monks to participate actively in politics, something which is considered illegal. As mentioned earlier, the monks in Mandalay have refused gifts from military personnel and their families since 1991, thereby cutting these people off from the accumulation of religious merit for their kamma. Aung San Suu Kyi is attempting to construct an interesting combination of liberalism, humanism and Buddhism—all universal ideals which cut through cultures and national parameters. The liberal element in Buddhism is that all individuals must have, in principle at least, an equal chance to acquire religious merit, according to the existing preconditions. Each individual is responsible for the administration of these preconditions according to the ethics of Buddhism. The humane aspect is stressed by equating Buddhism with the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Buddhist principle of non-violence (ahimsa) and the entire ethical system (avoidance of hatred, lies, greed, etc.) are reminiscent of

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universal human rights. The following is quoted from Aung San Suu Kyi’s Preamble to the above Declaration:’‘ [whereas it is essential] if a man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law.’1 Clearly this refers to the actual situation. The regime has answered that human rights are incompatible with Burman culture. Like all talk of democracy, human rights are merely an expression of foreign meddling. However, democracy is the main goal of Aung San Suu Kyi’s strategy, and she compares it with Buddhism and its ideals of a righteous monarchy (dhammarajd). As mentioned earlier, the ideal ruler must provide welfare and must not oppose the will of the people (avirodhd). In this case one must remember that the opposite attributes legitimised rebellions led by mìn laùng (pretenders to the throne). The implicit reference to the regime cannot be missed, but it is the comparison between a democratic leader and an autocratic monarch that is more problematic. Aung San Suu Kyi explains this comparison by stating that the population has not had access to international political analyses.2 This is a wise strategy, which precisely identifies the cause of the violence: an absolute abuse of power which is against all conceivable universal, humane principles. Aung San Suu Kyi utilises tradition but universalises its ideals. The message is clear both in Burma and internationally. Cosmopolitan norms of identity without thereby rejecting traditions are a good antidote to the regime’s paranoia and violence. Cosmopolitanism involves a plurality of strategies for social and cultural identities, which can be used across cultures and nations (states).3 These strategies mirror themselves in a plurality of identities, regardless of whether or not they incorporate universal norms. They are communicated via the media as consumerism, emigration, tourism, etc., and provide a flexibility and freedom of choice in an open terrain whilst simultaneously containing references to tradition and uniqueness. This pluralism, however, is open to interpretation and applicable in different cultural contexts. Aung San Suu Kyi risks that such openness will be met by criticism from those sectors of the population who still fear foreign influence and who emphasise the collective and corporate Burman

1. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:177). 2. Ibid. (1991:167–79). 3. For a discussion on new global identities, see Featherstone (1990) and Lash and Friedman (1992).

AUNG SAN SUU KYI’S STRATEGY 77

identity. She might also attract international criticism quite easily by not granting independence to the minorities. There are no easy solutions in this balancing act between (a) ethnic differences, (b) national unity, and (c) international relations and influences. She is quite literally the heir of that nationalism whose extreme fundamentalism she has been trying to remove: As nationalism in Burma was fundamentally a part of the traditional ethos, nationalistic movements also sprang from Burmese sources, even though they were inevitably influenced by western ideas and institutions.’4 Nationalism is fundamental because it is part of the tradition and thus a mental essence which is perhaps impossible to remove. This somewhat circular argumentation is often posed in the current debate on nationalism. But will nationalism in its most violent form ever disappear? There is a lack of agreement regarding this matter in mainstream debates on nationalism. Anthony Smith is of the opinion that the chances are small, whilst Eric Hobsbawm comforts us by saying that this evil will not last for ever.5 The real problem is that the term ‘nationalism’ is used to refer to many different political conditions. Conflicts all over the world are classified as nationalistic whilst national identity and nationalism are proclaimed to be the most fundamental and universal questions of all time. Smith poses the question in the following manner: Why have national identity and nationalism become fundamental in the modern world? First because of their ubiquity. If any phenomena are truly global then they must be the nation and nationalism.6 Nationalism is widespread because it is fundamental, and vice versa. Perhaps this is a somewhat tautological statement, but it does not mean that nationalism is an independent, evil agent. In

4. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:104; emphasis added). 5. A.Smith (1991:175): ‘It must be apparent by now that the chances of transcending the nation and superseding nationalism are at present slim’ (i.e. despite a growing cosmopolitanism); Hobsbawm (1992:8). 6. A.Smith (1991:143).

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Burma this is basically because nationalism is ingrained in social relations and in the history and cultural expressions of these. Globally, however, it acquires its fundamental nature via a universal discourse on power. Thus, it is important to consider these two levels of the national, both as a global discourse and as concrete studies of different nationalisms, and finally how the discourse and the particular histories are interrelated. A’COLONIZED’ CONSCIOUSNESS? Is it possible to isolate the causes of Burma’s miserable situation and identify some basic characteristics in the process? A single explanation cannot be selected—and it is no use proclaiming Ne Win to be ‘the culprit’ or using the regime’s own subjective explanation of foreign intervention in the history of the country. The dominant problem in Burma’s nationalism is that everyone has to subject themselves to the ‘hierarchisation’ of the social order whereby classification takes place according to race, culture/ civilisation, religion and ethnicity/ nationality. The process of identification and construction of identity is determined by this order of classification. The military regime has monopolised the modes of social and cultural classification and identification. They represent the past, the present and the future by naming what is Burman and Burmese, and what is national or alien. Plural society and its concepts are embedded in social relations, in models and in cultural symbols. The social order and its hierarchy are contained within all other models and strategies, in debates and propaganda, and in everyday life since independence, to the extent that the Burmese are confined within the labyrinth of this order. Comaroff and Comaroff (1989) have called this process ‘colonizing consciousness’; however, colonisation cannot fully overcome the consciousness contained in the collective memory and thus achieve sole access to and domination of all knowledge and practice. I do not believe that the colonial models and categories have completely colonised the consciousness and the collective memory, but rather that historical experience still encompasses the imaginations of the nation, its political discourse and other social practices. It would be more correct to say that its society has not been liberated from the influence of colonial models and concepts. When these models from the past are resisted they are simultaneously kept alive in the social memory. I would prefer to conceptualise the term in a slightly more abstract manner: an ‘occupation’ of social and culturally expressed experience and

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practice in relation to the political system. There are some, including Michael Aung-Thwin, who have maintained that Burma has still not found itself after colonisation, and that its independence was not at all real.7 I feel that it would be more correct to say that Burma’s society has not escaped from the showdown with the colonial era and its models of society. Cosmology, ontology and ideology, with their religious and ethnic contents, have been connected in totalising and universal models which, by referring to the past prophecies signify either a unity or a chaos. It is in this juxtaposition that we can trace the influence of the colonial era in the form of the chaos prophesied in Furnivall’s model of ‘plural society’. The dominant political discourse in Burma has been preoccupied with cultivating its distorted order of society as being of central importance to its future, and of claiming nationalism as a quasi-religious solution to this disorder. That this interpretation of the situation is dominant is stressed by the fact that Aung San Suu Kyi, in presenting her political alternative in terms of Western democracy and liberalism, will have to communicate her model via Buddhist concepts. This is because large sectors of the population have been isolated from international debate, and might criticise Aung San for seeking to introduce an alien political system and of undermining the ‘Burmese way’. She may also find it difficult to escape this self-reinforcing argumentation of nationalism.8

7. Aung-Thwin (1989:33). 8. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:167–79). In her entire presentation she not only calls forth the nationalistic heritage of her father but appears as a person with the authority and prestige to match the male, military power, and also as one who wishes to harmonise the universe.

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10. NATIONALISM AS THE PRACTICE OF POWER

What can Burmese history tell us about nationalism, ethnicity and religion as ingredients in the exercise of power, which displays increasingly similar features globally? As stated in the introduction, the comparison of surface phenomena alone easily ends by reproducing ahistoric explanations and the rhetoric of subjective nationalism. However, the process by which nationalism in Burma was created shows us several general tendencies which can possibly establish the basis for a comparison.1 The first element that I shall emphasise is that nationalism amongst the Burmans and Karen sought to take over the traditional cosmological model, or at least part of it, and thereupon modernise it. With this, a linkage appears which has often confused analyses of Burma’s history. The ‘Burmese way’ has been presented as an ideological mish-mash, a window-dressing, complete with deprecating comments about Ne Win, when it has proved impossible to find an alternative clear label. On the other hand, in the West there has often been an uncritical glorification of the ethnic rebels and the oppressed minorities’ heroic battle for independence. The Christian Karen used features of the traditional model, those concerning leadership for example, but proclaimed the British as father figures, providing law and order, whilst the motherly American missionaries helped them rediscover their lost religion and God. They built an imagined community with the white brother and his white man’s burden, which separated them from the Burmese context. 1. For example, a comparison can be made with the former colony of Fiji, where the preservation of the indigenous Fijian culture was used by the military to suppress the other half of the population, the Indians, who came to Fiji as sugar plantation workers during the colonial period. The ‘traditional’ chiefly culture, which the military claimed to save, is also a product of the same colonisation.

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Burman nationalists sought to keep the past in the present in their imagined community: theirs was an alternative to the colonial order. The aim was to repair the break in continuity which the colonisers had caused. The nationalists showed this historically without recognising that the use of history, as a holistic unit consisting of cultural, linguistic and racial values presented as a natural essence of existence, was in fact ingrained in the colonial power’s ‘club model’ and its ideas of a pluralist society and racial separation. At the same time, Burman nationalism has been a struggle against the European model of a nation. But in order to distance itself from the colonial model, Burman nationalism has had to emphasise its perpetual historical existence as Burman or even as Burmese cultural essence, undistorted by foreigners. On the other hand, the independent nation is also conceived as modern in its own terms. This is the fundamental contradiction of nationalism in Burma. The pluralist society concept of colonial Burma made ethnicity into a segregational force that hampers any models not based exclusively on cultural differences. Moreover, it has been countered by a hegemonic and autocratic model.2 The search for an unchanged fragment of the history is obvious in the use of cultural symbols: the spire on the pagoda; the old royal symbol of the peacock on the flag; pictures of Aung San, etc. It would be easy to conclude that the past alone was the model for independence and for developments after that. However, the meaning of these cultural symbols—namely that ‘we are the legitimate heirs to this power’—is used by all parties. Nevertheless, because these symbolic meanings pointing back to primordial origins are now so enmeshed with violence, this connection completely dominates as a motivating force and blocks attempts to formulate a strategy that does not insist on difference, original culture and religious cosmological thinking. The power of the symbols, however, lies not in the symbols per se, but in the way they legitimise and transfer other forms of power and domination. Nationalism is constructed on such symbolic power which distils history (see Chapter 16).

2. Chatterjee (1993) provides an important discussion on the nationalist predicament of post-colonial societies. Must their imagination of a nation forever remain colonised?

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POWER AND VlOLENCE Bruce Kapferer has shown how nationalism, as exemplified by Sri Lanka and Australia, both takes over religion and takes on the character of a fundamentalist religion itself. Nationalists often declare their nationalism to be a higher form of religion.3 In this process nationalism appears in place of religion as the dominant medium for political battles, and acquires an existential mark as something fated: either fight and the for the cause, or perish. Violence is thus almost unavoidable when religion becomes the substantial element of nationalism and determines identity. Religion often offers universalistic and fundamentalist ideas to the model and its strategies. But nationalism is not religion and neither nationalism nor religion is in itself an agent of history. Nationalism is a summarising designation for the process, its models and strategies. Hence, its prominence as a motive force. It is up to concrete and comparative analyses to determine when nationalism turns hegemonic. One shared feature of nationalistic models and strategies, however, seems to be the genealogical base, i.e. that they linearly represent the past in the present. If we dig deeper into the political tumult in Burma and its models and strategies, we find the factors that condition the theoretical and the concrete practice of power as accumulated in historical experience—the factors that make it possible to see the models as more than descriptions, or rationalisations, of definite actions. A central factor is the subordination to these either/or models and strategies, which has marked Burma and created such enormous paranoia. All actions are subject to the Burman-foreigner dichotomy; they must fit into the loyal or alien categorisation. Ethnocentrism and xenophobia are caught up in every political debate or action. Xenophobia has become ingrained in the practice of power, the motive force behind action and reaction (opposition and repression, coercion and consensus, etc.). To take a recent example, in the 1990 parliamentary elections, involving more than one hundred parties, the opposition won 80 per cent of the seats. The military arrested those opposition candidates elected, on the pretext of the threat to the country’s security posed by the opposition and its contacts with foreign, ‘subversive’ forces. Amongst those forces, the BBC, communists and Christian Karen were named.

3. Kapferer (1988:5, 1989).

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Michel Foucault has described this technique of power with graphic irony: The exercise of power can produce as much acceptance as may be wished for: it can pile up the dead and shelter itself behind whatever threats it can imagine. In itself the exercise of power is not violence; nor is it consent which, implicitly, is renewable. It is a structure of actions brought to bear upon possible actions.4 This is a total blocking of alternative political practice; where the subject’s fear is invoked at a mere signal from the rulers, who have gradually established themselves as the prime mover in this process. This hierarchy of power is reduced to a small group of officers who unleash a regime of fear and of whom only rumours reach the wider public. Individual and group actions are totally blocked, and those who try to protest will always have to resist getting caught up in ethnic and religious divisions. Moreover, they must be alert to the possibility of secret service agents in their midst. The corporate state creates a need for a violent regime, when power and control over the chaotic nationalist schisms must be preserved at all cost. In this total xenophobia, ethics and lives are sacrificed for the sake of unity. Even in opposition to such a regime, the tendency is to adopt the same techniques of power and use them in opposition. Chopped-off heads of soldiers and secret service agents are displayed, and the KNU are not known for taking many Burmans as prisoners.5 This is deeply disquieting and puts Aung San Suu Kyi’s Freedomjrom Fearin a new perspective. Nothing short of a miracle is required if Burma is to end this violence and find an alternative model. This is hard to hold on to when power is exercised so totally; in all its gruesome truth it is worse than Orwell’s universe. Yet here we can in fact reminisce with Orwell on the implications of history for this development—and not least certain historians’ interpretations used as apologies for committing such atrocities. There is no political violence which does not assert a historical and cultural right. The above elements can also be seen in Europe over recent years, possibly best expressed in the former USSR and in the former Yugoslavia, where the situation is approaching private warlordism. Therefore it is dangerous to see the cause as naturally inherent in the

4. Foucault (1988:214; emphasis added).

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culture, in the blood, in the history or in the individual. This approach is certain to call up the next violent response, and the one term can easily appear in the other’s place: culture instead of race, and so on. This tendency to naturalise culture and ethnicity, I believe, can be used as a basis for comparison. With this starting point we can investigate how people subordinate their identity and their living conditions to what we term nationalism, and how power is generated behind this label. Nationalism per se cannot be compared. It has become a superordinate term for the complex processes where ethnicity and cultural and religious conditions create models and strategies for the division of power, both within states and internationally. A more concrete comparison of the role of the military in the states of Southeast Asia also seems important. In spite of great differences, the military wishes to represent both nation and state and to hinder a democratic pluralism. The military, nationalism and different versions of the corporative state, as opposed to cosmopolitan strategies in the population, seem to be central areas of conflict requiring analysis.

5. See Jon Swain in the Sunday Times Magazine (28 June 1992). A particularly bloody execution of an alleged Burman spy, killed with a knife by a Karen soldier, is recounted. The authenticity of the scenario is difficult to assess, however, and the accompanying photographs have been blamed for sensationalism.

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11. THE RULES OF THE MYANMAR CLUB SINCE 1993

Since 1993 much has changed yet much is the same. The State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) has opened its door to foreign investments and invited tourists to Burma. However, the regime still expresses fear of foreign influence, Western culture in particular, and its military intelligence maintains a tight surveillance of contacts between Burmese and foreigners. Violence and repression have become integrated into daily life. In Rangoon and Mandalay old buildings have given way to modern hotels and shops. New cars congest the streets. The two main characters of the current ‘Burmese Days’ sit on their respective sides of Inya lake, largely confined to their houses. On the north side, isolated in his fortified house, the ailing Ne Win still wields some influence, although he is rarely mentioned on national days and has had his portraits removed from public offices. In 1996 Ne Win received a courtesy visit from President Suharto. On the south side, in University Avenue, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi was released from her house arrest in July 1995 and has been receiving visitors from the international community. On Saturdays she has regularly addressed rallies in front of her house although her husband and sons have not recently been allowed to visit her. In October 1996 the SLORC prevented a meeting in her house of delegates from the National League for Democracy. More than 500 party members were arrested and the road near her house was blocked by security forces to prevent visits and rallies. In November of the same year a mob attacked her car with stones. She blamed the attack on members of a SLORC mass organisation, the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA). Before the attack, the senior general of the SLORC, in a speech to the USDA leaders, called for the elimination of ‘destructive elements’ who surrender the sovereignty of Burma. At another USDA rally, the Minister of Railways is said to have

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urged the members to kill Aung San Suu Kyi. At the time of writing she is virtually isolated and confined to her house. In December 1996 students took to the streets for the first time since the uprising of 1988–89. They carried photos of Aung San and demanded freedom, justice and fair government, and the right to form student unions.1 The Lone Htein riot police dispersed the 1,500–2,000 students, arrested hundreds, and closed the universities. Although students and the National League for Democracy (NLD) have kept a tactical distance, Aung San Suu Kyi’s house was blockaded and the SLORC immediately blamed the NLD and Aung San Suu Kyi for instigating the demonstrations, and accused her of conspiring with communists, neo-colonialists and exiled groups. Aung San Suu Kyi is still classified by the SLORC as an alien and a ‘destructive element’ in her native country. Thus, she is denied admittance to the ‘club’. Although the economy is undergoing a SLORC-instigated programme of modernisation, the modern civil liberties are not allowed in the Myanmar club. A large number of NLD members have been arrested and detained since December 1996 in an attempt to quash the opposition. The situation in 1997 is such that chances of dialogue and democratisation have receded. The following chapters do not pretend to be a complete updated analysis of the changes since 1993. I have chosen to focus on the ethnic struggle and in particular on the Karen; on the role of religion, and on the nationalism practised by the SLORC. The analysis contained in the new chapters aims to demonstrate how ethnic opposition and nationalism have been gradually encompassed and ‘overdetermined’ by religion, and how historical memory is expressed and performed via religion and mass mobilisation.

1. It is ironic that Aung San is both a student hero and nationalist, as well as the founder of the armed forces who have feared, beaten and killed students since 1962.

12. BUDDHISM AND THE RELIGIOUS DIVIDE AMONG THE KAREN

Religion remains an important medium in the formulation of political strategies and identities in Burma.1 On 25 December 1996 a bomb exploded near the Kaba Aye Pagoda and the Maha Pasana Cave built for the Buddhist Synod in 1956 north of the Inya Lake in Rangoon. General Tin Oo, Secretary-2 of the SLORC had just visited the site. The explosion killed five people and injured seventeen, including policemen and members of the USDA.2 The Maha Pasana housed a tooth relic of the Buddha which was transferred from China on loan to Burma to promote good relations between the two countries. The relic was to be taken to Mandalay for ninety days before being returned to China on 5 March 1997. Pagodas of the tooth relic have been constructed in Rangoon and Mandalay by prisoners forced to earn merit in this way. The construction was supervised by Khyin Nyunt, head of military intelligence and secretary of the SLORC, a protégé of Ne Win who is also given the title ‘National Races Secretary-1’. The regime has been eager to pay respect to the monks and to restore pagodas after killing and jailing several monks during the uprising of 1988–90. More than 300 monasteries were raided by troops and about 200 monks3 are serving sentences in the infamous Insein Prison. The SLORC has warned the clergy against subversive acts from the National League for Democracy (NLD). However, some senior monks seem to support the regime, and support from the Buddhist Sangha is still necessary to

1. See Matthews (1993); Tin Maung Maung Than (1993). In a recent article I have attempted to examine the politicial role of religion in the latest history of Burma (Gravers 1996a). 2. A letter-bomb later killed Tin Oo’s daughter. In April 1998 two students were sentenced to death, presumably for plotting the assassinations.

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legitimate any regime. Those who construct a pagoda gain much merit, and such spectacular merit contains a substantial amount of symbolic power. No political practice is possible without involving Buddhism -and Buddhism has been politicised to a degree where no religious act is apolitical. Thus, the SLORC is active in organising elaborate ceremonies to award titles to leading monks while controlling the monasteries and checking any dissent. Headlines in the New Light of Myanmar, 16 March 1997, read: ‘Secretary-1 attends Htìdaut-hoisting in Rakhine State’, that is, the hoisting of the pagoda top spire or umbrella (htì), a powerful Buddhist symbol. In addition, Buddhism can be used more directly as a political weapon, for instance when members of the NLD were banned from ordination as monks in September 1996. 4 Such a discriminating decree is contradictory to Sangha rules. Dissent and opposition among the monks is found mainly in Mandalay and Rangoon, where in March 1997 monks demonstrated in front of Muslim mosques. They stoned the mosques following rumours that a Muslim had raped a Buddhist girl. The truth behind the rumours is not clear, but the Muslims in Burma are mostly of Indian origin (i.e. kala) and thus provide a scapegoat easily recalled from historical memory. Such rumours are related to fear and violence, and generated by the repressive rule. However, this incident, amongst others, shows that religion is an important field of struggle in Myanmar. The regime seems to have some support amongst the rural clergy, as we shall see below. The enormous symbolic power contained in Buddhist texts, ceremonies, rituals, pagodas and paraphernalia (amulets, icons and other items) is ingrained in the social relations and organisation of Burmese society, as well as in the historical memory shared by the population. Buddhism is a central pillar in the organisation and distribution of power—not merely as an ideological function but also as a distinctive social practice. Individual monks, as previously mentioned,

3. The exact number of monks in Burma is uncertain. In his Introduction to Aung San Suu Kyi (1997: xii), Alan Clements mentions a figure of 1 million; however, a figure somewhere between 300,000 and 400,000 is more likely. 4. See the February 1997 report from the Buddhist Relief Mission entitled The Almsbowl remains overturned’. The title refers to the reaction from monks to the SLORC’s killing of monks during the rebellion. By ‘overturning the almsbowl’, i.e. by refusing gifts, the monks would not return religious merit to soldiers and their families. This rare ritual boycott is tantamount to religious ostracism.

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were active in the anti-colonial struggle and nationalist movements, as well as in the rebellion of 1988. During the house arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi, a well-known Burmese monk named Rewata Dhamma, who was based in Britain, acted as a mediator between her and the SLORC. After her release, Aung San Suu Kyi visited the famous Karen (or Pa-o) monk, Thamanya Hsayadaw (U Vinaya), who lives north of Pa-an in the Karen state. He is a vegetarian and thousands of pilgrims visit him every year. The place is known as a peaceful sanctuary for Karen. Aung San Suu Kyi has recently become a vegetarian and practises meditation learned from U Pandita, another renowned monk. In a new book she directly combines politics and Buddhism. Buddhism and its active compassion (karund) are seen as a necessary spiritual dimension in the process towards democracy. The term metta (loving-kindness) is often used in her speeches and articles.5 According to Alan Clements, the interviewer, Aung San Suu Kyi has been compared to a female bodhisatta. However, she emphatically denies that she has reached that high spiritual state. Meanwhile, in the mountains of the Salween region in the Karen state, yet another eminent monk has played a crucial role in the split between Buddhists and Christians within the Karen National Union (KNU) in 1994–95. The name of the monk is U Thuzana and he bears the title of Hsayadaw Myaing Gyi Ngu. He is the leading monk in the Myaing Gyi Ngu monastery which is situated at the confluence of the Salween and Yunzalin Rivers (see Map 4 overleaf). U Thuzana is a Pwo Karen and his monastery is situated in a region dominated by Buddhist Pwo Karen. In December 1995 the religious conflict between Christian and Buddhist Karen, which evolved during the colonial period, erupted and caused a serious split within the KNU and the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA). The Buddhist Karen formed a Democratic Karen (Kayin) Buddhist Organisation (DKBO) and a Democratic Karen (Kayin) Buddhist Army (DKBA). With the support of the Burmese army, the DKBA conquered Manerplaw, the KNU headquarters, in January 1995.6 The conflict between the Buddhist and Christian Karen has its roots in the Karen nationalist movement. The leadership of the KNU has been dominated by Christian Karen since the wartime Karen Central Organization was split in 1947—one faction favoured staying in the

5. Aung San Suu Kyi (1995, 1997).

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Map 4: Myit-Szone

Union of Burma, the other wanted a separate state.7 The Karen Youth Organisation and the Buddhist Karen Association did not join the boycott of elections called for by the KNU but were in favour of a peaceful agreement on Karen autonomy. However, during the fifty years of nationalist struggle to form an independent Karen State, the KNU also drew support from Buddhist Karen. In fact, the Buddhists comprised about 70–80 per cent of the field soldiers in the KNLA, whereas most of the leadership and the commissioned officers were Christian Karen.8 The current president of the KNU, Bo Mya, is a Seventh-Day Adventist, but it is the Baptists who form the major Christian denomination in the KNU. The Buddhist KNLA soldiers are mostly recruited from the poorer villagers and do not have the same degree of

BUDDHISM AND THE RELIGIOUS DIVIDE 93

education as the Christians. They are at the lower end of the power scale and although they did not benefit from the KNU taxation and trade, they still had to take the brunt of the fighting and the repressions from the army. In all, they comprise the lower classes among the Karen and for years their resentment against the paternalistic, autocratic and rich KNU leadership has increased. Buddhism has thus become the collective identity of subversion for the frustrated subalterns among the Karen nationalists. In April 1989, the spiritual leader of the Buddhist resistance against the KNU, began to build a pagoda in the area where the Salween River bends and is met by the Moi River, which forms the Thai-Burmese border (see Map 4).9 On the north side of the bend is the Karen village of Thu Mwe Htar (or Thu Moe Tar). This zone was of great strategic importance to the KNU military control of its border bases, including Manerplaw. U Thuzana had already constructed other pagodas in the area called the Myit-Szone (confluence of rivers). He had permission from the KNU to build the pagoda in Thu Mwe Htar, but Bo Mya would not allow him to paint the pagoda white since it is situated on a mountain top and could be used by the army as a landmark to direct its cannon fire and air strikes against the KNU headquarters below. U Thuzana was ordered not to build a monastery and allow monks to live there since the KNU considered the area to be a fighting zone. The KNU also tried to restrict visits to the pagoda so as to prevent SLORC infiltration. Nevertheless, U Thuzana was able to attract at least a thousand Karen from the villages and monasteries in the Salween area. They supported the building of the pagoda, and his followers included Buddhist soldiers from the KNLA; some even left the KNLA and their families to become monks. According to the detailed analysis in the New Nation Journal, Colonel Saw Charles is said to have bullied the Buddhist soldiers in the KNLA 6. The history of the Karen and the recent political struggles have been viewed almost exclusively from the Christian KNU position, for example Falla (1991), M. Smith (1991,1994) and Gravers (1996b). The writings, including my own, have focused on the ‘folklorist’ interpretations of Karen myth and history. Little is known about the life of the Karen majority in the central areas of Burma. 7. On the historicalsourcesof Karen nationalism,see Gravers (1996b). See also Appendix 2 on the various Karen organisations. 8. The KNLA had an estimated 10,000 soldiers at the start of the rebellion. The force has recently been estimated at 4,000 and is rapidly dwindling.

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for some time. He alienated many Karen whilst he was in charge of Hlaing Bwe township, U Thuzana’s native place, during the 1980s. Saw Charles is related to the wife of Bo Mya and was promoted not for his achievements but because of his influential relatives. He has been accused of rape, murder and excessive taxation. He forced villagers to support the KNU before he was recalled to headquarters. Surprisingly, he was sent by Bo Mya to investigate the pagoda in Thu Mwe Thar. In recent years the KNU seems to have forced villagers to pay money and to send young men to the KNLA. A former captain in the KNLA told me that he had to collect taxes from villagers and would have to take hostages if the payment was refused. It is no wonder that U Thuzana was able to attract support. He had been involved in a religious committee under the KNU in the 1970s, but opposed the often highhanded practice of some of the KNU officers. The KNU became even more suspicious of U Thuzana and his plans when he was able to supply food for the Karen worshippers at the hill pagoda in Thu Mwe Htar. The worshippers were not forced to be porters for the army, as is common practice, and they travelled freely with a certificate issued by the monk. These Karen, however, stopped supporting the KNU, and Saw Charles was once again sent in by Bo Mya. He dispersed the worshippers who came to inaugurate the pagoda and some were beaten up by Saw Charles’s men. The Buddhist Karen then staged a protest march to Manerplaw. Buddhist KNLA soldiers also protested, but when a Christian colonel threatened to shoot down the htì (umbrella), when this symbol of Buddhist spiritual power was being raised on the top of the pagoda, the conflict escalated. A pagoda (zedi) with htì symbolises the Buddha (Gautama), the previous Buddhas, the future Buddha (bodhisattd), the universal monarchs (cakkavatti) who precede the bodhisatta, and the monks (sangha).10 It signifies accumulated merit of these figures, as well as of the donors. The mere idea of shooting at the htì represents a gross sacrilege. After failed negotiations with Bo Mya, U Thuzana and his monks withdrew from Thu Mwe Htar. He and his supporters had also asked permission to build a pagoda in Manerplaw, the KNU headquarters—and the refusal of permission underlined a feeling of inferiority compared to the strong Christian presence there. There were monks in Manerplaw, but they seemed not to represent the Buddhist villagers in the Salween area. In an attempt to control U Thuzana, Bo Mya demanded that the leading monk in the KNU, called Rambo Hsayadaw (U Zawana), an ally of Bo Mya, should be placed in Thu Mwe Htar.

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The Buddhist Karen had for some time complained of being repressed, discriminated against and segregated by Bo Mya and the Christian leadership. This time they were determined to act if their demands were not met. Whilst U Thuzana proclaimed that he withdrew to a mountain monastery in seclusion to meditate for forty-nine months [sic]- the Buddha meditated for 49 days after Enlightenment—about 500 local militia and Buddhist KNLA soldiers mutinied in December 1994. The army and the mutineers took advantage of the situation and easily overran Manerplaw. The KNU withdrew, burning all buildings except the religious shrines.11 When the mutiny began, Bo Mya sent a message in a paternalistic style, as the great grandfather ‘calling back his beloved ones who had drifted away, our sons and grandchildren... we leaders are the parents of the soldiers'- but all in vain.12 In January 1996, the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) began attacking Karen refugee setdements in Thailand. They were easily identified by their yellow headbands (kho per baw in Sgaw Karen) and were probably supported by soldiers from the Burmese army.13 They burned houses, took hostages and tried to force refugees back to Burma. They told the refugees that they could live peacefully in monasteries supervised by U Thuzana and they would get sufficient supplies of food provided they stopped fighting. The DKBA soldiers also attempted to identify pastors of the Seventh-Day Adventist denomination; this shows their obvious hatred towards Karen with the same religion as Bo Mya. Refugees reported that soldiers carried amulets with U Thuzana’s picture and urged them to come and drink his ‘magic medicine’ and take an oath in his monastery, Myaing Gyi Ngu. The idea was to unite all Karen and stop the fighting. In 1997, the DKBA continued its raids on refugees, burning most of the houses and looting and killing in camps around Mae Sot, where between 30 and 50 per cent of the Karen refugees are Christians. The Thai army has not attempted to stop the raids. The then Thai government of former Prime Minister Chavalit, also the former head of the army, has remained on friendly terms with the SLORC. The Thai government is worried that the SLORC may occupy parts of the undemarcated border in the mountains and forests. Since the 1950s the KNU has functioned as a convenient buffer. In March 1997, the KNU lost the last forward bases inside Burma,

10. See Chapter 3. 11. Manerplaw had been the headquarters of the KNU and its administrative centre since 1975.

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including the new headquarters in Htee Ka Pler and 15,000–20,000 additional refugees are on the move towards settlements in Thailand. Recently the KNLA soldiers were reported to have surrendered their weapons. The weapons and the officers were pictured in the SLORC newspaper, the New Light of Myanmar 12 March 1997. The soldiers— allegedly from the 6th Brigade of the KNLA—were greeting Khin Nyunt, Secretary-1 in the town of Kya-in. The caption read: ‘They exchanged arms for peace.’ The surrender of weapons is an act that is considered a betrayal to the Karen national revolution (cf. the KNLA slogan ‘Give Liberty or Death’). The KNLA followed the four rules of the late President Saw Ba U Gyi: ‘Surrender is out of the question; recognition of the Karen state; retain our weapons; decide our political destiny.’ The recent surrender of weapons has been belittled by the KNU spokesman, Ner Dah, who is also Bo Mya’s son. He said that they were just people who had committed adultery and therefore were excommunicated from the the KNU. Christian fundamentalist leaders in the KNU have administered harsh punishments upon young Karen for engaging in pre-nuptial sexual relations. A former officer told me that young relatives of the leaders evaded the ten-year jail sentence for partaking of forbidden fruit. Moreover, promises of payment and rewards for frontline fighting often did not materialise, thus widening the gap between leaders and subalterns. Bo Mya is near retirement and may be replaced by Shwe Saing, the vice-president. But Shwe Saing is loyal to Bo Mya, who has been rejecting proposals from the SLORC to end the fighting, unlike fifteen or so other edinic groups who have agreed to do so since 1993.14 A ceasefire before a political solution is reached is considered a betrayal of the Karen revolution. Within the KNU there is a growing weariness of the conservative and hardline leadership of Bo Mya—the time of 71year-old former Force-136 guerrilla is running out. The colonial legacy of Karen nationalism seems to be waning at last as the nationalism of the 1940s has been overtaken by the harsh political realities. The young generation is not prepared to live as a nation in exile with no prospects other than continuous violence and death. They are not willing to

12. The paternalistic rhetoric refers to Christian Karen interpretation of myths. They lost their way and their leader and became orphans (Gravers 1996b: 253). 13. Lay people and soldiers use the yellow colour of a monk to signify the democratic distribution of religious values. But the headband could be inspired by fundamentalist images of holy warriors.

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sacrifice their lives whilst leaders enjoy profits from cross-border trade and the sale of rare timber to Thai firms. This is the background to the split, and although the SLORC is supporting the DKBO, the schism is not merely a SLORC plot; religion and inequality lie at the heart of the conflict. However, we should not conclude that nationalism will disappear, as its roots in the history of Burma reach very deep. The following point made by George Orwell in 1947 after the formation of the KNU is still valid: ‘The fact is that the question of the minorities [in Burma] is literally insoluble as long as nationalism remains a real force.’15 However, nationalism in the present conjuncture has been overtaken by its embedded religious oppositions. The SLORC is using Buddhism to ‘Burmanise’ minority areas, while Aung San Suu Kyu views Buddhism as a fulcrum for democratisation. U Thuzana and his vegan movement is part of the same trend whilst representing a reaffirmation of a historic Karen identity and a strong Buddhist tradition amongst the Karen. The SLORC and the DKBO, as well as Aung San Suu Kyi, are demonstrating, albeit with different aims, that Buddhism constitutes an important medium for new strategies and models in the political struggle.

14. Amongst these are the Kachin Independence Organisation, the largest of ethnic armies, as well as Kayah, Pa-o, Mon, Padaung (or Kayan), Shan and Wa. However, the Kayah (Karen-ni) has resumed fighting following extensive relocations of civilians by the SLORC and a split within the KNU. The KNU has attempted to persuade these groups to take up arms again—a move which may have released the final offensive from the SLORC. 15. Orwell (1970:326).

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13. U THUZANA AND VEGAN BUDDHISM

U Thuzana is a disciple of a famous Karen monk and vegetarian, U Vinaya, who is known as the Thamanya Hsayadaw. Thamanya is the name of a hill and a monastery where U Vinaya resides north of Paan town. More than 400 monks and women ascetics live there.1 However, U Thuzana has never acquired his master’s profound wisdom. U Thuzana is not a learned Buddhist scholar who can recite the discourses of Buddha, although he has other important qualifications and is part of a long tradition of Buddhist leaders amongst the Karen in Burma. He became known for his vegan ideas—he eats only fruit and vegetables and does not allow the killing of animals and, by simplifying Buddhist ethics into the essentials of loving-kindness and non-violence, he is able to appeal to the common people in their endless experience of violence. His message and basic rules for his followers in Myaing Gyi Ngu Temple are: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

No politics. The five Buddhist precepts strictly observed.2 No anger; no fighting. No discussion of religious differences. No gossip.

1. Thamanya Hsayadaw is not involved with the Democratic Karen Buddhist Organisation. He is venerated by wide segments of Burmese society and distributes free food to Karen and Pao villagers living near his residence. 2. The five precepts (sild) are: ‘I undertake the rule of training to refrain from destroying life;…taking what is not given;…wrong-doing in sexual desires;… false speech;…intoxicants.

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These rules were originally formulated by the Thamanya Hsayadaw, and this policy is said to be so popular that it has even attracted Christians who have become vegan. To achieve a peaceful mind one must live life as a vegan and avoid the killing of animals. Meditation in seclusion is another crucial means to secure merit and peace. In particular, these vegan ideas are popular amongst the Karen and contain, as we shall see in the following chapter, an important symbolic value amongst the Buddhist Karen. Being a vegan is part of the preparations for the coming of the bodhisatta and a new era of peace due to a Buddhist revival. This message, the simple rules, and the longing for peace have no doubt attracted the more than 2,000 families who live around the monastery. The Myaing Gyi Ngu Monastery is the base of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Organisation (DKBO) and U Thuzana has distributed flyers and leaflets with his policy, featuring his round stamp showing the Nan Oo pagoda in the temple. In the stamp is written the name of his Buddhist association, Wai-Ya-Wissa, and the place ‘Myaing-Gyi Ngu Old City’. ‘Old city’ refers to the remains of old ramparts surrounding the temple of the important confluence of the Yunzalin and Salween Rivers; they are probably fortifications and a small town dating from the Mon kingdom. The use of the place and name signifies that it is a site of historical and political importance and not just an ordinary monastery. The place gives the impression of being affluent, with new and renovated buildings. One informant explained that the monastery gave the impression of a palace. Persons who carry a letter with its stamp are not bullied by the Burmese army, and Karen are not forced to be porters for the army. When Burma was in turmoil in 1988, this area remained remarkably peaceful. In this way U Thuzana was obviously able to attract considerable gifts from followers. U Thuzana possesses a traditional symbolic prestige and power. He is said to have crossed a particularly strong current in a small boat, and once after meditation he became invisible. He can also predict the winning numbers in the Thai lottery—a popular but probably illegal pastime under the present regime. However, his most important prediction is that once fifty pagodas have been built in the Karen state, there will be peace. This prophecy is crucial in legitimating the informal political role of U Thuzana who, paradoxically, has ‘no politics’ at the top of his agenda. His pro phecy signals a hpòn (glory) based on a model of symbolic power applied in previous struggles. U Thuzana belongs to the small but very influential sect within the Burmese Sangha, the Shwegyin Nikaya. It is known for its strict

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adherence to the 227 Vinaya rules of conduct for monks. The members of the sect emphasise discipline, study and meditation, often in reclusion like the forest monks. Shwegyin monks are ascetics: they stay out of politics and do not participate in worldly affairs. They cover both shoulders with the yellow robe and follow the Theravada idea that a young monk becomes a disciple of an older, learned monk. In this way they form lineages of teachers, just as U Thuzana is related to Thamanya Hsayadaw. In principle, the line can be traced back to Buddha. The Shwegyin sect was formed in 1856 during the rule of King Mindon who reformed and disciplined the Sangha. The leader of the sect supported King Mindon and helped to consolidate his power whilst the king lent prestige to the sect. Later the Shwegyin monks withdrew from monastic life in a final reclusion. The sect had approximately 17, 000 monks in 1980.3 During the rule of Ne Win and the Burma Socialist Programme Party there was close contact between the regime and the Shwegyin sect; Ne Win supported the sect and apparently used it to control the Sangha. A declaration from the Shwegyin Nikaya in 1921 significantly emphasises the central elements of U Thuzana’s programme: ‘Members of the Shwegyin Nikaya shall take upon themselves the duty to preach religion to lay people to promote peace and eliminate sin.’4 U Thuzana may eventually make use of the Shwegyin tradition—directly or indirectly—to legitimate his ambiguous role as ascetic monk and patron of the DKBO. However, he could also refer to the Buddhist Karen tradition of ‘prophets’ and mìn laùngs in the Salween-Yunzalin region. It must be emphasised that I have not seen any information stating that U Thuzana poses as mìn laùngor as a bodhisatta.5 U Thuzana’s vegan movement is an intervention into the Westernised KNU leadership and its nationalism, and it is an intervention on behalf of the poor and marginalised Karen in the mountains. Whilst democracy, economic development and consumption may be high on the political agenda in Rangoon, the Karen in the border areas are craving for peace and food. U Thuzana may be able to provide what the KNU has failed to do. His religious model also mixes tradition and

3. SeeThanTun (1988:165). 4. ThanTun (1988:174). 5. A person does not have to declare himself a mìn laùng or a coming Buddha to evoke the ideas of a new leader. His position and its legitimation depends on the recognition from his followers. See Herbert (1982).

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modern ideas to overcome the religious divide amongst the Karen. The following historical background is not an attempt to interpret the present as if the past were repeated in the present. What is important is the general role of Buddhism as a medium for social, cultural and political changes in times of profound crises and upheavals—a remedy to stop the violence and restore peace according to Buddhist cosmology. And within this scheme is the long tradition of expecting the coming of the bodhisatta called Ariyametteya.

14. BUDDHISM, PROPHECIES AND REBELLION

In early 1856 the htì was hoisted on a pagoda situated on a hill above the site of the present Papun town. Today Papun is the main town in this Karen-dominated area. In the mid-1950s it was the capital of the KNU Kawthulay state but was taken by the Burmese army in 1955. The htì raised in 1856 signalled the start of a long Buddhistinspired rebellion considered by the colonial government to be anti-British and instigated by King Mindon who came to power in 1853, the year after the second Anglo–Burman war. At that time the Salween area was not yet under British control, but Baptist missionaries had travelled on the Yunzalin and Salween Rivers since the 1830s, and they had met a famous Karen religious leader, known by the American Baptist missionaries as ‘the prophet Areemaday’, that is, the name of the coming Buddha.1 His Karen name was Ta Bu Pho and he was a Sgaw Karen. He was probably a local religious leader, a bu kho in Sgaw Karen (boung kho in Pwo Karen), meaning the ‘head of merit-making’. A boung kho is a lay religious leader, dressed in white, which symbolizes purity and peace. He observes the Buddhist precepts strictly and organises ceremonies at village pagodas which are unrelated to monasteries and do not involve monks. An important part of the ceremony, as it is still practised, is to fasten small wax candles, flowers and josssticks at the pagoda. Then libation water is poured onto the ground as a message to the earth goddess, Hsong Th’Rwi, the central spiritual figure: she is the temporary guardian of Buddhism as the proxy for Indra (cakkavatti) until Ariyametteya arrives with peace, prosperity and a revival of the Buddhist ethic.2 This tradition is still alive amongst Karen in Burma and in Thailand.3 The missionaries visited the ‘prophet Areemaday’ in 1833 and in 1837. He wished to ally himself with the

1. See Judson (1833:39–44); F. Mason (1862).

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mission, sent presents to the Baptist missionaries, and invited a teacher to start up a school. However, he rejected conversion and his followers became increasingly hostile towards the missionaries. He had followers in the whole region as far as Moulmein and attracted Karen from all parts of Burma. He proclaimed himself a mìn laùng, joined with the Kayah chief (sawbwa) of Baw Lahkè, and fought against a Burmese force in 1844–46. At that time the area was still tributary to the Burman king. Areemaday was killed in battle, and many of his followers were slaughtered.4 According to the influential Baptist missionary and scholar, Francis Mason, the boung khos often transformed into mìn laùngs and launched prophecies that the time of Ariyametteya was approaching, that a new righteous king would appear and cleanse the immoral world (as described in Chapter 3). The Karen shared this belief with their Buddhist neighbours, although they kept their own particular type of leadership and ceremonies. The mìn laùngs and their messengers sometimes came from villages far away and travelled widely to bring the new tidings. Some of the leaders were former monks or forest monks, yathe (ruesi or rsi in Sanskrit), that is, hermits who live totally outside of society as ascetic recluses and are often said to possess supernatural powers (not unlike those attributed to U Thuzana). Among the Pwo Karen in Uthaithani province in Thailand, the legend of ayatheis still the foundation of the Lu Baung sect (yellow thread sect),5 The yathe (eing hsai in Pwo) known as Th’ Hsoeng Ne Dje instructed the Karen to stop feeding on and offering domestic animals to the spirits. Instead they should build 2. Hsong Th’Rwi is the Indian earth-god Visundhara; Wathonday in Burman. When Mara, the evil tempter attacked the Buddha immediately before his Enlightenment, Hsong Th’Rwi, who witnessed Buddha’s good deed, wrung her long hair and the water swept away Mara’s warriors. The myth signifies the victory of Buddhism; and the libation water poured on the ground called upon Hsong Th’Rwi to confirm meritorious acts. See the beautifully illuminated legend in Herbert (1992). 3. For example, the Telakhoung and Lu Baung movements in the BurmaThailand border regions. See Andersen (1981); Gravers (1994; 1998) ;Stern (1968). 4. F.Mason (1862) calls the bu kho and mìn laùng ‘imposters, who with religious pretentions cover political projects’. And missionary Vinton, who travelled with Mason, wrote: ‘The Karen in all this region have a tradition that God is about to visit this world in human form. Numbers have inquired if Mr Vinton is that god’ (Baptist Missionary Magazine, 1836, vol. 16, p. 295).

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pagodas and put up a protective pole called the th’doengwith an umbrella-like htì on the top. These poles are placed on and around the pagoda, near the house, and in the fields to protect against spirits and to signify that the Buddhist precepts are being observed. The pagoda (glongin Pwo) is made of sand and bamboo. Boungkhos were installed as the daily supervisors of religion and morality, and as ceremonial leaders. The main purpose of the boung kho and his wife (boung mü) is to uphold the Buddhist ethic until the coming of Ariya (Ariyametteya), the Buddhato-be. They organise and lead the ceremonies at full moon, and abstain from eating meat during the four lunar phases. The legendary yathe, Th’ Hsoeng Ne Dje, is seen as the powerful figure who liberated the Karen from burdensome acts of demerit controlled by the spirits. The boungkho and the yatheare considered by the Karen to be less corruptible than the monks in a monastery, and they actually work hard to prepare for the coming of the future Buddha, whereas the monks have easier lives. Their work of merit does not depend on monks, although a yathe and a boung kho may visit a monastery to pay them respect. The Karen are more easily impressed and convinced by a charismatic and active outsider than by an intellectual, withdrawn and learned monk. However, a figure like U Thuzana seems to fulfil both roles. Thus, a yathe would carry sufficient symbolic power to be able to convince villagers of the approaching Ariyametteya and to revive Buddhism, whereas it would probably be more difficult for a locally known person to convey a convincing prophecy and to distance himself from worldly attachments. The Karen would sometimes look upon a monk (a member of the Sangha) in the monastery as a figure with less kamma and hpòn than a yathe (the ascetic outsider), and less than a boungkho (an insider and guardian of knowledge). Religious knowledge and charisma are constantly assessed by the villagers and not by the Sangha. Boung khos are disciples of older boung khos and often succeed their fathers—all are disciples of Th’ Hsoeng Ne Dje. However, a

5. ‘Sect’ is not a precise translation; ‘movement’ would be a better term. The Pwo concept lu baung s’raung means ‘Lu Baung’s collective act’, i.e. religious work; and the yellow thread refers to a string around the wrist. It protects the owner and is a sign that one follows the Buddhist precepts. It is a crucial symbol of ethnic identity of a Ga Phloung Lu Baung, a ‘Yellow Thread Pwo Karen’. There is no overarching organisation or leadership of Lu Baung. Boung khos are ranked according to age and how many years they have functioned as leaders.

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boung kho or a boung mü must accumulate symbolic capital in order to be elected and accepted as leader.6 When the time was near, the leader would urge people to respect the precepts, to become vegetarians, and to gather and clear out the roots of the religious decline—in particular to strengthen the moral precepts. The leader of the 1856 rebellion claimed to be related to the previous mìn laùng who had raised the htì and initiated rebellions since the fall of the Mon kingdom in 1757 when the Karen were allied with the Mon king against the Burman king, Alàung Hpayà.7 British intelligence sources from 1856 mention the names of nine Karen leaders dating back at least a hundred years. They appear to have followed a kind of dynastic line. The leader of the rebellion in 1856 was Saw Dwe Gow (Tso Duai Kow) from Papun who gathered a large following in a camp surrounding the pagoda above Papun. The pagoda and the camp were visible from the river and decorated with coloured flags. Here he had collected an arsenal of weapons, mainly spears and crossbows, but also muskets. When British officers and the sepoys entered the camp after his withdrawal they found a large compound with the pagoda in the centre. Next to the pagoda was a pyatthat, a hall where Saw Dwe Gow received his followers and their donations.8 There were several barracks for the men. No exact number for his armed followers is given in the colonial intelligence reports but estimates from a few hundred to 2,000 have been given. However, all Buddhist Karen supported the Karen mìn laùng who also proclaimed himself hpayà laùng, the coming Buddha. He was said to possess the thirty-two signs and eighty marks demonstrating his hpòn. He and his guerrilla army ambushed the British forces in the mountains and made traps of sharp, pointed and poisoned bamboo. They attacked the army with big stones when it passed through ravines. The guerrillas quickly withdrew and the army had to attack ‘these marauders and deluted savages’ uphill ‘with hearty cheers; the Karen yelled and screamed in return’. Numerous Indian soldiers and British officers were killed and wounded in this 6. A woman can function alone as a religious leader. 7. This alliance has been subject to guesswork among scholars on the ethnic identity of the groups involved. See the highly speculative theory in Brailey (1970). The point is that a mìn laùng or dhammaraja is a leader because of particular religious and personal qualities whereas ethnicity is secondary (Lieberman 1978). 8. The pyatthat was connected with royalty and the hall or pavillion normally had a seven- or nine-tiered roof. It was used for audiences and had a throne.

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guerrilla war between 1856 and 1860. The Karen rebels came close to the important town of Shwegyin and threatened the Christian Karen loyal to the British. Saw Dwe Gow withdrew to Kayah where he had an ally in the sawbwa (chief) of Eastern Kayah state. His rebel army included not only Sgaw and Pwo Karen but also Kayah and Shan. This fact is crucial because it demonstrates that the rebellion was more of a religiouspolitical project than an ethnic insurrection by religious fanatics, as the colonial and missionary sources termed it. Saw Dwe Gow was never captured by the large military expedition sent into the Salween area in 1858. He was probably killed by the Thais of Chiangmai. Reading the intelligence reports on the mìn laùng reminds one of the Scarlet Pimpernel—They seek him here, they seek him there, … [they] seek him everywhere’—but they never encountered the mystical figure. It was an essential part of his tactics not to get involved in violent confrontations himself! The British forces burned numerous villages and granaries and took the rice. Even in 1861 when Mason travelled along the Yunzalin River, the area was largely deserted. The missionaries were not welcomed by the Karen. Francis Mason had urged the commissioner to distribute guns among the Christian Karen for self-defence, but the British feared that the recently converted Karen would apostatise and join the rebellion. A few months after the rebellion broke out in Salween, a Karen mìn laùng appeared in the Bassein area in western Burma. He was said to have come from the mountains in eastern Burma and to possess supernatural powers. His men had been tattooed by him as a protection against bullets. He issued ‘royal proclamations’ and his programme was the same as Saw Dwe Gow’s: He proclaims that the Karen have a natural right to this country, which was formerly held by their ancestors, since which time it has been conquered by four nations: the Puthees [Chinese], Talaings [Mon], Burmese and English, but the time has now arrived for the Karens to assert their rights and reconquer the country.9 Both leaders said they would ‘drive the kullahs out’, namely the foreigners (kho la in Pwo Karen; probably borrowed from the Burman kala), and establish a new dynasty in Pegu, the ancient capital of the Mon kingdom.

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At this time missionaries had collected myths and traditions from among the various Karen groups and had edited them as if they signified the advent of Christianity. One verse often included in their journals and books goes as follows: The Talain [Mon] Kings had their season; The Burman kings had their seasons; The Siamese kings had their seasons; And the foreign kings will have their season; But the Karen king will yet appear. When he arrives there will be only one king; And there will be neither rich nor poor. Everything [sic] will be happy, And even lions and leopards will lose their savageness.10 This verse is obviously part of the mìn laùng-Ariyametteya tradition among the Karen and was cited in the years preceding the rebellion. To the Baptist missionaries, however, it contained clear Christian connotations and pointed to a kingdom based on Christian/Western civilisation. It was a common belief amongst colonial officials that the leaders of the rebellion had attended missionary schools. The reasons for the rebellions were many. The Karen resisted the relatively high poll taxes exacted by the colonial government. Some were opposed to foreign rule, or the Christian missionaries, but first and foremost the rebellions were Buddhist-inspired projects to reestablish a righteous social order and regain control of the universe. While the missionaries’ accounts and more recent analyses have emphasised the millenarian aspects and the

9. The rebellion is reported in letters from colonial in Burma to the government in Calcutta, see India Political and Foreign Proceedings (1856-1858) in the Oriental and India Office Collection, British Library, London. See also Stoll (1861); he was the first officer to be stationed in the Papun area after the rebellion. The missionary accounts are found in Baptist Missionary Magazine (vol. 36-38, 1856-58). 10. E.B. Mason (1862: 85). On the historical role of the mission among the Karen, see Gravers (1996b). More than a century later, the Pwo Karen in Uthaithani, Thailand, would cite the following verse when remembering the past: ‘When the Burman dies, and the white foreigner (kho la) goes home - the Karen shall eat, eat…’

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defensive reaction, the rebellions were just as much an attempt by the rebels to obtain political and religious control of their own world. There were many other rebellions led by mìn laùngs in this part of Burma, involving all ethnic groups. One important rebellion took place in 1843 in Daloung, near the present border with Thailand. The mìn laùng was a Mon, and the Karen in the area joined his movement. The leader, known as Nga Pyan (nga meaning ‘inferior’, ‘criminal’) in the report from his trial, gained influence by raising funds to build pagodas. When followers gathered around him, he declared war against the English. His royal proclamations referred to the symbols of Indra (cakkavatti), and he declared that the poor and suffering people would be taken care of and live a quiet and happy life under his reign. He was eventually jailed for life.11 In 1867–68, a new Karen mìn laùng appeared in Papun and attempted to mobilise the Karen in the Salween area. His name was Maung Dee Pah and he referred to his predecessor, Saw Dwe Gow. Saw Dwe Gow had repaired the pagoda built by Ta Bu Pho (the ‘prophet Areemaday’), and Ta Boo Pho’s sons joined Saw Dwe Gow; all nine Karen mìn laùngs revered Saw Qwe Ran, the great mìn laùng from Papun, whom the Karen expected to return one day. This was indeed a long—almost dynastic—tradition of rebellion. When the British colonised the last part of Burma in 1885 and ‘pacified’ the mountains, they encountered resistance from monks: ‘It is a trait in their national character to have religious prophets to stir up amongst them’, concluded the Baptist missionary, D.L. Brayton, in a report to Commissioner Phayre. I would prefer to say that it is a model of society, including a historical experience, to which the Karen turn in times of crisis.12 After ‘pacification’, Christian Karen police were stationed in Papun and the missionaries obtained a foothold in the Salween area, although it remained a predominantly Buddhist region. In 1938, a Sgaw Karen leader, known as Phu Gwe Gow (Pu Kwe Kow means ‘honest Grandfather’) built a monastery near Kler Doe Kya in the Papun Hills, in the Salween district, and called it Wey Mau Kow (‘Kingdom of Heaven’). The colonial officers called him an ‘enlightened agitator’,

11. ‘Report of a Trial for Rebellion, held at Moulmein by the Commissioner of Tenasserim. Communicated by Sudder Deway Adawlut’. Journal of the Royal Asiatic Socieiy of Bengal, new senries, vol.14, no. 2, 1845, 14, no. 2,1845, pp. 747–55. See Sarkisyanz (1968–69) on other similar movements.

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who formed a syncretistic movement mixing Christianity, animism and Buddhism. Phu Gwe Gow gained support from older Karen and called for the Salween district to be made independent. He was killed by Force-136 Karen during the war.13 During the negotiations leading to the independence of Burma, the Karen from Salween were divided and submitted several different proposals to the Frontier Area Committee, with the aim of demonstrating that this area had its own particular history. Even among the Christian Karen there was disagreement, and some broke away from the Karen National Union (see Appendix 2). It is in the context of this historical background that U Thuzana’s movement should be assessed. He has not claimed to be a mìn laùngor a bodhisatta, but he has the religious qualities and the symbolic power to become a leader who can refer to this long tradition in an implicit way; a leader whom the Karen can identify as belonging to this tradition. However, he is also a monk of a modern and different political context. Thus, it is important to emphasise that history is not a mere repetition of a culturalreligious schema shared equally amongst all actors.14 Likewise, we cannot explain events of the past by situating them in a modern political struggle. The context of the rebellions of 1856 was of another order. The historical memory of the Buddhist Karen in the Salween area today may not include any details of these past events except the Buddhist precepts, the building of pagodas, the raising of the htì, the ceremonies and the ascetic ideals of the yathe, such as meditation and vegetarianism. These are experiences shared and recollected, and embody a mode of imagining a better future by looking to the past. For example, the hoisting of the pagoda htì is satiated with royal symbolic power: the future ruler would be the person who put the htì on the new pagoda. Actually, the same act executed by Secretary-1 Khin Nyunt or U Thuzana can be interpreted to radiate a traditional mixture of prestige (goun), glory (hpòn) and power (and), as well as religious merit (kutho).

12. It is a model shared with other Buddhists in Burma. See Sarkisyanz (1965; 1968). However, the model has been used in very different pro jects throughout history. The Hsaya San rebellion was also a modern nationalistic movement. 13. See Karen’s Political Future M/4/3023, and M. Smith (1991:437, note no. 49). 14. Cf. Ortner (1989:127–29).

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The Karen population has been involved in continuous struggles characterised by contradictory social classifications: as a nation versus the Burmans/Myanmar; as ethnic subgroups within the category ‘Karen’ (Sgaw, Pwo, Kayah, Pa-o, Padaung), and outwardly against Burman, Mon, Shan (Thai); as religious denominations—Christian (Baptist, Seventh-Day Adventist, Catholic), Buddhist ‘sects’ (Telakhoung, Lu Baung), and ‘animists’; between the wealthy and educated on the one hand, and the poor with less education on the other; between leaders and subalterns; and between exiles and those who stayed and endured. In all, this is a skewed world divided into compartments of opposing social and cultural categories. It is in this historical context that Christianity and Buddhism have emerged as ‘remedies’ to remake the compartmentalised world into a unitary order by excluding all that is divisive from the agenda and by stressing the universal ethical religious values. The Karen memory of the past, however, differs according to social position and experience, although the feeling of being a people scattered, divided and without leadership is widely shared. This memory is often expressed by using orphans as a metaphor for the ancestors who lost not only their way, but also their leader, their knowledge and their religious wisdom.15 U Thuzana’s movement is basically a struggle against ethnicism and nationalism. However, it is a sad fact that it is also totally dependent on the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC). Moreover, it is difficult to reconcile U Thuzana’s claim of promoting loving-kindness, non-violence, and non-political practice with his alleged role in ordering the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) to attack refugee camps in Thailand and kill Karen.16 However, what appears to be a paradox is not necessarily contrary to Buddhism as, long as a monk does not directly order the killings. Before peace can be restored the righteous leader has to straighten out the skewed world—by force if necessary. The universal monarch (cakkavatti) may use fire, wind or water as the appropriate means, according to the cosmological legends (see Chapter 3). The history of the Karen has witnessed an abundance of vio lence. When the Karen turn to religious expectations it is not because they are predetermined by the particular rationality of a cultural-religious schema in a millenarian tradition, but because they have used and

15. The image of the orphan is widely used in publications on the Karen. See Falla (1991); Fink (1995:24).

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reformulated the religious schema in their historical memory of social experiences during a long and violent political process. Violence, in turn, is explained in Buddhist ethics as an outcome of evil and demeritorious roots such as hate and greed. When a leader hoists the htì and everyone joins in the ceremony with candles, flowers and joss-sticks, the recollection of the past is part of the ritual. A boung kho includes acts of merit from the past, the kamma of parents and grandparents in his prayers. Thus, the kamma and glory of the yathe, and the boungkhoand mìn laùng of the past enter the stream of the present as symbolic power. Buddhism as such cannot in itself legitimise political power: however, merit and glory are potent signs of a coming leader. Thus, U Thuzana may not refer to mìn laùng, cakkavatti, bodhisatta or other figures. The historical memory and the collective recollection of the participants will decide the degree to which of the legendary elements can be revitalised. In other words, those elements must appear as genuine representations of Karen history and identity which can encompass a majority. One informant noted that U Thuzana looks like one who wants to make use of these images of leadership and power from the past, for example the style of the monastery, perhaps not as a ruler himself but as the maker of one. Only time will tell but U Thuzana is obviously aiming to be the master of religion and collective memory. Furthermore, religions, in this case Buddhism, are not merely models for an afterlife or models of the present social order in the way religion has commonly been analysed. Religion among the Karen appears as both historical memory of social practices and as a medium of political power.17 It is too early to reach a more definitive conclusion about the DKBA and U Thuzana, and I may have placed too much emphasis on the history and the symbolic practice, neither of which is shared or remembered by all Karen. However, the study of symbolic practice and historical memory in all its ethnographical richness is crucial to the understanding of power.18 Ethnicity and ethno-nationalistic rebellion may be moving down on the political agenda, whereas religion is taking the top position. However, it is unlikely that ethnicity can be removed from historical 16. Major Toe Hlaing from the DKBA explained to journalists that U Thuzana is the policy leader and General Yaw Het is the military chief of the Buddhist Karen. Toe Hlaing claimed that U Thuzana ordered the DKBA to cease the attacks on refugee camps, thus indicating that a monk is capable of giving military orders (Bangkok Post, 1 and 9 May 1995).

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memory and social identity in the near future, since it is such an integral part of the same historical memory. In 1992 the SLORC pronounced that ‘the theory of the big races’, i.e. the eight major ethnic groups of the colonial time, has been fading from day to day, and claimed that the ‘135 ethnic groups or national races’ of Burma will obtain a local autonomy at district level, but will still be controlled by the regional State Law and Order Restoration Councils and the army.19 A closer look at the list of the 135 national races reveals that the terms are Burman and taken state by state: for example the Pa-o or Taungthus are listed as belonging to the ‘Kayin (Karen) national races’ as well as to the the ‘Shan national races’. The Karen ‘national races’ consist of twelve groups, but do not include the Kayah. In this way the regime uses ethnicity and ethnic differences politically to disguise its programme of ‘Myanmarisation’ or ‘Burmanisation’, where Burman culture, language and the Burman way of Buddhism are absolutely hegemonic. The device seems to be: rule, classify and divide. Villagers in Kayah, Kachin and Karen states have been forcibly removed from infrastructure projects or fighting zones.20 Christian Chin, Kachin and Karen villagers are often prohibited from conducting their religious ceremonies, and Christian Chin children are said to have been taken to Buddhist monasteries in Rangoon.21 Such acts leave little hope for forgiving and forgetting ethnic struggles of the past. The Myanmar Ngaing-Ngan, the ‘Union of Myanmar’, modelled on the SLORC, is an example of an organisation synonymous with Burman culture and nation, where the regime controls the social and cultural classifications of every single actor. It may be a transitional hegemony, as described by the Kachin scholar Maran La Raw. He and other elite members of the ethnic minorities in exile are strong proponents of a federalism whilst still defending the national identity and integrity of the minorities.22 They refer to the Panglong Agreement from 1947 with Aung San and emphasise the memory of the ‘Panglong spirit’ of

17. On the debate on social/historical memory, see Connerton (1989); Gillis (1994); Appendix 1. 18. Cf. Comaroff and Comaroff (1992); Ortner (1995). 19. Steinberg (1992:226). Steinberg believes it will end the discussion of federalism and that it offers certain potential advantages for the smaller groups (ibid.: p. 227). 20. See M. Smith (1994).

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cooperation and dialogue. At least it was legitimate to negotiate the wishes of the minorities. It is interesting to read the historical recollections of the two Kayah leaders, Abel Tweed and Ted Buri. In an interview, they stated that Kayah always remained outside the state of Burma—or at least was semiindependent.23 Likewise, Maran La Raw talks about learning from history and stresses that the Kachin did not become a minority under British rule, that they were not integrated into the colony, but they were among the co-founding nationalities of independent Burma.24 Kayah and Kachin are both outside Burma, yet also nationalities of independent Burma! This is the ethnic predicament: the contradiction between a primordially constructed identity and the fixed boundaries of the modern nation-state. The British muddled the issue by defining excluded areas. However, this historical memory of ethnic elites cannot ignore the fact that the multi-ethnic union did not prevent inter-ethnic and nationalistically inspired fights. The most serious problem to deal with in the future is thus the contradictory mixture of claims and demands based on ethnicity and a political union of equal democratic rights. Perhaps that is why Aung San Suu Kyi is somewhat opaque when speaking about these questions: We will include all the ethnic groups based on Union spirit. Everyone will have equal rights. The equal rights that I am referring to here is for the ethnic groups. Before I address this, I would like to mention that we also need equal rights among those in Burma. All of us who are citizens should have special rights.25

21. See Burma Debate (vol. 3, no. 6, Nov.-Dec. 1996). 22. Ibid. Among the Chin, the number of Christians has increased significantly during the military rule. Recently, 40,000 have fled to India because of forced labour and religious persecution. 23. Kayah was actually defined as a non-British territory until independence, although from 1935 it was directly under the control of the British governor. 24. See interview in Burma Debate (vol. 3, no. 6, Nov.-Dec. 1996).

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The ethnic representatives in exile of the post-war generation may refer to the Panglong spirit’ in vain, since the new leaders inside Burma, such as U Thuzana, may indeed fail to include the ethnicity of the past in their search for new models.

25. Speech from February 1996 (Burma Debate, vol. 4, no. 1, Jan.-Feb. 1997: 22).

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15. AUTOCRACY AND NATIONALISM

Nationalism is a major theme of this book because it has been a dominant feature of Burma’s history. However, the presentation and analysis of the first edition of this book showed that nationalism is embedded in other, more or less cognate subjects and features of Burma, such as colonialism, religion and politics, ethnicity and ethnicism, as well as other subjects that are not included in this book, for instance language, literature and eco nomics. The reason is that the nation and nationalism are modern ways of imagining state, society and culture in the form of unity and identity. Thus, nationalism canot be analysed per se; only as specific ways of imagining this unity and identity, and always from specific positions of power in a social hierarchy.1 Theories of nationalism may inform the analysis and the discussion, but a reification of nationalism as if it were an autonomous agent in history produces erroneous conclusions. Nationalism is not a force above the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) in Burma’s history, and the SLORC and the army are major agents of violence, rather than nationalism as such. To make nationalism an agent in itself is a gross fallacy, which unfortunately has entered the debate recently. For example, Anthony D. Smith states that nationalism has the capacity to generate widespread terror and destruction, and, further, that it functions as the unrivalled socio cultural framework, based on the historic ethnic community (‘ethnie’) of the modern nation-state.2 Such functionalism cannot explain the particular way in which the SLORC manipulates nation alism and history to construct a symbolic power with its rhetoric, and uses symbolic violence to orchestrate its use of physical violence.3

1. For a discussion of theories of nationalism related to Asia, see TØnnesson and Antlöv (1996, Introduction). 2. A.D. Smith (1995:159).

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How then to explain the continued fierce nationalism of the SLORC— the logic of the generals? It could be argued that a regime with so much blood on its hands would obviously cling to power at any price. This is, of course, part of the explanation, but there are other important reasons. If the SLORC is unable to promote modernisation, economic growth and stability, as have been promised, the internal corporate solidarity of the Tatmadaw (army) may easily collapse and the SLORC may lose its direct and indirect support in the civil society. A new bankruptcy, as in the 1980s, and a new uprising could undoubtedly create chaos. Events in 1988 show that the behaviour of the Tatmadaw and the historic experience of violence could make the SLORC’s prophecy a dire reality: without the army, Burma would end in turmoil and lose its independence. It is precisely from this circular process of evils that nationalism gains its meaning as a forceful ideological interpellation as well as a dreadful reality. Although many in Burma are not convinced by the SLORC’s rhetoric, and many may find it utterly repellent, nationalism cannot be dismissed as a spent force. The rhetoric is an instrument of discipline within the army and SLORC-controlled organisations, and it carries the threat and fear of high-handed violence to the rest of the population. Even though only a minority, mostly in the countryside, listen to and agree with the SLORC’s ideology, the entire population is intimidated, coerced, and subdued by its nationalism and autocracy. Obviously, I cannot claim to have evidence of first-hand knowledge while writing from a distance, and the SLORC’s rhetoric, although an important practice, is indeed no explanation in itself. I shall, however, try to render probable the hypothesis outlined above. In 1993 the SLORC formed the nationalist organisation known as the Union Solidarity Development Association (USDA). It appears to be modelled on the organisations and mass mobilisation from the time of the now-defunct Burma Socialist Programme Party. People are more or less coerced to participate in the mass rallies and marches led by student bands. The USDA claimed to have reached a membership of more than seven million. Its aims are: • non-disintegration of the union; • non-disintegration of national unity;

3. Neither ethnicity nor nationalism is a self-generating force although they may be seen as such by political regimes and their adversaries.

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• perpetuation of sovereignty; • promotion and revitalisation of national pride; and • the emergence of a prosperous, peaceful and modern nation. It has a moral code centring on patriotism, duty and loyalty, yet it also offers free courses in computer training, management and Buddhist culture.4 Traditional culture and Buddhism are widely promoted by the SLORC, and the generals regularly present gifts to monks, support the building of new pagodas, and renovate the old ones. By using a mixture of tradition and modernity, the SLORC is mobilising under the tight control of the army. The generals are the patrons of the USDA and their new clients may be an important agency when the new constitution is ready. However, they may also be used in violent acts. USDA members are believed to be behind the attack on Aung San Suu Kyi in her car in 1996. One of the USDA’s functions is to guard against anyone who disturbs the stability of Myanmar. Thus, the USDA will continue to combine what is nationally correct with violence against deviancy. Simultaneously, the SLORC has continued its xenophobic nationalist rhetoric and practices. For example, accusations against Aung San Suu Kyi for collaborating with foreigners (including diplomats, journalists and her husband, Michael Aris) against Burma’s interests. According to articles in the government newspaper the New Light of Myanmar, Aung San Suu Kyi is ‘inciting violence’ and collaborating with countries and foreign forces hostile to Burma. Her statements and calls for the boycott of investments and other sanctions are seen by the SLORC as an attempt to destabilise the nation and to disrupt economic development. There is no doubt that the military regime is genuinely afraid of losing control and thereby losing power—and perhaps their heads. In December 1995 the New Light of Myanmar compared Aung San Suu Kyi to the traitor, Maung Ba Than, who in 1885 helped the British to conquer Mandalay and bring the independent kingdom of Burma to an end. The article concluded: ‘Young patriots will destroy the traitor.’5 Colonialism, imperialism and the humiliating loss of independence are historical memories used as warnings for the political opposition, also implying the loss of cultural and national identity. However, the Tatmadaw is portrayed as the historical saviour:

4. On the USDA see David Steiberg (1997); the Bangkok Post Sunday (22 January, 1996:2); and James Guyot (1996:268). Officials have to be members.

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Tatmadaw has rescued Myanmar people from the hands of the British and the Japanese; strenuously striven for emergence of the Union of a Myanmar; safeguarded the union of Myanmar from collapse at a time when Yangon was the only place left unvanquished, and prevented the union from disintegration in 1988.6 ‘The army is the nation!’ This, then, is the rallying cry despite the intruding Western culture, missionary schools and the lack of respect towards Buddhist monks. Despite disunity and ethnic division, the British colonialists did not succeed in destroying the cultural core of Burma according to the army’s historical memory, a point which is crucial to the present nationalism of the SLORC in the New Light of Myanmar. Another crucial instrument conveying the nationalism of the SLORC is the National Convention, which has been in and out of session and working on a new constitution since 1993. The convention is dominated by the regime and its proposals are censored. A mere 15 per cent of the delegates are elected. Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy (NLD) withdrew its eightysix delegates in 1995, complaining that the SLORC censored the debate. The NLD was then expelled from the convention. Some of the proposals would have prevented a person with long-term residency outside Burma from ever becoming president of the union: Aung San Suu Kyi would thus be excluded from that position. Some of the six objectives of the convention are the same as those of the USDA: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

non-disintegration of the Union; non-disintegration of national solidarity; consolidation and perpetuation of sovereignty; emergence of a genuine multi-party democracy system; development of the eternal principles of justice, liberty and equality in the future state;

5. On Maung (or U) Ba Than, a clerk of the British Chief Commissioner’s office who was masquerading as a prince. See Ni Ni Myint (1983:91). 6. The New Light of Myanmar (May-July 1996:5). Aung San is described as the architect of the nation and the organiser of the army. Ne Win’s role is positively assessed.

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6. participation of the Tatmadaw in the leading role in national politics in the future state. Obviously, the military does not intend to relinquish its power. When Aung San Suu Kyi withdrew from the convention with the ninety-one delegates of the NLD in October 1995, the Secretary-1 of the SLORC, Khin Nyunt, branded the opposition in these words: ‘Adopted sons and daughters of the colonialists, [who] under external influence are attempting to cause the disintegration of the union and the loss of independence.’7 To be anti-SLORC is to be anti-national. What we see here is the continuous construction by the SLORC of proofs of an impending disaster. Within this scheme, Aung San Suu Kyi cannot act without delivering the evidence of collapse and disaster. The character of the political process, particularly its nationalism, seems to render a dialogue impossible. The logic of the generals is based on the definitive and irrevocable dismissal of their opponents, and their democratic reasoning and values. And vice versa: Aung San Suu Kyi and her party cannot endorse any of the policies of the SLORC. In July 1996 the official media urged Aung San Suu Kyi to abandon politics altogether and leave the country—‘people were afraid other women would follow her and marry foreign men’. The attacks continued through September: ‘They [destructive elements] are disrupting politically the peace and tranquillity, hindering economic progress achieved and forcing the people to become hungry and destitute’, said Khin Nyunt, Secretary-1 of the SLORC. This kind of nationalistic rhetoric and strategy propagated by the SLORC could be seen as a mere window-dressing for its extreme repression. However, it is a mode of control in itself and not just a way to create legitimacy, since it is a fundamental part of exercising absolute power over the civil society of Burma. In its nationalism, the SLORC conveys the message that the regime controls the order of its realm completely, and that no one else is allowed to intrude or challenge their rule. This message is communicated not merely to the population in general, but to the Tatmadaw in particular, so as to strengthen the internal unity of the armed forces. State, army and nation have a unitary structure in the SLORC’s social model.

7. Cited in Guyot (1996:268). Khin Nyunt is the head of the powerful military intelligence, Directory of Defence Services Intelligence (DDSI), and has close relations with Ne Win.

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Any challenge to power will bring disaster to Burma—and the dreadful truth is that the prophecy will almost certainly be fulfilled if the Tatmadaw lose control. No doubt the regime fears an eco nomic crisis which could be a major reason for a new upheaval, like the one in 1988. A shortage of oil and a decline in the rice harvest causing a sharp rise in prices have been reported. In 1996 exports amounted to less than half the value of imports in 1995. Exports seem to have fallen by 50 per cent since 1993, whereas debt is increasing and credit is being extended. Foreign reserves are as low as they were after the rebellion and seem to be almost depleted. Inflation is estimated to increase by 30–40 per cent a year. Recently the exchange rate of kyat went from 170 to 250 to the US dollar.8 Tourism has failed despite the ‘Visit Myanmar Year in 1996' campaign. This economic decline, if it continues, could destabilise Burma. In the view of the SLORC it is caused by alien and hostile forces working inside and outside Burma.9 Burma’s economy is not easily analysed since official figures are unreliable. The following brief summary is only meant to outline the important reasons for the SLORC’s nationalism. However, the SLORC way to modernity reveals some major problems. Garment industry This is presumably one of the biggest money earners in Burma, but may be hit hard by sanctions. It is probably attracting investment from former low-wage countries in Asia. Forestry: teak and other hardwood This is a major economic resource. Big money-earners and logging have increased significantly since 1992. China and Thailand are the main importers while Europe (Scandinavia in particular) and the USA are the main importers of furniture. The increased logging is a threat to the largest virgin forest in the region. Before the army took control of the

8. According to the Far Eastern Economic Review (7 August 1997), an economic crisis, like the one in 1988, is imminent. Inflation has been on the increase ever since. 9. See figures in the Christian Science Monitor (12 November 1996); the Far Eastern Economic Review (Yearbook 1996); and Burma Debate (vol. 3, no. 4, 1996).

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border with Thailand, the Karen National Union sold teak to Thai logging companies. The bitter irony is that Karen villagers are moved out of an area in Tenasserim province, which is to be declared the Myinmaylekhat Nature Reserve, with support from the Worldwide Fund for Nature.10 The Yadana pipeline The Yadana (‘treasure’) pipeline in Tenasserim, a joint project involving Unocal (USA), Total (France), the Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise (MOGE; owned by the Burmese state), and the Petroleum Authority of Thailand. It will supply Thailand with gas and become the biggest enterprise in Burma, with an estimated turnover of US$400 million a year when completed. The construction has resulted in the relocation of Karen villagers and has involved forced labour.11 Opium produetion and the heroin trade These have been growing alarmingly since 1988 and have had a profound impact on the economy. The alliance between the SLORC and big drug traffickers such as Khun Sa and Lo Hsing Han has resulted in millions of dollars being laundered via state enterprises and recycled via the construction of hotels. The earnings could be as high as the official earnings on legal exports. Some of the money may have been used to buy weapons for the expansion and modernisation of the army. At the same time, the country is facing an explosive rise in the number of drug addicts and HlV-infected victims. The WHO has estimated the number of addicts to be 500,000.12 Rice prodnction Rice production has seen an expansion of irrigated areas and a significant rise in the production of paddy. The Irrawaddy Delta is

10. The Nation (13 April 1997); Rainforest Relief’s International (24 March, Internet message). See also Bryant (1997). 11. See Earth Rights International: Total Denial A Report on the Yadana Pipeline Project in Burma (1996); the Los Angeles Times, (25 November 1996); Asia Week (3 May 1996). 12. See People of the Opiate’ in The Nation (16 December 1996).

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producing about 60 per cent of all rice. However, the SLORC is taking up to 25 per cent of the harvest—an increase from 11 per cent—at a special low rate to secure cheap provisions for the army and state employees. The peasants are facing poverty and deteriorating living conditions.13 At the same time there has been a fall in the export of agricultural products. > > > > > These economic changes are steeped in with repression and a rapidly growing inequality, not to mention the problem of corruption and mafia methods. A mixture of patron-client favours and the use of blatant force is adding to the internal dissension and may result in new upheavals. To control and contain the impact of this drive to modernity, the SLORC is using nationalism as a counterbalance and a uniting force. Thus, if nationalism in Burma is the rationale for historical processes and their changing social and cultural conditions, it can be considered as a megaforce, a total model of nation, state and power as a corporate, sovereign unit. The often abusive language used to debase Aung San Suu Kyi is a spell of purification deployed by a xenophobic, nationalistic regime to cleanse the community by first explaining the dangers of the aliens (foreigners and ethnic minorities), then by exposing their forces and plots. In other words, the political opponent is also made culturally ‘unclean’.14 The xenophobic rhetoric summarises the logic of the generals: ‘If we lose control, Burma will collapse.’ In reality, the real threat to the SLORC is certainly not alien culture but rather national bankruptcy. If the economy is seriously in decline, the SLORC will possibly lose support amongst its own clients, military as well as civilian. These clients have benefited from the open economy and they have tested the modern global culture of consumption—they have gained since the days of Ne Win and therefore have something to lose; and the majority may become ‘hungry and destitute’ as Khin Nyunt predicted. Sanctions, if effective, will have an impact on everyone, not just the poorest sections of society. At the time of writing, the USA and the EU have restricted visas for Burmese, and Aung San Suu Kyi’s call for an economic boycott have gained support in some EU governments

13. See The Nation (24 January 1997). 14. This mechanism is often seen in extreme nationalism. Anthony D. Smith (1995:69) has described cultural purification in these terms: ‘The politization of native culture often went hand in hand with the purification of the community. This meant, first of all, jettisoning all “alien” cultural traits …’

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and in the USA, where economic sanctions are already under way. Whereas such sanctions may not disrupt the economy completely after Burma was admitted into the Association of Southeast Nations (ASEAN) in July 1997, and when Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, England, France, Japan, Korea and China continue their economic involvement and investments, they may still have internal repercussions.15 It is within this logic that we should place the words of General Than Shwe when he said that the country would be ruined if priority were given to ‘such superficial things as human rights’. The SLORC seems to turn its rage over Western criticism inwards against the opposition. Sanctions could thus backfire and damage the opposition, as indicated by a supporter of Aung San Suu Kyi: ‘We lived under self-imposed isolation for decades. Ma Suu (Aung San Suu Kyi) says we have to tighten our belts and think about politics. But there are no more notches to tighten in our belts.’16 No doubt a proportion of the population, mostly in the cities, considers investment and growth as important elements of normalisation after the Ne Win era and its ‘paranoia of economic colonialism’. On the other hand, if the SLORC cannot control foreign influence entering the country via investments, its own xenophobia may equally turn into a self-made boomerang, for example in Mandalay, where local traders resent the influx of Chinese and fear that Burma will become a Chinese colony and Mandalay a ‘Chinatown’. Although investment and international contacts are welcomed, several Burma scholars seem to agree that there is concern amongst the Burmese that the opening of the country to investments and tourism may have negative consequences for Burman culture.17 Thus, the SLORC’s rhetoric may strike a chord, even though it has a shrill sound to foreign ears, as demonstrated in the following quotes from the official media: ‘Vigorous efforts [are] being made for the preservation of our cultural identity and national personality’ [apparently the meaning is Burman culture], and further: ‘[To] ensure our great Myanmar

15. On foreign investments, see Bray (1995); Thailand invests in roads, and Thai companies in livestock and poultry production. Other foreign investments are placed in sugar and rubber plantations. 16. Quoted in ‘A Reporter at Large, BURMA’ in the New Yorker (12 August 1996, p. 13). See Ma Thanegi’s critique in Far Easterm Economic Review, 9 February 1998, p. 30. 17. SeeTaylor (1995:246).

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country, which has a great cultural tradition, is not influenced by Western culture’.18 Thus, the need to modernise whilst preserving culture is central to the ideology of the SLORC. Nationalism, even in its most extreme expressions and practices, then is the condensation of economic, cultural, political and social relations into specific conjunctures of power. From this definition we may be able to interpret the rhetoric, the seemingly erratic actions, and the violent repression which have dominated Burma for decades. In this process, as well as in the present situation, history is a crucial theme.

18. Quoted in Steinberg (1992:229).

16. HISTORICISM, HISTORICAL MEMORY AND POWER

To settle the debts of history, all-out efforts are being made for all round national development’, said the leader of the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), General Than Shwe, at a meeting of the Union Solidarity Development Association (USDA) in April 1997. ‘Settling the debts of history’ is indeed an essential element in the worldview of the SLORC and the army. Editing the past in the present is an important instrument in most political struggles, particularly when nationalism is heading the political agenda. Historical memory as social recollection serves to create models of the past by meticulously recalling collective experiences as if they were of direct consequence to the present situation. In Burma the fear of losing control and independence is constantly invoked by the SLORC in their references to colonisation, neocolonialism and the chaos during the post-independence rebellions. The historical memory is used to recall and emphasise cultural identity and moral values from past struggles.1 Memorising history, as orchestrated by the SLORC, aims to create fear of losing an identity authenticated by the past. The awareness of continuous problems in preventing the nation and the state from collapsing is, obviously, an important part of the social memory of post-war generations in Burma. In particular, the act of renaming the country Myanmar is an act of controlling historical symbolism and represents a break with colonialism. Thus, history is a representation which becomes a part of the present reality. Memory of the past is used simultaneously to create a break with the colonial past and a continuity of tradition. Historical memory is always trapped by the political conjunctures of the present. In Burma it is a ‘cordon sanitaire’ around high modernity and its

1. On the concept of social/historical memory, see Appendix 1.

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multiple risks of instability and infringement on culture and collective order. Hence, historical memory is a crucial basis for social and cultural identification in Burma. Protection of political independence and cultural identity is thus seen as part of the same struggle to maintain control and sovereignty. The Tatmadaw (army) still claims to be the one and only historical force capable of protecting independence and preventing the union from disintegration. This is difficult to argue against because the army has ruled autocratically since 1962. It has suffered innumerable losses in the civil wars since 1948. The last major struggle against the opium king Khun Sa and his Mong Tai army, which ended in 1995, resulted in the death or injury of 1,500 officers and soldiers (Bangkok Post, 3 October 1996). Only in recent years has the army acquired modern equipment. Being a member of the Tatmadaw means risking your life for both subalterns and officers. Consequently the Tatmadaw may have a firm conviction that all economic and political privileges that soldiers and families stand to gain are reasonable rewards for hardship and the common loss of life. At present, around 500 army families are believed to be at the top of an extended patron-client system. Admission to lucrative trade and jobs depends on this system’s formal and informal networks. The War Veterans Organisation and its members 125,000 members in 1988—are active in the trade and services sectors. As of 1996, the army was increasing and its number was approaching 400,000 active soldiers.2 The USDA, the aforementioned nationalist organisation, is also involved in business ventures, including the control of the Pin Lon Yadana gem market which returns considerable profits.3 In this way, the SLORC is building a corporate solidarity and can secure some support by providing a living and access to modern consumption for those who support the regime.4 In the wake of the rebellion in 1988 between 4,000 and 5.000 civil servants and government officials were dismissed for lack of loyalty. Besides jobs and trade, bribes and corruption are increasingly a problem for foreign companies, adding to the costs, as well as for ordinary citizens frequenting hospitals and even schools.5

2. Guyot (1996:261); Far Eastern Economic Review (Yearbook 1996) estimates 286,000. 3. Members of the USDA also have to do voluntary work and pay a small membership fee. See Steinberg (1997). 4. See Tin Maung Maung Than (1993).

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Thus, it is of crucial importance to the SLORC to be able to balance the patron-client system and the open economy. This intricate balance may determine the fate of the regime. Although I have not seen a detailed analysis of the patron-client structure in its present form,James F. Guyot (1994) and Tin Maung Maung Than (1993) have contributed significantly to an understanding of the system. Tin Maung Maung Than emphasises the corporate character of the army, which developed during the 1950s and 1960s. The army not only assumed the role of paramount defender of unity by taking power; it also created the Defence Services Institute (DSI) in 1951, originally a welfare organisation which expanded into a corporate economic business enterprise, the largest multi-enterprise concern in Burma.6 Today, a company owned by the Ministry of Defence, known as Union of Myanmar Holding Co., is the largest, with a capital estimated at a fifth of GNP.7 It is fair to say that military personnel are able to benefit, directly or indirectly, from most investments and trade, and that earning a living means abiding by the present order. This is perhaps the most crucial source of power to the SLORC, and if the economy expands so does their power. Very little trade can be done outside the corporate system of the DSI and the USDA. Within this structure of power, the SLORC relies on the historical memory of society and the control of the official memory of past events. A major part of the Burman population has grown up under military rule. During this period the dominating model of society encapsulated state, nation, union and the Tatmadaw within a singular and unitary imagination of Burma; and the historical roots of this imagination have been Aung San, the Thakins, and the Burma Independence Army (BIA), the legitimate political, nationalist force of Burma. The BIA, the Japanese-organised anti-colonial army, later became the Burma National Army (BNA) which fought the Japanese. The BNA, led by Ne Win, is the origin of the modern Tatmadaw. Interestingly, four of the National League for Democracy (NLD) leaders are BIA veterans, a fact emphasised in a recent presentation of the NLD leadership.8 The Tatmadaw, in its own eyes, is the undisputed centre of national unity, since it represents the continuity of Burmese

5. Bangkok Post (15 October 1996). 6. Tin Maung Maung Than (1993:34). The DSI is involved in shipping, banking, hotels and commerce. 7. Guyot (1994:131).

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history. The army will thus claim its legitimate role by recalling the struggles of the 1940s, the 1950–60s, and recent years. The SLORC has monopolised the ceremonies surrounding Independence Day (4 January), Union Day (17 February), Army Day (27 March), and Martyrs’ Day (19 July), commemorating Aung San. Rituals, signs and symbols are controlled as well as the participants. Dissent is demonised as a ‘destructive element’ and seen as a threat to unity and stability. The Tatmadaw will memorise its role, whenever necessary, as the legitimisation of its practices, and within its historical memory, nationalism is seen as the major instrument of unity. The following extract is from a speech by the SLORC chairman, General Than Shwe on Armed Forces Day, 27 March 1997: It is necessary for you, Comrades, to remember that our nation fell into servitude because we did not have an army. The Thirty Comrades strove to establish the Myanmar Tatmadaw. From this, you, Comrades, will find in history evidence of how crucial a modern army is for a nation to regain its independence and how crucial it is for a nation to remain a sovereign entity.9 This historicist memory can be traced back to colonial times and postindependence, and is expressed in the writing of John Furnivall, who envisaged a disrupted and chaotic Union of Burma in 1948 and prescribed nationalism as a probate cure: ‘One was to make a bold stand on the principle of nationalism as the only means available for dominating economic forces.’10 In Furnivall’s view, however, nationalism also implied ‘cultural relations with the modern world’. The reason was that: ‘England opened up Burma to the world but did not open up the world to Burma.’11 Instead the army turned inward and excluded modernity and its global cultural forms. The SLORC can be viewed as an extreme continuation of this political strategy by the use 8. Burma Debate (vol. 3, no. 3, 1996). These include U Tin U, former Chief of Staff and Minister of Defence. He was dismissed by Ne Win and spent seven years in jail. 9. New Light of Myanmar (28 March 1997). 10. Furnivall (1956:158). See Taylor (1995) for an interesting assessment of Furnivall’s influence on post-independent Burma and the bankruptcy of 1988. From a Burmese view, echoing Furnivall, U Khin Maung Nyunt (1994:13) writes: ‘Without tradition, a nation will have no roots and its identity will be lost. Without modernity a nation will stagnate and decay.’

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of xenophobic nationalism and a cultural fundamentalism to control strong, modern economic forces. However, modernising and preserving traditional culture are not contradictory in the ideology of the SLORC. It follows a strategy believed to be a genuine Burman way to modernisation. The bankruptcy of Ne Win and the Burma Socialist Programme Party is seen as resulting from economic mismanagement, corruption and a lack of control of the national cultural realm. The drastic demonetisation in 1987 was the last straw: an ill-equipped army in an endless struggle against ethnic insurgents, suffering humiliating losses, whilst a small elite prospered and travelled abroad, eroded the historical legitimacy of the previous regime, even within the army. Thus, the socialism of the Ne Win era was naturally replaced by a nationalism which signifies the historical memory of the experience from the era of independence. Unfortunately, the sanctions imposed by the USA and the EU as a response to human rights issues, only seem to confirm the SLORC’s own prophecy—since Burma has survived colonialism as well as twenty-six years of total isolation it may well be able to do so in the future. The Western world is viewed as hostile and unwilling to allow Burma its place in the world. History is thus represented as repetitive cycles in which nationalism is a necessary and natural bulwark against hostile, alien, neo-colonial forces. I would contend that this combination of historicism and nationalism has some foundation in sections of a population still largely denied access to global discourses and confined within a unitary model of state, nation and regime. Economic development in itself, whilst controlled by the SLORC, will not promote democracy. Another important aspect of historical memory and nationalism is the violent state of Burmese society. Violence was also an integral part of colonial rule and of post-independence and is therefore seen as the logical consequence of all major political conflicts and confrontations. It has been ingrained in the historical memory of generations and experienced in their everyday situations—often mistakenly interpretated as if violence were a natural part of a ‘national character’. The nationalism of today evokes past violence, of the struggle against a foreign colonial power and its culture. In the rhetoric of nationalism, historical memory is used to structure the social practices of the present. The SLORC’s power is based on this legacy, which anticipates

11. Furnivall (1957: xiv).

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repression and violence as an inherent logic. The extensive use of violence, forced labour, forced conscription of children and forced resettlement, documented in volumes by humanitarian organisations, originates in the nationalism of fear propagated by the regime as a means of ensuing its own survival.12 It is within this context I consider social memory and history to be crucial mechanisms in generating and perpetuating violence. Violence in Burma has become a total social and cultural experience entering daily life. In the name of the nation, religion, ethnicity and democracy, violence is branded on to body and soul; inculcated via metaphors and in gestures; in all, as objective facts as well as subjective experience. Nationalism is thus considered a necessary and natural antidote to this ill. At the same time violence generates autocracy and corporatism, and it appears as the total rejection of all that conflicts with its self-identity. However, as firmly stated in this book, violence is not a collective psychological or cultural essence in the Burmese population; it is social practice of a specific regime generated over a long historical process. The predicament facing the opposition is that the SLORC has forced it to enter into its nationalistic discourse although the National League for Democracy is contesting the SLORC’s ideo logy. This dilemma can be seen most clearly in the proposal from the National Council of the Union of Burma (the opposition in exile) for a new constitution of a Federal Union of Burma. The proposal (draft) is actually based on the very difficult definition of nation and national states comprising eight major ethnic categories (Burman, Mon, Shan, Karen, Kayah, Kachin, Chin and Arakan). Article 37 states that’ [e]ach ethnic group shall have one state only’. But what about the Pa-o, the Wa, the Sgaw, and the Pwo Karen? Moreover, the draft suggests that new nationalities, states and national autonomous regions may be included in the final version. However, ethnic rights are not necessarily synonymous with democratic rights—they are often trapped in the historical memory of past ethnic struggles. Thus, to reify ethnicity and cultural differences as the political substance of states may prolong conflicts. Such ethnicism carries the memory of past violence. On the other hand, a genuine local 12. On human rights issues, see the Amnesty International reports Myanmar —‘In the National Interest’. Prisoners of Conscience, Torture, Summary Trials under Martial Law, Images Asia’s No Childhood at All A Report about Child Soldiers in Burma; and Total Denial by Earth Rights International & Southeast Asian Information Network, 1996—to mention but a few documents with the same distressing information.

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autonomy preventing Burman dominance has to be achieved. This is a real and difficult dilemma for all parties.

134

17. A FINAL WORD—BUT NO CONCLUSION

The nationalism of today’s Burma differs from the nationalism of the anticolonial struggle, as well as from the nationalism of 1947 immediately before independence, when ethnicism began to determine the future. In the 1940s nationalism meant liberation from a foreign coloniser; since independence, nationalism has become a remedy for preserving a union as one unitary state. The present nationalism does not anticipate freedom since that has become a fearful expression of imminent division and the collapse of the union. Whereas the nationalism of 1947 was an anticipation of modernity including democracy, the nationalism of today signifies endless autocracy and corporate modernity in the SLORC model, while some of the ethnic movements envisage democracy and federalism. Within this process there is a plurality of imaginations of a nation and a national identity—identities often based on a subjectively defined, ethnic core. There is, however, one crucial change: all minority groups have given up demands for exclusive territorial space. This leaves cultural and religious autonomy as the most crucial claims at the moment. According to Partha Chatterjee (1993), in Burma, and in other countries with anti-colonial nationalism, culture and religion were separated from the material domain as social practices not directly controlled by the colonisers. This separation left a ‘cultural core’ and images of an essential identity intact, as seen from the indigenous nationalists’ point of view. Interestingly, this observation is not merely confirmed by the SLORC in its nationalism, but also by Aung San Suu Kyi: ‘While Indian nationalism was essentially a product of British rule, there had always existed a traditional Burmese nationalism arising from Burma’s cultural homogeneity.’1 And part of this homogeneity was, and is, Buddhism: ‘To be a Burmese is to be a Buddhist.’2 The aim of nationalism, then, was to eradicate the colonial policy of difference and fragmentation and to replace this policy with egality and unity. However, new differences were generated during this process. The

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key to understanding the diversity and the changes in Burma, however, does not lie in general definitions of nationalism but in the historical and political process of which nationalism is an overarching designation as well as an ingrained substance. Since 1993 it has become evident that the SLORC’s nationalism is an attempt to cleanse the historical memory and place all historical merit in the Tatmadaw—remembering and celebrating the army while forgetting Aung San Suu Kyi and the NLD.3 The SLORC is actually trying to orchestrate a Burman nationalism of both continuity and discontinuity with the past. The military regime aims to represent the past in the present as a singular social and cultural identity, and thus prevent the Burmese from entering the modern world where claims of the right to self-identification are top of the agenda. It is a self-assured SLORC identity of being modern in a Burmese—and a non-Western—way. The historical memory is simultaneously the source of empowerment of diversified identities amongst the ethnic groups. The regime is attempting to control ethnic classifications by modernising the ethnic categories into ‘135 national races’ whilst ‘Burmanising’ their societies and cultures in terms of their own identity politics. It is a bureaucratic mode of controlling the ethnicism of the past. The outcome is a hegemonic order where even a banal gesture or utterance is arbitrarily ruled as a deviance from the desired order. The new nationalistic hegemony is shifting the remnant memory of a democratic time into oblivion. A nation and a national identity are the outcomes of a process combining historical memory, cultural and religion-dominated discourses, ontological experience and rationalised actions; they are not natural properties primordialised in groups and individuals, although such claims of primordial attachment often are politically important. Their representations are the result of political conjunctures and the distribution of power, and their classifications are always contested and reformulated.4 As we have seen in the history of Burma, nationalism

1. Aung San Suu Kyi (1991:103). I am not sure that Indian nationalists and researchers such as Chatterjee would agree with the comparison between India and Burma. 2. Ibid.:83. 3. Have the common Burmese begun to lose interest in the NLD and are they wary of foreign interference and boycotting? These are pertinent and painful questions to evaluate in the coming years.

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characterises this process and its complexity. In today’s Burma the process is undergoing both a forced amnesia of collective memory and an analysis of the past and of identities. When social memory is denied a civil space and is paralysed by fear; when it is relegated to the private sphere, then the past becomes a minefield. Identity and its formation are closely linked to history and social memory. And as this process becomes ingrained with violence and fear, then giving in to the simplified nationalistic model of the regime may well appear as a reasonable defence and the lesser evil. However, this does not necessarily mean agreeing with that model and its definition of a social and cultural order. In summarising the nationalism of the SLORC we can identify the following mechanisms: • Nationalism of the present is an outcome of past struggles and strives to control the social memory of the past and the representations of the nation in history. • Nationalism is used as a technique to discipline the elite (in particular the Tatmadaw); to inculcate the corporate model of Myanmar society; and to protect its unity against internal and alien, evil forces. It is the moral legitimisation of the control of the population in all areas of life, public as well as private, i.e. the total social and cultural space.5 • Nationalism is a mechanism whereby autocracy is rationalised as a means to generate modern economic and technological development in the Burman way. • Nationalism is a mode of determining and controlling social and cultural systems of classification, in particular ethnicity and religion. The blunt use of physical force is thus combined with symbolic violence (a violence not always recognised), which forces people to participate in the way the SLORC classifies and represents identity as nation, history, culture and religion.

4. Whereas there may be no universal form of a nation or nationalism, it should not prevent the use of theoretical concepts to identify general mechanisms of nationalism. For a brief and preliminary outline of concepts, see Gravers (1995). 5. For example, guests who stay overnight in a private home have to be reported to local authorities; a song or an utterance interpreted as a critique of the regime can lead to jail; contact with a foreigner is restricted and under surveillance.

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• National, ethnic and religious identity are highly politicised and related to violence of the past and the present. In the longer historical process, nationalism appears to have dehumanised violence and suffering under the guise of protecting the unity of the nation, the state and the Tatmadaw and is subsumed within a hegemonic national identity. This development is not particular to Burma but is also seen, for example, in the Balkans. According to Benedict Anderson (1991), the dawn of nationalism brought the dusk of religious models of society. In Burma and in many other countries this prediction of modernity and its idea of progression have not materialised—for the simple reason that the self-identification of modernity has been built on the idea that the past must disappear and make room for the new order and its models. However, religions like Buddhism and Christianity in Burma combine universal and particular values, as well as collective and individual ideals. They provide schemes for communal actions and personal merit, healing, or good fortune; and finally religion combines past traditions with present practices, thus balancing the modern with the traditional. Religion appears in the legitimation of power and of resistance—as a continuous fulcrum of the political process. Thus, there is no religious revival in the sense of an opposition to modernity or to the nation-state, nor merely a crisis of authority, as some modernist scholars seem to believe.6 But in the case of Burma there is a failure of and a seemingly profound distrust in the Western model of modern social order and its plurality of identities. That is the basis of the political paranoia. The role of Buddhism in Burma is complex. As a crucial ingredient in nationalism it has constructed a bridge of memory over the fragmented world of the colonial era. Buddhism is still legitimising power as well as resistance, and it is a part of the model for a peaceful and righteous world in the NLD and among the Buddhist Karen. Buddhism combines the present and the future with the past. However we should not conceive Buddhism (or nationalism) as a scheme structuring all actions or explaining all events. Religion is rather a medium for a collective assessment of the world, thus enabling people to bring some common

6. See, for example, Keyes, Kendall and Hardacre (1994, Intro duction). They state that the recent development in Asia first appeared in Europe and later spread. Such views tend to overlook regional and local processes. Modernity is no longer generated by a European hegemony.

A FINAL WORD—BUT NO CONCLUSION 139

sense into it. In this way, religion is also a medium for the present political struggles, providing a common conceptual and semantic ground for interpretations of social practices, as well as for legitimising these practices. Examples here include the publication by the military of lists of donations by officers to monasteries; and Aung San Suu Kyi’s insistence that democracy and engaged Buddhism need not be separated in politics. She criticises un-Buddhist attitudes such as complacency which she calls ‘a dangerous feeling’.7 All parties in Burma can agree upon Buddhist concepts of compassion, peace and non-violence. In this way Buddhism is the neutral common-sense medium connecting to a social order of the past. However, it can also be used to construct models for one-dimensional identification, fundamentalism and violence against other religions or denominations. Moreover, to classify acts as unBuddhist could draw religion further into the present struggle and add to the symbolic violence of nationalism—in the same way as acts have been classified as unpatriotic. Although traditional Buddhism as a field of merit is considered relatively secluded from worldly affairs—a non-political vantage-point from which political extremism can be criticised—it harbours the memory of past struggles against colonialism, mìn laùng prophecies and rebellions as well as U Nu’s personal appropriation of Buddhism and his efforts to make it a state religion in the 1950’s.8 Ironically, it seems as though the army and the NLD agree to mix politics and Buddhism openly, whilst some Karen use it to withdraw from the violent world and its disenchantment. The regime will soon open a Theravada University for the Buddhist Mission, and one reason behind this could be the promotion of the army’s model of law and order in minority areas. Since 1998, Buddhism has increasingly been related to the political struggle and its central issues, namely democracy, auto cracy, nation and ethnicity. This mixture and its ingredients are not necessarily compatible; on the other hand, Buddhism could be the fulcrum for a future reconciliation and a dialogue, provided all parties openly agree to and carefully reflect on their uses of religion as a political medium and as symbolic power. Power in Burma is not merely concentrated within institutions, it is also highly concentrated around a few persons. However, often power relations are not transparent. For the majority of

7. Aung San Suu Kyi (1997:124). 8. See further Gravers (1996a).

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people, power is too dangerous to challenge openly. They are more or less confined to the grey zone of dissimulation, fear, disillusion, indifference, forced amnesia, subdued identities and indifference. One of the fundamental properties of existence according to Buddhism is suffering; the words from the dhammapada verse 278 announce: ‘All existing things are involved in suffering. He who knows and perceives this ceases to be in the thrall of grief.’ Indeed, grief may be relieved by acknowledging its causes, but we know that the memory of extensive and extreme collective sufferings such as slavery, colonialism, genocide, war and upheavals tend to be passed on through generations: victims are mourned, heroes commemorated, losers marginalised and the rest may either join the powerful or suffer in seclusion. We also know that violence as an element of modern existence has become highly organised and supported by complex technological inventions. A recent, important anthropological debate on social suffering comes close to the Buddhist saying above: ‘Suffering is one of the existential grounds of human experience; it is a defining quality, a limiting experience in human conditions. It is also a master subject of our mediatised times.’9 In the case of Burma, suffering has been a common social experience since colonial times. All sides in the internal conflicts over the last fifty years have suffered: the soldiers without legs and work; the raped women; the incarcerated; the exiled; the resettled; those under surveillance; the loss of lives, of relatives’ health, of homes: the list seems endless. No proclamation of rights or universal ethics and no intervention can heal the overwhelming traumatic experiences. Only a persistent effort of communication and the mutual will to eliminate the causes and practices of violence can initiate the process of reconciliation. The routinisation of collective suffering must be stopped by reducing the use of violence, physical as well as symbolic, in all areas of life, and particularly within the state, its bureaucracy and organisations. Simultaneously, nation alism and its practices must be contained because they have become to indentify violence. Whilst we may have to accept that suffering is a fundamental human condition, we do not have to accept violence and political paranoia in the name of nationalism and primordialism.

9. Kleinman et al (1997:1).

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‘BURMESE DAYS’ FOREVER? A new bankruptcy might topple the SLORC, whereas a coup and a new leadership would probably not alter the deadlocked situation. However, what is most distressing about the regime and the impasse is that another generation is being systematically deprived of the experience of democracy and the ability to recollect and reformulate their historical memory of different social practices. Fear and violence are continuously and heavily ingrained in the social and personal memories. Only via a prolonged social and cultural exchange with the rest of the world, as well as shared power between the Tatmadaw and civil society, can enduring and positive changes come about. Until then Burmese Days remains an accurate description of the agonising powerplay still at work in Burma, whilst the white foreigner seems utterly exorcised and outside the influence of his former imperial domain. Nevertheless, describing and analysing this tragic history at least means resisting the amnesia. ‘Who controls the past controls the future: Who controls the present controls the past.’ In Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, Winston must repeat this party slogan, and is further interrogated: ‘Does the past exist concretely, in space?’ ‘No.’ ‘Then where does the past exist, if at all?’ ‘In records.’ ‘And- ?’ ‘In minds. In human memories.’ ‘In memory … we, the party, control all records, and we control all memories. Then we control the past, do we not?’ ‘But how can you stop people remembering things ’? cried Winston …10

10. Orwell (1982:99; emphasis added).

142

EPILOGUE

In November 1997, the SLORC changed its name to the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC). The SLORC’s last proclamation emphasised peace, modernisation and development, rather than law and order. Moreover, the new council announced ‘the emergence of a discipline-flourishing democratic system’. Five ministers from the former government were not reappointed and were later kept under house arrest on charges of corruption, while the leading figures from the SLORC retained their positions. Secretary-1 Khin Nyunt is the apparent strongman of the SPDC. He controls the intelligence organisations, education (as chairman of the Myanmar Education Committee), religious affairs and development in minority areas—all crucial and conflictridden spheres of society. On the other hand, Myo Nyunt, who chaired the National Convention Convening Commission preparing a new constitution, and who was minister of religious affairs, lost his posts. He is an officer from a poor family, with a rudimentary education, but proud of his background. The winner in the latest round of the power struggle has been Khin Nyunt, who is close to Ne Win. On the surface, the changes resemble an anti-corruption campaign. General Than Shwe, head of the SLORC and SPDC, has given guidance to service personnel in the ministries to ‘avoid corruption and redtapism’. Among the dismissed were the ministers of trade and commerce, forest and agriculture, and tourism—all notoriously corrupt. However, it could also be considered as a move against persons in the elite who have had more than their fair share of the cake. Their advisers and followers have been arrested and their families and friends are under surveillance and cannot leave the country. Thus it is an action against parts of the patron-client system. The flourishing Westernised nightlife seems to be restricted. Children of the ruling elite appear to be among those who indulged in it.1

144 EPILOGUE

Khin Nyunt appears as the one who cleared out the bad elements but the economy is rapidly deteriorating as evidenced by a number of signs: rising inflation; rice crops damaged by flooding; investments slowed by the crisis in Asia; and an uncertain future for an estimated 700,000–800, 000 illegal Burmese immigrant workers in Thailand. In September 1997, the 86-year-old Ne Win paid a visit to President Suharto in Indonesia. Although it was a private visit he travelled with a military entourage, and the visit has been interpreted as a sign that the SPDC is looking to the Indonesian model of regulated democracy. It is also a sign of the unchanging hierarchy in Burma and an old man’s guidance of his protégé. The National League for Democracy (NLD) was allowed to hold its annual meetings in September across the country and there were more than 700 visitors to Aung San Suu Kyi’s compound. There has also been a meeting between the government and the NLD; Aung San Suu Kyi, however, was not invited. At the same time, NLD party activists have been arrested and denied their right to have lawyers for their defence. One of the arrested is said to be the brother-inlaw of Khin Nyunt. Aung San Suu Kyi remains effectively confined to her house and all visitors are registered and controlled by the military; her husband and sons were refused visas for a Christmas visit. She is a reported to have become a vegan. Small groups of Karen National Liberation Army soldiers and their families have continuously been ‘exchanging weapons for peace’, as it is described in The New Light of Myanmar. They surrender their weapons to the Tatmadaw and in return they receive accommodation, food and money. Lawlessness and sense of insecurity have increased in the overcrowded Karen refugee camps in Thailand. The Thai authorities are considering repatriation and are now fully cooperating with the UNHCR. In March 1988 the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army attacked two camps in Thailand and burnt 1,500 shacks. Two refugees were killed and about 9,000 were made homeless. Khin Nyunt, secretary-1 of the SPCD, urged the Thai commander in chief to take action against the the DKBA, and claimed that Rangoon had nothing to do with that army. It is difficult to say whether the DKBA is now acting outside the control of the Tatmadaw. It seems unlikely, although they may have supporters among Buddhist Karen settled in Thailand and the DKBA has probably

1. The Guardian, 22 December 1997.

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gained control over some of the logging trade along the border. This may enable the DKBA to operate more independently. A crucial event was the defection in April 1988 by Padoh Aung San, member of the KNU ten-member Central Executive Committee. He was in charge of the economic department and was thus the highest-ranking member of the KNU who has so far surrendered to SPDC. The New Light of Myanmar wrote that he was received by Thein Swe, the head of the Office of Strategic Studies, the most powerful organisation within the complex system of intelligence organisations, and directly under the control of Khin Nyunt.2 At the press conference following the surrender, Padoh Aung San described the split within the KNU and accused its leader, General Bo Mya, of being ‘thoughtless and ruthless’ and of ordering the killing of dissident KNU members.3 The regime has consolidated its position and grip on power, aided by the admission to ASEAN which is fully occupied with the economic crash. The boycott and the economic crisis in ASEAN have had a serious impact on the economy. Prices have risen by 45 per cent while the kyat is rapidly losing value. The price of rice alone has increased 25 per cent in one year. With bankruptcy looming, Myanmar is likely to return to isolation and unending misery, so it is urgent to compromise in order that the boycott may be lifted. The boycott has aggravated the living conditions. Myanmar has alarming high mortality rates for women in childbirth and after abortion, in addition to widespread malnutrition.4 The SPCD is still repeating the well-known nationalistic rhetoric and considers Myanmar as a national and cultural island in a sea of neocolonial monsters. Significantly, the Union Solidarity Development Association now has 7.5 million members and is extending its organisation and influence to most social issues: education, Buddhism, management, information technology and so forth. The USDA

2. See Andrew Selth (1997) on the hierarchy of intelligence organisations. The Office of Strategic Studies is headed by well-educated officers who are able to monitor international affairs and control areas such as ethnic affairs, drugs policy, environment and the surveillance of the NLD. 3. These accusations could be somewhat tainted, but I have no doubt that they signify the dire situation of the KNU leadership. Padoh Aung San indicates that many Karen favour an agreement and peace. Padoh Aung San participated in negotiations between the SLORC and the KNU in 1996. Those who are able to stay behind in Thailand are the economically well-off, with houses and farm land. Among Padoh Aung San’s group there were seventy officers, including one colonel and one major, and 134 members of their families.

146 EPILOGUE

continues to warn against internal traitors (i.e. Aung San Suu Kyi) and external destructive interference. Western countries are using the Internet to spread disinformation with intent to destabilise some developing countries. The Internet creates cultural problems—and it is essential for Myanmar people to preserve and adhere to Buddhist ethics and try not to lose their culture, (Khin Nyunt in the New Light of Myanmar, 9 January 1998). In terms of political hegemony, the growth of this organisation may be significant. People are more or less forced to join the USDA and leave the NLD to avoid interrogation and arrests. Although the hegemony is not based on popular support for the regime, it stands to gain from a drive against wild nightlife, corruption and conspicuous consumption. The USDA may achieve temporary success by awakening the historical disposition among a majority of poor people against negative foreign influences. The social memory of the past is firmly controlled by the armed forces, as seen in the ceremonies commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of independence. How will it be possible to construct an alternative identity to resist this hegemony, its forced memory and its phobic nationalism? As the anniversary of the 1988 uprising was approaching, Aung San Suu Kyi left her house to meet NLD members in Bassein. The army stopped her car on a bridge twice and forced her to return to Rangoon after several days in the car. She has also called for the convening of the parliament elected in 1990. The SPDC has accused her of disrupting the stability of the state. A demonstration by students was quickly dissolved and several students were arrested. Foreigners distributing leaflets were expelled. This proved to the SPDC that there is a foreign meddling in Myanmar’s internal affairs which aims to destabilise the country. Although there have been talks between the SPDC and the NLD, the regime refuses to have direct talks with Aung San Suu Kyi. In June, they accused her of insulting her father’s memory and warned that she could be another Ngo Dinh Diem, the South Vietnamese prime minister assassinated in a CIA plot in 1963.

4. See R.Carier (1997) who describes it as a silent emergency.

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After calling for the convening of the parliament, Aung San Suu Kyi formed a political committee of NLD and minority delegates. The committee declared that all laws enacted since 1988 had no legal basis. The army reacted immediately by detaining 7–800 NLD members in state guest houses. Secretary-1, Khin Nyunt, formed a Political Affairs Committee of 16 officers, including several from the important Office of Strategic Studies. Mass meetings were organised in all states, resulting in declarations from so-called peace groups, including the DKBA, Union Karen League and other ethnic organisations, condemning the move by Aung San Suu Kyi. She and the NLD were accused of disruption of peace, stability and national unity. Aung San Suu Kyi was also accused of unlawful actions and of jeopardising internal security. The regime is virtually dissolving the NLD by forcing its members to resign: a strongly worded statement from a meeting in Rangoon declared that it was time to drive Aung San Suu Kyi out of the country and to punish the NLD which was accused of betraying the nation. Meanwhile, Khin Nyunt urged teachers to ‘promote a high moral and nationalist outlook among the youth’ and to ‘keep vigil’ against what he called ‘destructionists’ cunning schemes to disrupt the peaceful pursuit of education’. The universities were still closed in October 1998. In November, an exhibition to ‘Revitalise and Foster Patriotic Spirit’ opened, and Khin Nyunt outlined its objectives: • to promote patriotic spirit and national pride; • to preserve traditions and origin, lineage and national character; • to enable the young generation to learn true historical events. The Tatmadaw is depicted as safeguarding the nation from disintegration and neo-colonialism.5 «»«»«»«»«» Is this recent development a sign of escalating paranoia and a prelude to violent action? Does it mean that the opposition’s force has petered out and that the majority of Burmese are fed up and increasingly indifferent to the political struggle? If this is the case, the possibilities for dialogue may be fading, as nationalism becomes more and more fundamentalist in its rhetoric and actions.

5. The New Light of Myanmar, 13 October 1998.

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APPENDIX 1: THEORETICAL CONCEPTS

The following is a short elaboration of the theoretical concepts that are used more or less explicitly in the analysis. They are outlined here so as not to disrupt presentation.1 Model This concept refers to the general characteristics attributable to a society. Actors may refer to universal and eternal values based in culture which ostensibly hold society together and seem to determine its change. A model refers to the generating principles of society theoretically condensed. Therefore a model refers to a dominant frame of reference for both practice and its evaluation. However, I do not use the model as a substitute for structure—the order of things; rather, it is the way this order and its properties can be identified and used as a basis for the analysis and explanation of practices and processes of society. A model then does not necessarily provide the explanation of specific individual actions and subjective motives or behaviour, nor such properties which determine action. A model can thus be seen as the condensation of the motivating forces in a particular society, and a mode of communicating these forces.

1. Sources: Leach (1964); Geertz (1966); Gramsci (1971); Stirrat (1984); Kapferer (1988, 1989); Comaroff (1989); Connerton (1989); Ortner (1989); Bourdieu (1990); Featherstone (1990); Balibar and Wallerstein (1991); Friedman 1992; Asad (1993); Gillis (1994); Wilmsen and McAlister (1996);Jenkins (1996, 1997).

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Power Two important concepts used in the text are hegemony and symbolic power derived from A. Gramsci and P. Bourdieu. I use hegemony as the political legitimate power representing and defining the interests of all social strata and groups, and coercing the whole population of a state to join the practices and corporate ideology of a regime. Social and cultural classifications are mono polised and strictiy controlled. Symbolic power and violence are more or less recognisable. They are embedded in the nationalistic rhetoric, in ceremonies and rituals, as well as in the symbols used by a regime and an opposition to define identity historically and culturally. Signs and symbols are not coercive by themselves, but by signifying potential actions of physical violence they thus create fear. Strategy This signifies the general notion that there is a logical coherence in practice whose meaning and intention are raised above momentary considerations by reference to the content of one or more models. Collective strategies bind models with actual religious and political practice. However, strategies are not just instrumental agents; they unfold depending on context and thereby act as correctives which relate back to models and concrete events. This applies both to the exercise of power and to the establishment of identity, where collective actions are planned and executed with and against others. Cosmology The term cosmology is often, but not exclusively, rooted in the religious, that is, the order of the universe (and the world) in which religion has its foundation. Cosmology includes models of the earthly life and of the life beyond, of past and eternity, of physical and metaphysical laws that span all existence (animals, spirits, humans), myths, prophecies, etc. Cosmology is not used in the sense of a cultural code determining action. It is seen as a living tradition of knowledge; a schema recognised collectively -but not evenly known or agreed upon by all. Cosmology must be studied and analysed as a social practice and not merely as a symbolic system. Concepts and symbols of a cosmology form a powerful medium when they are presented in political struggles.

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Ontology Being in the world—a ‘design for living’; the manner in which existence meaningfully unfolds according to the ethics of a religious or philosophical system. The meaning here is the disposition which conditions the organisation and ruling of the individual’s practice. It must be emphasised, however, that it is not conceived as an inherent psychic essence determining practice although ontology is often invoked by nationalists as such a timeless device. This ordering of life puts historical experience in perspective. Ontology is the logic used to guide ourselves and to navigate our way through life. This is often marked by principles of cosmology and religious myth and ethics, but it is also affected by technological or bureaucratic rationalisations, statistics, laws, etc. In religious fundamentalism, identity is understood as being rooted in the very nature of being and in the cosmos, and thus largely beyond human agency. In this way, ontology and cosmology, merging with nationalism, can form a fundamentalistic model and a powerful political mechanism. Ideology I use this term when referring to the political order. Ideologies are models for political organisation, power and domination (from auto cratic to democratic systems, and between resistance and liberation). Ideology often includes elements from cosmology and ontology, when individuals are interpellated by a hegemonic order. This happens through the mass mobilisation and staging of large events and ceremonies (national days, etc.). Ideology in this sense expresses the attempt of a regime to subordinate and control cosmology and ontology, and to prescribe a social and cultural identity. Identity Identity is the sense of belonging to something shared in relation to society, culture or religion. It is the establishment of the subjective. Yet this belonging is not just an independent, individual (free) recognition: it is also something largely ascribed by others -often powerful others— in the process whereby individuals are subordinated to hierarchy. All identity is, in principle, individual but arises in the relationship between the individual, society and culture, namely in the space between self-

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identification and public identification, between individual and collective identity. Identity is always defined through shared frames of reference and expressions of social relations. It also comprises modes of classification and categorisation using culture and social status within specific historical contexts. Identity cannot be isolated with a definite, uniform content that covers all collectivity. Identity changes constantly in content and in connection with situations and social relations. Thus, in the analysis, we must avoid using the concept of identity as if it constituted a substance above the social relations and the politics of difference, which make and remake ethnic, national and other identities. Cosmology, ontology and ideology find expression in different strategies but realise a shared, although not necessarily uniform or unambiguous, frame of reference for the creation of identity. It must be emphasised that identity is established with its point of departure in many different strategies: ethnicity, nationality, the individual’s status and prestige via occupation, symbolic capital, consumption, and many other ingredients. Ethnicity and Nationality These are general appellations for shared frames of reference that appear to represent the whole collectivity in time and space and that establish rules and boundaries for membership. Nationalism can be said to be a ‘nationalisation’ of individual and ethnic categories and groups under a collective frame of reference of the state, which gives members a genealogically fixed right to community. The ‘national’ marks the generalising of a power situation, where differences must be subordinated to state power and a regime’s rule of the social hierarchy. Theories and strategies of nationalism are thus always suspended in the contrast between particular and universal tendencies. They classify something typically human and an especially individual essence signifying one nationality or another. Identity, in relation to ethnic or national characteristics, is therefore generally ambivalent and difficult to grasp of both for participants and in an analysis. The theories, concepts, models and rhetoric in nationalism resemble one another, while history and social models seldom do. Ethnicism Ethnicism is an equally dominating phenomenon, often linked with or directed against the national state, a division into ethnic groups and

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categories. This process could be called the ‘privatisation of nationalities’, that is, the separation or seclusion of groups from nationstates in the name of ethnic freedom. It is a manifest form of ethnic opposition, where cultural differences are classified as primordial and antagonistic. Ethnicism contains both a reconstruction of historical groups and the establishment of completely new groups, where cultural frontiers and cultural content are changed. The processes occur globally but are marked simultaneously by particular characteristics. Nationality and ethnicity have possibly become such widespread designations precisely because we can all identify ‘our’ genuine membership through the universal convention of the designations. Ethnicity has thus been elevated to a primary human right, especially in Western societies, and cultural and religious particularism have gained influence within the world order. This raises questions about historical rights to homelands; an ethnic clean-up often accompanies ethnic liberation. Culture and liberation easily become a cover for warlordism and racism. Ethnicism and its demand for ethnic freedom are not only a dominant right but a dominant ‘disorder’ in the ‘new world order’. This paradox is based on a historicism and culturalism reaching back to the ethnic hierarchies of old empires. Ethnonationalism often applies primordialism to legitimate claims of autonomy. Cultural identity thus becomes the foundation of political rights (cf. the Karen). The politics of difference can dramatically change the cultural and social identities that were the origin of process. Social/Historical Memory Cosmology, ideology, identity—these categories all relate to, and are encompassed by, the modes in which we recollect society in historical narratives, discussions and commemorations as part of our social practice: in ceremonies, rituals, organisations, etc. Social memory and the process of social and historical collection include a concerted forgetfulness or enforced amnesia. Historical memory is crucial to defining identity, legitimising classiflcations of identities within a nationalist ideology, or rendering subjective concepts of, for example, an ethnic movement authentic. Social memory thus is the practice of actualising the past in the present by activating a recollection, collective as well as individual. The social and historical memory becomes manifest in both actions and in

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representations. Without the social act of recollecting the past we would not be able to define what is identical in the present. Shared memory is thus a substantial part of social and cultural identities. In this way social memory and identity are important sources of empowerment—in the forms of nationalism, ethnicity or religious movements. Unfortunately, the recent anthropological debate on identity tends to define identity as a pure social or cultural construct, devoid of historical memory. It is also important to emphasise that social/ historical memory is not seen as uniform consciousness, bounded and shared by all. It is always contested and interpreted—whilst imagined in terms of essence and continuity. This is why social/historical memory is important in explaining nationalism and ethnicity.

APPENDIX 2: KAREN ORGANISATIONS

The Karen and their organisations1 have played a crucial role in Burma —a tragic and some would say disproportionately important role. Thus, before presenting the various organisations, it is relevant to outline briefly the causes of this often divisive and violent role in the history of Burma. Before and during the negotiations for independence, the expectations among the Karen, in particular the elite, rose dramatically. They imagined that they were a nation in every sense of the word and, as such, had legitimate claims for an autonomous state. When the Karen leaders returned empty-handed after receiving much sympathy in London in 1946, they still expected help from their ‘younger, white brother’. However, they received no reply at all to their unrealistic claims on territory, including the present Karen State of Tenasserim and part of the lowland where the Karen were not a majority. Saw Tha Din said that it suited the British well to be confused when the Karen organisations flooded London with contradictory memos and proposals. The British, who blamed the Karen for a lack of coherent leadership, could then leave the problems to the Burmese, not realising that Karen unity totally depended on external decisions. Saw Tha Din and other leaders were bitter and emphasised that had the British told them their proposals were unrealistic, they would have changed their strategy! Instead, the rising radical nationalism placed the Karen in a position outside constructive policy and reinforced their own self-image of being orphans. The uncertainty, confusion, mistrust and fear generated during the Japanese occupation were encompassed by the increasingly self-

1. Sources: Karen’s Political Future (1945–1947); Burma Government (1949). Trager (1966); F. Tinker (1967, 1983–84); U Maung Maung (1989);M.Smith (1991).

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assured Karen national identity. It fuelled the radical nationalism among the younger leaders. Moreover, the Karen were armed. The great expectations, the uncertainty and confusion also generated divisions amongst the Karen. The various Karen organisations reflect their political diversity, despite the fact that they strongly imagined a Karen nation in the making in 1947. The Karen National Association (KNA), established in 1881, mainly included the local Karen Baptist associations, but was seen as the beginning of Karen national unity by their American and English supporters. The Karen Central Organisation (KCO), comprising all Karen organisations, was formed in 1942 to cooperate with the Burmese government in preventing further inter-ethnic fighting and suppression from the Japanese. After the unsuccessful negotiations in London, the KCO split in February 1947 into the Christian Karen National Union (KNU), the Karen Youth Organisation (KYO), which was affiliated to Aung San’s political organisation (AFPFL), and the Buddhist-oriented All Burma Karen National Association (ABKNA), established in 1922. U Maung Maung (1989:346) says that the ABKNA in the 1920s was equally as strong as the Christian KNA. In June 1947 the KNU formed the Karen National Defence Organisation (KNDO) and began issuing weapons in preparation for the rebellion in 1949. The Karen who remained loyal to the union government organised themselves into the Union Karen League within the AFPFL, and a small organisation named the Karen Congress, representing a minor fraction of KNU, did not join the rebellion in 1949. In the Salween district the hill Karen joined the United Karen Organisation (UKO). It was renamed the Papun United Karen Organisation in 1947 and vowed to keep the KNU and the KNDO out of the district. Interestingly, the Papun UKO included all nationalities of the district. The leaders were former Force-136 fighters who had helped Major Seagrim during the Second World War. They opposed the affluent lowland Karen and their unrealistic demands, and acted independently. The Papun UKO signed an agreement with U Nu, and one of the leaders was shot by the KNU. In 1953, a pro-communist and antireligious party, the Karen National United Party, was formed by leftwing KNU leaders. It had a significant role in the KNU’s struggle until the mid-1970s. In 1995 the Democratic Karen Buddhist Organisation (DKBO) was formed.

GLOSSARY

adipadi: sole ruler. agati: the wrong path—as distinct from Enlightenment (bodhi). ahimsa: non-violence. ana: power. Ariyametteya: (Pali) or Mettaya (Sanskrit: Maitreya); the name of the coming Buddha (bodhisattd), who is waiting in the Tusita heaven. Bama/Burman/Burmese: Bama means Burman or Burmese and is related to the words Mranma and Myanmar. Myanmar is used by the present regime as the name of the country and to denote one common national identity, that is, a Burmese identity including all ethnic groups. The nationalists in the Dobama organisation used Bama to describe the whole population, including ethnic minorities. The British used Burman and Burmese with both denotations. Burmese seems to be the most widely used of the two terms in English and American publications. In the 1950 census, Bama was used for all indigenous groups and Burmese for the majority group. This distincdon creates confusion and complications, but since it is widely applied in the literature, I have maintained Burman (Bama) for the ethnic group, its members, language and culture. Burmese signifies a citizen of the union and is used in a broad sense to describe things that belong to the country. However, there are several instances where the use of this dichotomy is disputable, and it is clear that non-Burman ethnic groups will deny belonging to a common Burmese identity. I have not found any reason to use Myanmar instead of Burma, as does Amnesty International for instance, and I do not intend to endorse the interpretations made by the present regime. They often translate Myanma tuin ran sa, ‘son of Burma’, into ‘national race of Burma’— indeed a perpetuation of conventional colonial language. bodhisatta: (Pali), bodhisattva (Sanskrit); the Buddha-to-be (hpayà laung in Burman). boung kho: (Pwo Karen); bo khu (Sgaw Karen): head of religious merit, a religious leader. boung mü (I use the letter ü to indicate that the sound is between uand y): female leader. Burman names (towns etc.): Rangoon=Yangon; Bassein=Pathein; Irrawaddy=Ayeyawady; Salween=Thanlwin; Pegu=Bago; Arakan State/Arakanese=Rakhine.

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cakkavatti: (Pali; Sanskrit: cakravartin)\ world conqueror; the universal monarch, who is to arrive immediately before the coming Buddha. Setkyamin in Burman. From setkya (cakka): celestial wheel and mìn: king. chettyar: (Burman: chetti-kala): moneylender. dana: giving alms; charity (reciprocity). dhamma: doctrine; the teachings of the Buddha; right (the law); law of the universe; cause and effect; the nature of existence; ultimate reality. dhammaraja: righteous king, who rules according to the dhamma and its ten rules: almsgiving, observance of the precepts, liberality, rectitude, gentleness, self-discipline, control of anger, avoidance of the use of violence, forbearance, and non-opposition against the people’s will. Dobama Asiayone: ‘We the Burmans’ organisation/party. The name of the nationalist movement in the 1930s. Galon: (Sanskrit: Garudd)\ mythical bird, the enemy of the Nagas (‘serpents'). A symbol of Saya San’s rebellion. Later used as symbol by right-wing political groups. hluttaw: the king’s council of ministers. hpòn: glory. Associated with spiritually or morally superior beings. Combined with kutho: religious merit, and kamma. Also charisma (in relation to political power). hpòngyi: great glory (i.e., field of great merit); ordained monk. hsaya: teacher, astrologer, alchemist. hsayadaw: royal teacher, head of a monastery. htì: umbrella; the top spire crowning a pagoda, especially on royal pagodas, symbolising the king’s crown and rendering his power legitimate. kala: (‘caste’) foreigner (from India); kala pyu: white foreigner (sometimes spelled kullah). The British regarded the word as an abusive term. kamma: (Pali) actions; karma (Sanskrit); kan (Burman). karuna: active compassion. kutho: religious merit. (Pali, kusala: wholesome; skilful). metta: active goodwill, loving-kindness. mìn laùng: king in the making; pretender to the throne leading a rebellion. Myanmar: see bama/Burman/Burmese. nat: spirit. The thirty-seven nats are terrestrial guardian spirits of the royal family and the state. They signify both central power and local control. Their lord is Thagya (Sakka), i.e., the god Indra, and their official abode is Mt. Popa south of Pagan. nidanas: (Pali) link; a chain of dependent origination. A Buddhist concept of the fundamental logic of existence with ignorance as the primary root. It relates consciousness to cravings, mind to matter, etc. In the last instance birth and life depend on kamma.

GLOSSARY 159

sahib: Mr, Sir, master (i.e., the British), an Anglo-Indian title; pukka sahib real gentleman. Sangha: (Pali) assembly of monks; the monastic order (founded by the Buddha). Sawbwa: (saohpa or chao fa in Shan/Thai) prince in the Shan and Kayah states. sepoy: native soldier (Anglo-Indian). setkya mìn: see cakkavatti. Shwegyin: Buddhist reformist sect originated in Shwegyin town in the nineteenth century. sila: moral precepts and practice in Buddhism. Tatmadaw: (Burmese) ‘armed forces’. The Burman term is widely used in English. Thakin: master, lord; equivalent to sahib. Title of the nationalists in the 1930s and 1940s. Thathanabaing (thathana is sasana in Pali, translated as religion): one with authority over religion; head of the Sangha appointed by the king. Wunthanu athin: nationalist association or group under the General Council of Buddhist Associations (GGBA). yathe: (Burmese from Sanskrit rsi) a holy sage, hermit. Person living in seclusion having achieved a high spiritual attainment. Pwo Karen: eing hsai zedi: (Burmese from Pali: cetiya): pagoda, stupa. Building derived from the traditional burial mount for Buddhist saints.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

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170

INDEX

Agati 2, 156 Ahimsa 13, 74, 156 Ana (power) 110, 156 Anderson, Benedict 20, 137 Anti-Fascist Peoples Freedom League (AFPFL) 48, 52, 57, 58 Ariya Metteya (Ariya). See also bodhisatta 18, 56, 102, 103, 104, 107, 156 Armed forces. See Tatmadaw ASEAN 124, 144 Aung San 38, 41, 42, 44, 49, 50–53, 72, 73 on Buddhism 42 on nation, nationalism 44 Aung San Suu Kyi 70, 78, 118, 119, 120, 124, 143, 145, 146 on Buddhism xv, 74, 90, 138 on ethnicity 73, 114 on human rights 74–75 on nationalism 2, 7, 39, 76, 133– 135 Aung-Thwin, Michael 78 Avirodha 75

See also Ariya Metteya 18, 56, 90, 94, 99–101, 109, 111, 157 Bo Mya 92, 93, 96, 144 Boung kho 102, 103, 104–105, 110, 157 Buddhism, 13–19, 21, 54, 56, 57 in the 1947 Constitution 57 and nationalism 42, 137 and SLORC 88–90 and socialism 53, 55, 61 Buddhist concepts. See agati, ahimsa, avirodha, dana, kamma, karuna, kutho, metta, sangha, sila. Buddhist World Council 56 Burma Independence Army (BIA) 44, 46, 128 Burman/Burmese (Bama) 156 Burman names 157 Burmanisation 112–113 Burma Rifles 44, 53 Burma Socialist Programme Party (BSPP) 53, 55, 61–62 Cakkavatti, 9, 17, 18, 35, 46, 63, 94, 102, 108, 111, 157 Chatterjee, Partha 133 Chettyar, moneylender 28, 34, 37, 157 Chin in 113 Chinese 129 Christianity 21–23, 33, 137, Club, colonial, 2, 3, 9, 31, 71

Ba Maw 38, 47 Bama (Burman), 156 Baptists. See also missionaries and Karen vi, 21–22, 58, 103 Bodhisatta.

171

172 INDEX

Myanmar 85–87 Ne Win’s 68–70 Colonialism. See plural society Colonisation. See also pacification 23, 25–26, 30 ‘Colonizing consciousness’ 75 Commanroff, Jean & John L. 77 Communist Party 53 Communist rebellion 52 Corporate state and society 41 Cosmology, Buddhist 10, 11, 15, 18, 19, 21, 36, 102–105, 149 Cultural classification 77 essentialism 71, 81, 85, 123, 130, 133, 145 Dacoit 10 Dana 18, 157 Defense Services Institute (DSI) 128 Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) 92–97, 110, 111, 143–144 Democratic Karen Buddhist Organisation (DKBO) 92–97, 99, 100 Dhamma, 9, 13–15, 16, 19, 35, 157 Dhammaraja 16, 17, 35, 63, 75, 157 Dobama Asiayone ‘We, the Burmans Association’ 38–40, 157 Economy 121–124, 144 Ethnicity, 112, 152 and politics 44, 47, 48, 50, 58, 72, 73, 110, 112–113, 131, 132, 135 Ethnicism 50, 133, 152–153 Eurasians 28 Europeans 29–30 Excluded areas 25, 27 Foucault, Michel 83 Force-136 (SOE) 44, 109 Furnivall, J.S. 29, 129–130 Galon 35, 36, 157

General Council of Buddhist Associations (GCBA) 34, 35, 37 Guyot, James viii, 128 Hluttaw, (king’s council) 11, 16, 157 Hpòn, (‘glory’) 15, 16, 63, 99, 110, 157 Hasya San, rebellion 34–38 Htì, (pagoda final) 15, 63, 89, 94, 102, 104, 105, 110, 157 Identity 75, 76, 77, 113, 136–137, 150 cultural 21, 22, 125, 126, 135 ethnic 20, 110 Karen 111 national 25, 28, 133 Indians. See also chettyar 26, 28, 29–30, 63 Indra (Thagya Mìn) 17, 102 Japanese occupation 40–41, 44–48 Kachin 25, 26, 52, 58, 113 Kala viii, 11–12, 22, 30, 39, 89, 107, 158 Kamma (karma) 16, 17, 19, 57, 70, 74, 110, 158 Kapferer, Bruce 82 Karen Buddhist 90, 92–97, 97, 110 Christian 10, 23–24, 28, 38, 44– 48, 52, 72, 79, 90–97, 106 organisations 154–155 prophet 103 Pwo 46, 102 rebellion (1856) 24, 102 refugees 143 Sgaw 46, 102 uprising (1949) 51 Karen National Association, KNA 25, 155 Karen National Liberation Army, KNLA 90–96, 143

NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL PARANOIA IN BURMA 173

Karen National Union, KNU 48, 49, 72, 90–97, 100, 109, 144, 155 KNU border trade and tax 64, 94 Karuna 90, 158 Kayah (Karenni) 25, 27, 48, 49, 113 Khin Nyunt 88, 89, 120, 123, 141, 146 Kipling, Ruyard 10–11 Kuomintang 51 Kutho (merit) 15, 110, 158 Mandalay 9, 57, 62, 74, 88, 89 Manerplaw 91, 93–95 Maran La Raw 113 Maung Maung Gyi 65–66, 70 Marxism 53 Memory, historical/social 110, 111– 112, 113, 126–131, 135–136, 140, 145, 153 Metta 90, 158 Mindon, King 100, 102 Mèn laùng 17, 18, 24, 75, 100, 158 Burman 35 Karen 103, 105–109, 111 Mon 108 Missionaries 21–23, 58, 102, 103, 106 Models 78, 79, 81, 111, 126, 147 autocratic 18–19, 62, 68, 133, 136 concept of corporate state 60–62, 83, 136 nationalistic 53, 55, 77 Mon 105 Monks 9, 15, 23, 33, 56, 57, 62, 70, 88, 90, 93, 97 Monarchy 13–19 Muslims 28, 57, 89 Myaing Gyi Ngu 90, 97, 99 Myaung Mya 46 Myit Szone 91, 93 Nat (spirits) 17, 57, 158 National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma 131

National League for Democracy (NLD) 70, 87, 89, 119, 143, 145– 146 Nationalism, 85, 115, 125, 136–137, 150, 152, 154 Burman 36, 38–41, 72–73, 76–81, 123, 129–131, 133, 146 concept of. See Models Karen 25, 79, 97 rhetoric, ix–x, 2, 117 religion 82, 97 SLORC 117, 120, 126–131, 133– 137 New Light of Myanmar 89, 95, 118, 119, 143, 144 Ne Win 2, 51, 53, 55, 57, 58–70, 71, 74, 143 Nu, U 39, 52, 54, 55, 56–58, 63 Office of Strategic Studies 144 Ontology 150 Ontological 15, 17, 21, 61–62 Orwell, George xv, 3–5, 28, 68, 97, 140 Ottama, U 33 Pacification, British 8–12 Pagoda 8, 17, 24, 63, 88, 93, 94, 102, 104, 108, Panglong Agreement 48–49, 50, 114 Papun 102, 105, 108, 109 Paranoia (political) 50, 73, 82–83, 137, 146 Patron-client relations 20, 55, 64, 127–128, 141 Peoples Volunteer Organisation (PVO) 52–53 Plural Society 7 29, 77 Power 2, 64, 82–83, 110, 120, 128, 137, 139, 140, 149 concept 149 royal 16 symbolic 70, 90, 99, 105, 110, 117, 129, 149

174 INDEX

Pye, Lucien 66 Race 39, 70–72, 85, 112 Rebellion 9, 75. See also Hsaya San ; Karen Sangha 9, 13, 15, 54, 56, 57, 62, 89, 94, 105, 158 Salween 26, 90, 93, 102, 109 San C. Po, Sir 46, Saw Charles 93–94 Saw Ba U Gyi 49, 96 Sawbwa, 158 Kayah 106 Shan 26 Saw Po Chit 44–44 Saw Tha Din vi, xi, 52 154 Saw, U 51 Seagrim, Major 45, 155 Setkya mìn. See Cakkavatti Shan, State 26, 27, 49 Shew Dagon Pagoda 8 Shwegyin sect 62, 100, 158 Sila 18, 104, 158 Smith, A.D. 76 State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) 85, 87, 95–97, 112, 113, 115, 117–121, 123–125 National Convention 119–120 Social/historical memory 126– 131, 135 State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) 141, 145 Stevenson, H.N.C. 49 Strategy, concept 149 Suffering (social) 139 Tatmadaw, Armed Forces 12, 54, 74, 127, 135, 136, 137, 143–144, 158 and nationalism 117, 119, 121 and social memory 129 Thakin 38–40, 54, 158 Than Shwe, 126, 129

Thamanya, Hsayadaw 90, 97 Thibaw, King 8 Tin Maung Maung Than 128 Tho Mèh Pha 46 Thu Mwe Htar 93 Thuzana, U 90, 93–95, 97–100, 109, 110–111 Union Solidarity Development Association (USDA) 85, 117, 126– 128, 145 six objectives of 118 Vegan 97, 99 Vegetarian 90 Violence xv, 12, 23, 66, 75, 83, 117, 118, 130–131, 139 Wunthanu Athin, (nationalist association) 34, 159 Xenophobia 21, 31, 50, 71, 82, 83, 118, 123, 124, 129 Yathe 103–105, 110, 111, 159 Young Men’s Buddhist Association (YMBA) 31, 35 Yunzalin 90, 102, 106