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7. Struggle Over Space in Myanmar: Expanding State Territoriality after the Kachin Ceasefire
- ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute
- Chapter
- Additional Information
113 7 struggle over space in myanmar: expanDing state territoriality aFter tHe kacHin ceaseFire1 Karin Dean In the context of the Union of Myanmar/Burma, the application of several concepts that are suggestive of autonomy for ethnic minority regions can be misleading for the wider international community. In Myanmar, “union” reads as “unitary”, illegitimate can be treated as “legal”, and “legal” may actually mean “illegitimate”.2 In a similar vein, the term “ceasefire” as a stage in ethnic minority conflict resolution — as read by the international com munity — may have very different implications when it involves unilateral offers made by Myanmar’s ruling military authorities to armed ethnic groups. For practical purposes, such “ceasefires” are simply aimed at enforcing authoritarian order while indefinitely staving off ethnic minority demands for greater political autonomy within their historic homelands. The central argument in this chapter is that the establishment of ceasefires has made the task of achieving territorial control largely easier for the Tatmadaw.3 It has also helped to bolster the military’s ambitions of legitimizing its statebuilding efforts while depriving minority groups of any meaningful autonomy. To this end, the chapter will discuss the military’s version of statebuilding in relation to the autonomy expectations of the Kachin ethnic minority. After a brief overview of the evolvement of the 114 Karin Dean Kachin armed resistance (1961–94), it will then focus on the trends and developments during the 1994–2011 ceasefire in Kachin State. backgrounD Myanmar is variously viewed as an authoritarian “ethnocratic” state (Brown 1994) or an “illiberal” and uncertain “unitary state” (Tin 2004). The malfunctioning of many of the institutions expected from a state (in the Westphalian sense) such as law enforcement agencies, ministries and executive branches, has prompted designations of “weak” or “failed” for Myanmar as a state, although never “unsovereign”. “… Myanmar is a juridical state rather than an empirical one. Or … it is a “weak” state because ‘the institutions of the state are contested to the point of violence’” (Rajah 2001, p. 14 quoting Buzan). Or is it a weak state but a strong regime because its military regime has managed to hold on to power for almost fifty years? “Internal colonialism” has been used by some authors (Sidaway 2000, pp. 598–600; Brown 1994, pp. 158–205) to describe the situation where the exploitation/management of abundant natural resources is the driving force for the (central) state (government) to acquire and control territory, and for establishing communications and infrastructure to facilitate access, while economy and politics are utilized as measures of control over space. Regardless the designation, directly relevant to the ways how the armed conflicts and their resolutions are managed, have been the military’s wants and its versions of analyses of the political situation. The military seized power in Myanmar initially as a caretaker govern ment in 1958. Between 1961 and 1988, General Ne Win ruled with force and thoroughly institutionalized the military until he was forced out of power, at great human cost, by popular street demonstrations. In 1990 the military allowed elections for constituent assembly for drafting a new constitution, where the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) won in a landslide. The NLD victory was a miscalculation by the military authorities that had tried to prop up its own political party — and the then de facto government, State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), maintained power. The constitution drafting process was started in 1993 under stringent military control and supervision, prompting the NLD to walk out in protest in 1996. From 1988 until the elections of 2010 there have been no clear distinc tions between the state, the government and the armed forces, all of which have been conflated (Selth 2002). The contested territorialities at Myanmar’s ethnic borderlands and the lowintensity guerilla warfare continue to [44.200.249.42] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 23:40 GMT) Struggle over Space in Myanmar 115 signify the lack of internal sovereignty within the internationally recognized boundaries.4 Regardless that Myanmar today is more unified than it has ever been, its territories have never functioned as one, internally sovereign, political unit. Historically, there have been centuries of rivalry and expansion of various kingdoms (Mon, Shan, Bamar, Arakan), loosely connected tribal territories and zones of Chinese influence at the present borderlands. British colonialism created the boundaries for a future Burma, followed by the Second World War and turbulent years of independence premised upon a pact between the Burmese independence architect...