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Begin New Search Topic Political Activism Publishing Institution East-West Center

1. Contesting Buddhist Narratives: Democratization, Nationalism, and Communal Violence in Myanmar

Author:
Matthew J. Walton and Susan Hayward.
Publication Date:
11-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
For the past few years, Myanmar's political transition has been hampered by violence between Buddhists and Muslims. A nation with an ethnically Burman and religiously Buddhist majority, the population also comprises a large minority of Muslims and members of other religions, and includes many different ethnic groups. As such, Myanmar society is complex and innately plural.
Topic:
Political Violence, Ethnic Conflict, Religion, and Political Activism
Political Geography:
Burma and Myanmar

2. Burma/Myanmar's By-Elections: Will Personalities Trump Institutions?

Author:
Tin Maung Maung Than
Publication Date:
04-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
By-elections in electoral democracies usually elicit very little excitement beyond the affected constituencies. However, Burma/Myanmar's recent by-elections held most of Asia and the West in rapt attention, with droves of international observers, media representatives, and curious foreigners flocking to Myanmar on an unprecedented scale. As anticipated, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), won 43 of the 44 seats that it contested, subsequently hailed as the “victory of the people.” The lead-up, campaigning, and the actual voting, along with the post-election euphoria, resembled a regime-changing national election rather than a series of by-elections that secured the NLD a very minor 6.4 percent of the overall seats in the parliamentary Union Assembly's Lower and Upper Houses. The current government of President U Thein Sein most likely regarded these by-elections as a means of legitimizing its mandate to govern and enhance its own reform credentials.
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, Human Rights, Politics, Regime Change, and Political Activism
Political Geography:
Asia and Myanmar

3. The Significance of Burma/Myanmar's By-Elections

Author:
David I. Steinberg
Publication Date:
04-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
The drumbeat against the process and the potential results of the Burma/Myanmar by-elections of April 1, 2012 for 45 seats (37, or 11 percent in the Lower House of the bicameral legislature; 6, or 4 percent in the Upper House, and 2 in regional bodies) started before the polling began and the votes were counted. Human Rights Watch said they were a step forward, but not real reform. Campaign Burma UK wrote that it was impossible for them to be free and fair. And Aung San Suu Kyi, running for a seat, said they would be neither free nor fair. The plan to undercut their significance before they took place was evident.
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, Human Rights, and Political Activism
Political Geography:
United Kingdom, Southeast Asia, and Myanmar