Nationalism as political paranoia in Burma : An essay on the historical practice of power

NATIONALISM AS POLITICAL

PARANOIA IN BURMA

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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

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. Exduded Area 1946 28

3. Karen and Mon States 60

4. Myit Szone 92

vi

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 well￾known 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 NaiShwe 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

me how the conflict and the violence in Burma have been ingrained in

social relations and their cultural expression during the lasttwo 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!

viii

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

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

x

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 self￾perception 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.

xi

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.

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).

xiii

ABBREVIATIONS

ABKNA All Burma Karen National Association

AFPFL Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League

ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations

BIA Burma Independence Army

BNA Burma National Army

BSPP Burma Socialist Programme Party

CPB Communist Party of Burma

DDSI Directory of Defence Services Intelligence

DKBA Democratic Karen Buddhist Army

DKBO Democratic Karen Buddhist Organisation

DSI Defence Services Institute

GCBA General Council of Burmese Associations

KCO Karen Central Organisation

KNA Karen National Association

KNDO Karen National Defence Organisation

KNLA Karen National Liberation Army

KNU Karen National Union

KYO Karen Youth Organisation

NLD National League for Democracy

OIOC Oriental and India Office Collections

PVO People's Volunteer Organisation

SLORC State Law and Order Restoration Council

SPDC State Peace and Development Council

UKO United Karen Organisation

USDA Union Solidarity and Development Association

YMBA Young Men's Buddhist Association