New Taigress

Politics

23: Democracy, Anarchy and Transition

Oct 25th, 2007 by Raluca Enescu

I have recently read an article by Denis D Grey, published in Thailand (thanks to Thaung Nyunt for forwarding). The point he was making was that , after a possible revolution, there might occur a “nightmare scenario”: resurgent ethnic insurgencies, gutted institutions, clashes among leaders with no experience in democracy and continuing aftershocks from the junta’s ruinous economic policies in one of the world’s poorest nations.

The transition to civilian rule is bound to be extremely difficult, given the fact that the country has not had a truly civilian government since 1962,” says Bertil Lintner, one of several Myanmar experts who believe elements of the military would have to be retained to guide the country through such turbulent times., quoted by Grey

Of course, this is a real threat and an issue to be considered. Yet, I most honestly doubt that the situation might get any worse than it is now, and, as well, I doubt such threat is unavoidable. Not only that , in a way, as destructive as it may be, even chaos is preferable to tyranny, but also I believe that the risks that Grey presents in his article, although real, are somewhat exaggerated.

Firstly, the hypothesis that ethnic insurgences may occur: I believe it highly unlikely that there would be stronger violence of an ethnic group whatsoever against a political system that is far more likely to respect its rights as the one before. I mean-honestly- have you ever wondered why there are ethnic insurgencies in Burma in the first place? Talk to any member of an ethnic group organisation-and the first thing they would mention would be their rights being violated. In a case where there would exist a democratic government that wouldn’t violate their liberties any more,but accept them as an ethnic minority with full rights and with a certain degree of autonomy over the land they’re occupying (specifically-federalism)-why would they revolt? We must also take into account that much of the ethnic unrest in Burma is caused by junta’s infamous “divide and rule” strategy. Replace that with proper education oriented towards cooperation and tolerance, in a democratic context. So, it seems that a changing of government would rather decrease than increase ethnic unrest

Another issue that Grey’s article raises is that Burma has not had a civilian government since 1962 and that,overall, the country is quite inexperienced with democracy. “There are too few qualified civilians left to run the country, and disbanding the army might imperil security, much as it did after Iraq ’s forces were sent home after the fall of Saddam Hussein . ” says the article

This, again, is quite true, but there is a solution to this as well: a lot of pro-democracy Burmese activists have been forced to flee the country and currently live in exile; but they are interested in coming back to Burma and involving in politics, providing that a change of regime occurs. During their stay abroad, they have learned about democracy more than they could have in the closed society of their country-and they have an experience with democratic institutions which they can use in implementing democracy in Burma. Assuming they would “jut not fit in” is a most faulty and dangerous way of thinking. I remember that, in Romania of the early ’90’s the same assumption was made of Romanian exiled politicians and dissidents; therefore, they did not receive much of the public’s support-the commonplace expression was-”you’ve never eaten soya salami-so you can’t understand what’s going on in the country”. [note: because of the extreme poverty during Ceausescu’s regime, soya had replaced meat in most products; the “soya salami” had become a very symbol of the Romanian totalitarian era and its hardship]. Looking back, almost 20 years after the revolution, you may see that, with the former exiled dissidents ruling the country rather than with the former nomenclature communists apparently “converted: to democracy the country had been much better off. I don’t think this mistake is at such point bound to be repeated-there is always something that arising democracies can learn from countries that have been trough a transition-or, to give it a humorous turn-better make your own mistakes instead of copying others’. In addition, in Romania, we didn’t have any charismatic leader of the democratic movement, comparable to Aung San Suu Kyi; people like this have a strong influence on what the political class would be like-for instance, compare the previously presented example of Romania with the Czech Republic -where obviously less people of the “old system” have been involved in top political positions.

“You’ve had, over the past 40 years, the army slowly become really not just a dominant state institution but practically the only state institution, even at the local level,” says Thant Myint-U, author of a recent book on his homeland, “The River of Lost Footsteps.”, , again, quoted by the article.

This is a state of facts that only a revolution is able to change- the very definition of “revolution” implies a changing of institutions. It is, as Thant Myint-U says “an unprecedented task” and also it may not happen peacefully, as he states-but is the current situation in Burma peaceful? Definitely not! The stability of totalitarian regimes is only apparent and, actually, it hides more murders and suffering than any short period of rebellion and unrest. This is not a choice between stability and instability-it’s between continuous tyranny and a dangerous fight,but which may bring an end to the tyranny.

” Democracy may not find fertile soil in Myanmar, which has passed through a thousand years of feudalism, 124 years of British colonial rule and 45 years of military dictatorship, with a tumultuous, 14-year experiment in democracy sandwiched in between.”. says the article. You may be surprised to find out that one of the fastest-developing new-born democracies in the world, the Czech Republic, did not have that many years of democracy behind at the moment when communism fell and the first democratic government has been restored.

As for the fact that Aung San Suu Kyi Suu Kyi “remains untested as a political leader “- continuing the analogy with the Czech Republic, neither was Vaclav Havel and, however, the Czech Republic did turn out to be a functional democracy.

That the education is precarious-and this would lead to a strong drawback into implementing the democracy-indeed,this is again, very true But the restoration of a democratic regime is the only possible way of breaking this vicious circle. The more time the Burmese would spend under a dictatorship-the worse the education will become.

But although, as I have shown,the arguments provided by the article are somewhat valid, the conclusion, again quoted from Bertil Lintner-that some elements of the military regime might be helpful in a future democracy-has it all wrong. If there’s a complaint about dissidents-that they don’t have the exercise of democracy-even less can be thought and said of members of the present ruling class which, apart from this, are far more interested in keeping their privileges than in building a democratic country, so they’re both unable and unwilling to become proper democratic leaders. Instead, they should be put on international trial and charged for their crimes, the regime as a whole should be officially condemned and a lustration law-stating that, at least for a certain number of years-access to important political functions is forbidden to the ones that have been part of the old nomenclature.

I remember that, in Romania of the early 90’s , right after the revolution, the “22″ pro-democracy magazine has published an article called “No perestroika”. Of course, this has lead to quite a lot of criticism from the public, which saw Gorbachev’s Perestroika as an improvement from the previous totalitarianism. What they did not understand was that “22″ were now speaking from the point of view of an arising democracy born out of a revolution, not of a totalitarian country seeking for compromise. Compromise may help, indeed, but in extreme cases such as Burma’s, it is only to be taken into account when the alternative of a complete change-even though risky and lengthy- of regime and institutions is utterly impossible.

http://burmadigest.info/2007/10/25/democracy-anarchy-and-transition/