Burma/Myanmar: Reconciliation without Capitulation

(a critique of the NBR report)

The recent report by the National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR), Badgley, J.H. (2004) “Reconciling Burma/Myanmar: Essays on U.S. Relations with Burma”[1], presented a shamelessly one-sided set of arguments for changing United States policy towards Myanmar. This paper tries to redress the balance, and to present both sides of the argument concerning what is, after all, a complex and heated issue. Two “core arguments” of the NBR report are identified and discussed, and in contrast the author develops two “core counter-arguments” for maintaining, with modifications, the existing U.S. policies with respect to Myanmar.

The NBR document is a collection of papers by seven authors, with an Executive Summary. The Executive Summary and initial chapters by John Badgley and Robert Taylor are the least objective. Aung San Suu Kyi is not mentioned until page 15. The killing of between 3,000-5,000 students and NLD supporters in 1998 is glossed over by avoiding the details and referring to “the tragic events of 1988”. In an artful piece of sophistry, the May 1990 elections are actually blamed for increasing “difficulties in resolving confrontations” (p.9), and that the NLD won 392 of the 485 contested seats in not mentioned.

It is one thing to avoid the details of events and facts that do not support the main line of argument, but the papers, and particularly the Executive Summary, also denigrate or ignore the core arguments for continuing the present US policy towards Myanmar. In doing so the writing often leans more towards a political polemic than a piece of academic research[2]. The opening claim, for example, that an “intellectual ‘tectonic shift’ is underway [wrt. Myanmar]” is simply a fiction, and as this author will demonstrate, the arguments for retaining present United States policies are strong.

Present U.S. policies are vilified in the NBR Report Executive Summary as “unrealistic” (p.3), “impatient” and disrespecting “the capacity of the people to manage their evolution towards modernity” (p.7), and having an “ineffective focus on a narrow definition of human rights, while ignoring larger societal as well as strategic and regional issues that also need to be taken into consideration” (p.9). Such vituperative language is hardly going to convince a less myopic reader that what follows is objective analysis.

The arguments of the papers, taken as they are, seem compelling. In short, they are that the US needs to consider more than human rights issues (notably the “real politics” of India-China relations), and that the present military regime has held out promise for a period of substantive reform. These two main arguments underpin the list of reasons for change in the Executive Summary. Lists are easy to make, so in Table 1 this author has reproduced the NBR report list and put it alongside a similar list of reasons for pursuing the present policies.

Table1: Claims and counter-claims for removing or retaining US sanctions

In the NBR Report: Sanctions have not worked in Myanmar	The reasonable counter-claims: Sanctions are working in Myanmar
Ø Years of sanctions have not achieved their aim of regime change.	Despite only six years in force (and only in full force since 2003), sanctions have increased political pressure for regime change.
Ø The United States has no ammunition left if it continues to pursue sanctions.	Imposing sanctions is a big step, and so is removing them. Both steps must be responses to big events (acts, no words).
Ø The application of sanctions makes the United States look strategically irrelevant in the eyes of Myanmar’s neighbours.	The application of sanctions makes the United States look serious about human rights issues in the eyes of Myanmar’s neighbours.
Sanctions have been counter-productive in the short-term	Sanctions have been productive in the short-term
Ø They have undermined the position of reformers within the military.	They have undermined the position of conservatives within the military (General Than Shwe retires)
Ø They have strengthened the resolve of the opponents of reform in the military.	They have strengthened the resolve of reformers within the military (witness: “road map to democracy”)
Ø They have made supporters of democracy in Myanmar appear as traitors, in the eyes of both reformers and opponents of reform within the regime.	They have increased the weight of international opinion against the regime in favour of supporters of democracy, who have the support of the populace despite government rhetoric.
Ø They have deleterious social effects on an already poor country.	They reduce the rate of economic development in an already poor country. The economic cost for political gain.
Sanctions will not work in the long-run	Sanctions will work in the long-run
Ø They provoke the military to expand the state’s coercive capacities, as a matter of survival, thereby weakening the capacity of civil society to develop.	They maintain pressure on the regime just to survive, thereby keeping alive the possibility of regime change by mutual NLD/Military compromise or crisis.
Ø They undermine the civilian administrative capacity of the state and emphasise the power of the army in administration.	They have little or no impact on civilian administrative capacity.
Ø They weaken the intellectual strength and international understanding of both civil society and the military government.	They increase the need to understand and find acceptable solutions to move towards more democratic structures.
Ø They hit the poorest segments of society with only marginal impact on the elite.	They force the elite to rely on income from a narrow range of rent-seeking activities (little FDI, minimal ODA, modest taxable incomes, etc.)
Ø They undermine Western influence in the country by making Myanmar increasingly impervious to the interests of Western nations.	They take away the one thing the regime lacks and is desperate to obtain: regional and international (“Western”) legitimacy.
Ø They ignore long-term strategic trends in Asia as China and India grow in power vis-à-vis ASEAN, and thereby undermine ASEAN while assisting China to the detriment of India.	They sacrifice short-run strategic influence over a game-playing military dictatorship for long-run gains when working with a legitimate democracy.
Sanctions ignore fundamental principles of politics in developing countries	Sanctions do not ignore fundamental principles of politics in developing countries
Ø There is no such thing as a hungry general – the army’s monopoly of violence can only be contained through economic development and the establishment of effective civilian governing institutions.	The army’s monopoly of violence can only be contained through economic development and the establishment of effective civilian governing institutions, both of which require meaningful (i.e. NLD-involved) regime change.
Ø Involving states and societies in the web of international trade and finance is the best way to link them to the norms of transparency and the rule of law.	Involving states and societies in the web of international trade and finance is the best way to link them to the norms of transparency and the rule of law, which requires meaningful regime change.

The NBR report argues that the announced “road map” for constitutional change, the cease-fires with ethnic insurgents, and the negative economic impact of the sanctions on the general populace constitute “an opportunity to re-examine U.S. relations with Burma.” (p.3). This is a tenuous definition of “opportunity”. That sanctions hurt, and hurt the general populace, can hardly be an unexpected result. They are a crude and rather desperate foreign policy tool. The announcement of the “road map” is hardly reason for joy, given the lack of dates, or any mention of the NLD and its leader, and all hints pointing towards some form of military controlled “disciplined democracy” (possibly along Indonesian lines [see p.89]). The cease-fires are an achievement, especially as they show that the regime is able to make compromises (the ethnic insurgents have been allowed to keep their weapons). It is hard to see how these events in 2003 constitute a fundamental change in the character of the military regime in Mynamar such that a fundamental shift in U.S. foreign policy might be warranted? It was, after all, also the year that Aung San Suu Kyi was sent back to prison.

The substantive argument of the NBR Report is the “real politic” one. Badgley argues that “the convergence of several Asian powers’ strategic interests in Burma suggests it is time to reexamine U.S. interests in Myanmar” (p.15). Similarly, Taylor asserts that “Myanmar holds a crucial position at the hub of the Asian balance of power” (p.29), and has been forced towards a reluctant dependence on China. Actually, we might also assert that Burma occupies a relative geo-political backwater, away from the main shipping routes, and unlikely to destabilize its immediate neighbours. Like many other areas it is located between India and China, and like these other areas it must play a game of balancing the interests of those giants. Sanctions have probably strengthened the links to China, but the “strategic damage” of such short-term expediency can be over-estimated.

Other aspects of the “real politic” argument centre around the accusation that all but a narrow definition of human rights has been allowed to determine U.S. foreign policy towards Burma. Further, it is argued, considerations about drug and HIV/AIDS control, and even weapons of mass destruction proliferation have largely been ignored. It is unlikely, however, that U.S. policy makers do not take strategic and other concerns into their calculations. It is more likely that the gross abuses of human rights (and the international attention given to these and to Aung San Suu Kyi’s plight) simply outweighed the other considerations, which the NBR Report has exaggerated. A more cynical interpretation might be to say that the lack of Burma’s strategic and other significance has “allowed” the U.S. to put human rights first, unlike in foreign policy towards many other countries.

The NBR report argues that the U.S. sanctions do not work, if only because they have not caused regime change since their imposition in 1997. It also argues that the general populace bears the “considerable pain”[3] of these sanctions (p.5). Both are valid points. The economic impact of the U.S. and other country sanctions goes far beyond the loss of factory jobs cited as the main impact in the NBR report[4]. Sanctions delay the speed at which a country benefits from globalization: technology transfer, gains from trade, and exchange of ideas and information. Myanmar could have been doing what Vietnam has done in the past 10 years[5]. But sanctions also make a powerful political statement: We do not accept the legitimacy of your sovereignty over the vast majority of citizens in your country. It is therefore hoped that the negative economic impact, combined with the political statement, will contribute to regime change (as in South Africa).

The NBR report argues that blame for poor economic performance has been largely deflected by the regime onto foreign sources, and that sanctions have reinforced the nationalistic hype of the regime (p.7). While this author considers the NBR report to take such nationalistic hype too much at face value, he would agree that the net “micro” impact has been to help rather than hinder the regime in Myanmar. This, however, ignores the “macro” impact of the political statement. Without international legitimacy, the regime will always be under great pressure to reach an accommodation with those who really represent the people of Myanmar.

The obvious argument against changing present U.S. policy is the moral imperative to support the “just cause”. Removing sanctions and increasing “engagement” will probably accelerate a gradual process of developing civil society and more rapid development, but it will not return the NLD and Aung San Suu Kyi to power, shared or otherwise. Engagement without an “NLD solution”, we might argue, means reconciliation with capitulation: selling out Aung San Suu Kyi.

The other “no change” argument is that maintaining external pressure to undermine regime legitimacy, through sanctions or otherwise, is the best path to achieve regime change. The clear impression of the NBR Report is that the NLD is an annoying gadfly pestering the present regime. Aung San Suu Kyi is described as “inflexible” and the NLD as “exhausted”. The Buddhist monks (p.16) and the ethnic minorities are now “on side” with the regime, albeit by coercion, and so the NLD should also reach some accommodation. They should help in “defending the social order created by the military and the Buddhist monks”[6] (p.16). The NLD, the authors argue, is seen by Burmese as propped up by external forces, and as such is effectively marginalized and portrayed as alien in a cultural milieu that is apparently more xenophobic than your average Asian country. We might describe this as the “hey, give up” scenario (and by the way, we are giving up on you too).

The alternative scenario is, of course, the “hey, keep trying”. In this scenario we accept nearly all of the above points. They are tired (or dead), they have not been flexible[7], and they do rely heavily on external forces (being all they have left in the public sphere). But the crucial difference lies in the interpretation of the broad base of support for the NLD. In this scenario we argue that the NLD would be voted in with a vast majority if free and fair elections were held, that the ethnic peace is tenuously enforced by military might and not by meaningful reconciliation, and that all the mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, cousins and friends of those who have been killed for their political convictions have maintained their rage. There are thousands of these largely-educated, largely-urban people. The Generals know that. They also know that “most people are frustrated with the current situation, and even though they despise the government and support the NLD, they are frustrated with the failed sanctions policy”[8] (p.84). That is why Myanmar remains a “regime under siege”, but from inside the country, as well as from outside.

The “keep trying” scenario refers mainly to external support. Of course those who have lost brothers and sisters will keep trying. If U.S. policy was to noticeably weaken while Aung San Suu Kyi remains in prison it would quickly spell the end for NLD hopes. The Generals could then move to establish a “managed one-party democracy” along the lines of many other ASEAN member states. Their physical well-being, as well as personal wealth would be assured. An incremental but tightly controlled emergence of civil society could be permitted during their lifetimes, and removing the worst of the economic policies would generate quick returns. Despite being their “saviour”, the U.S. could hardly expect thanks from the Generals, who would continue to play off India and China for what it is worth.

The present regime lacks the regional and international legitimacy to go down this incremental reform path while fundamentally ignoring the NLD and Aung San Suu Kyi. Their foreign policy has always been a desperate search for legitimacy. The July 1990 rationale by the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) for ignoring the election results included “that the SLORC had international legitimacy because it was recognized by the UN and individual countries”. The NBR report seems at pains to ignore this overriding foreign policy priority of the regime, and Myanmar’s joining of ASEAN in 1997 is described as “a startling departure” (p.18) and a move that “reflected the Myanmar government’s awareness of geo-political changes taking place throughout Asia” (p.11). It was neither. Myanmar, or more appropriately, the SLORC, joined as soon as they were permitted. They will join any club that will take them.

If U.S. policy does not weaken, then the NLD and Aung San Suu Kyi remain in the game. The Generals and the NLD must reach a climax or a compromise to move forward. The NBR Report frets about the “instability” of a crisis and forecasts all sorts of vague-but-negative results (p.10; 13), although one, of course, could be the return to power of Aung San Suu Kyi and some semblance of democracy.

If not a climax, then a compromise is possible. The Generals and Aung San Suu Kyi should be pressured and cajoled in every way possible to work out some compromise for moving forward. That is the sort of “roadmap” that the U.S. should be getting behind, for it is the only roadmap that produces a non-crisis solution to removing military dictatorship[9].

What are the chances for a compromise emerging in the next few years? Badgley talks of “new leaders emerging within Myanmar’s military for advocating serious negotiations with opposition groups” (p.27), and Taylor of “military reformers who understand the necessity of power-sharing and democratization, of liberalization and economic reform” (p.30). Yet Steinberg argues that compromise is more than usually difficult in Burmese society (p.49), and Kyaw reminds us that these “military liberals” still expect military control of society. Whatever the future trends within the military may be, we can probably safely agree with Pedersen that: “The military leaders are more entrenched today, and more confident, than when they took power in 1988” (p.87). The only piece missing is international and national legitimacy, and from that follows the confidence to make economic reforms and generate rapid development. A compromise with Aung San Suu Kyi could achieve that. It is possible, but very problematic (see Pedersen, p.92).

The weakest aspect of the NBR Report is when it tries to argue for the relevance of the present as a time for change. The three reasons that apparently constitute this “opportunity” are close to trivial (the “roadmap” announcement) or irrelevant (ongoing cease-fires, the harm of sanctions). The most solid line of argument is simply that sanctions were the wrong policy reaction in the first place. There is much substance to this argument. Sanctions harm ordinary Burmese, and they probably entrench more than undermine military control. The likelihood of the NLD and Aung San Suu Kyi coming to power through a sanctions-aided crisis is very remote. It was possibly the wrong policy choice (for reasons of misjudged impact, not “real politics” considerations), but that argument is largely irrelevant as to whether they should now remain or be removed.

The argument for keeping sanctions is that they are the prop that supports the NLD. It is a political prop of withheld international legitimacy, not an economic prop of withheld development. If sanctions are removed the regime gets the last card it needs: international legitimacy. To remove them without a prior agreed compromise concerning the NLD is to betray the NLD. Indeed, this leads to a core question that the NBR report does not address: How would removing sanctions cause regime change? (If we define the “worthy cause” [p.3] of regime change as including “a meaningful role” [p.30] for the NLD and Aung San Suu Kyi).

Sanctions must remain for the time being. But the assumption that they should also be accompanied by minimal dialogue needs to be questioned[10]. As Americans are inclined to say: “You got a problem – talk about it”. Somehow, dialogue should be pursued with even more vigour because of sanctions. Particular avenues for exchange and dialogue need to be opened up. Certain technical assistance and international NGO activities should be encouraged. Channels of communication need to be explored, and opportunities to support compromise between the regime and the NLD sought out. The most likely solution to the present deadlock is a compromise, and for that pressure (and rewards) can be applied by the U.S. both to the NLD and the regime.

A conscious effort on the part of the U.S. to stimulate dialogue and exchange would be a sensible step, despite the icons of legitimacy it may offer the military regime. Another approach is to consider consciously (but informally) “teaming” with other Western democracies. An arbitrator of a compromise might come from a Scandinavian country, or Australia could increase its engagement activities and play the “good cop” role. Such activities should include dialogue about economic policies (without loans), as well as humanitarian assistance. International NGO activity should be well funded.

This paper has found the core arguments of the NBR Report to be exaggerated. In contrast, the counter arguments for keeping sanctions have been shown to be substantive. These counter arguments being the moral imperative, and that international legitimacy is the last remaining political obstacle stopping the regime from developing an Indonesia-style “disciplined democracy”. Where one stands, for or against removing sanctions, essentially involves a judgement about “real politic” considerations, and about the possibilities for a climax or compromise solution emerging in the next few years. Progress towards a compromise should be stimulated, despite the sanctions, and that involves a rethinking of “low level” dialogue and assistance. That is the path toward reconciliation without capitulation.

By Adam McCarty

Chief Economist

Mekong Economics Ltd.

[email protected]

www.mekongeconomics.com

31 March, 2004

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[1] http://www.nbr.org/publications/analysis/vol15no1/index.html

[2] The other papers by (non-Burmese) David Steinberg, Morten Peterson and Helen James are more modest in their claims and nuanced in their arguments.

[3] The NBR report also, however, argues that sanctions have a “limited impact” as Myanmar is a largely agrarian country (p.7).

[4] Further, as an Economist would explain, sanctions harm the net national welfare of those countries imposing them as well as those having sanctions imposed on them.

[5] Actually, most of the blame for being “excluded” from the benefits of globalization must rest with Myanmar’s own terrible economic policies, although the sanctions have no doubt exacerbated the economic isolation. In 1989 Vietnam showed that changing such policies does not require the return of the Bretton Woods institutions, as Taylor claims (p.36).

[6] The opposition and oppression of the monks is mentioned in the NBR Report (p.83), but not in the Executive Summary, and the inference that they have long been wedded to the regime is an injustice to so many who have struggled for so long.

[7] What “flexible” means is open to interpretation, but presumably having it is a virtue. In this case it probably means having to once again try to trust the present regime to some extent.

[8] This is the conclusion of the fieldwork conducted by Kyaw Yin Hliang, and it goes a long way towards answering Badgley’s earlier naïve question: “Could the military have survived and prospered as a regime if it were entirely at odds with the people’s interests?” (p.16).

[9] Other countries, such as Chile and Argentina, have had to work out similar painful compromises with military dictatorships in order to move forward.

[10] Steinberg, for example, views dialogue and sanctions as exclusive (p.53), but they do not have to be. Of course they make dialogue more difficult, but there is still much scope if consciously pursued as a policy choice.