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Burma/Myanma(r) Research and Its Future, 21-25 September 2002, Gothenberg, Sweden (Conference Report) [2003] JSPL 10; (2003) 7(1) Journal of South Pacific Law

Burma/Myanma(r) Research and Its Future,
21-25 September 2002, Gothenberg, Sweden

by Myint Zan^[*]

This conference was perhaps the “biggest” international conference that has ever been held about Burma or “things” Burmese or Myanmar. From post-conference information provided by Dr Gustaaf Houtman, the main organiser of the conference, altogether 114 papers were presented at the conference including a few in absentia. Close to 200 persons, including keynote-speakers, paper presenters, panel chairs, panellists for various plenary sessions and other participants attended the conference. The conference was a success and most of the credit would go to Dr Houtman for his unstinting enthusiasm, careful and patient preparation and cooperation with paper presenters and participants from about 20 countries around the globe. Such coordination was done in the course of 18 months prior to the conference.

This report or “impressions” by its nature is selective. I would first discuss some of the plenary sessions. The first plenary session was on “Fifty Years of Burma Studies”. The panellists comprised of seasoned academics and Burma Studies specialists, most of whom have done research on Burma since about the mid-1950s, in a variety of fields. Their fields of study range from anthropology to politics to religion to economics to literature to linguistics. It was a lively session and was chaired by Dorothy Guyot whose husband Jim was also among the panellists.

This reporter/reviewer asked a question about monastic education which “triggered off” some more discussions on the topic. No Burmese were in the panel since – it should be said and acknowledged- that most (not all) researchers and scholars who have done academic research on Burma for close to 50 years are non-Burmese. In this regard one “youngish” (in that the person was not born when all of the panellists commenced study and research on various aspects of things Burmese) made the point to the effect–quoting and applying Edward Said’s thesis – that some of these scholars’ researches and findings might have shades of “Orientalism”. What he in effect meant was that due to the fact that all of the panellists were foreigners their scholarship is tainted with the designation of things Burmese as “the Other” and almost inherently-by the fact that they were “Westerners” their views cannot but have Orientalist biases and overtones.

The second plenary or key note session was on the themes of “Between Scholarship and Activism” and “Between Scholarship and Involvement”. The key note speeches were given by Dr Chao-Tzang Yawnghwe and Professor F- K Lehman. Again the issue of whether a Burma scholar can and should be an “activist” – in the political sense of the word- was made during the discussion period. The same person mentioned above made the point in effect that pretence of (political) detachment has been made by some scholars who are not activists in the political sense. Said’s “Orientalist” thesis was raised again and Professor Lehman (Burmese name U Chit Hlaing)^[2] stated that he is not that “impressed” with some of the “postulates” of Said. The two key note speakers appear to agree with each other on the interstices of scholarship, involvement and activism though the “interventions from the floor” at times might have a more jarring note.

The third plenary session was a Discussion panel, ‘Diplomacy: the Nature of Dialogue and Reconciliation’ which was coordinated by Professor David Steinberg (Georgetown University) and Dr Kyi May Kaung (Senior Research Associate, The Burma Fund, Washington DC). Apart from Professor Steinberg there was one other “foreigner” on the panel. The rest were Burmese at least by national origin. Most of the Burmese on the panel can be described as “activists” as well as scholars. Though the Discussion panel’s topic was specifically “Dialogue and Reconciliation” one speaker used the term “life and death struggle” – a phrase potentially replete with Leninist or “millennial” overtones- to describe the current situation in Burma. During intervention time I pointed out that perhaps the phrase life and death struggle may be a shade reflective of “all-or-nothing-thinking”. I also softly raised the issue of one panelist – a floor intervener in other sessions as discussed above and now on the dais for this panel discussion- openly castigating scholars who are both Burmese and foreigners. I expressed my view that the particular panelist’s castigation of persons who in his opinion are not actively toeing “the oppositionist lines” may not be appropriate. I stated that though there are some scholars who openly toed the “establishment’s line” there are also Burmese (by nationality or at least national origin) academics and scholars who are not supporters – at all- of the current Burmese or “Myanmar” government. For a variety of reasons they are not as (politically) active (in oppositional politics) as some on the panel. I even made the point of acknowledging –that almost all, though perhaps not all, of the Burmese panelists on the panel are more (politically) ‘activist’ than myself. I did state that I mentioned this fact not in ridicule but in respect. My sentiments – of specifically according “respect” to the political activists or oppositionists on the panel- were not reciprocated by that particular panelist. Indeed I think that I have unnecessarily perhaps over-praised that particular activist inasmuch as he is also on the panel an act which I now regret. He said in effect that I am “ranking” or favoring one form of scholarship over another (which is just not true; it may be a projection of what he is actually doing) he mentioned that those scholars who are not “activists” – apparently in the mold of him and his “activist” organization- are “moral animals”. Though I am not sure he might even have used the word “dogs” in denigrating “non-activists”. “Moral animals” he definitely used. I should state that both the co-chair of the Discussion panel – whom he criticized by name- and organizer of the conference chided him for his comments.

I also asked the panelists what the (internal and external) opposition would do concretely and positively if – in the currently very, very unlikely event of the internal opposition being able to “share power” with the ruling generals. One (Burmese) panelist slightly chided me for the “crystal ball” (so to speak) nature of my question about “best-and-worst-case scenarios”. U Thet Tun, a former Burmese Ambassador to France – who is also in the Panel- in his discussion about Reconciliation said that our country has since just before British colonization up until now “missed the bus” at least “six times”. Yet in regards to the future and perhaps in response to my query about “future scenarios” the former Ambassador said almost resignedly “Que sera sera...”

Indeed U Thet Tun was the “surprise” speaker at the Conference. His surprise Lecture topic was (I do not recall the whole topic) ““... How NOT to manage the economy”. It recounts, with personal anecdotes, how the economic policies and plans were formulated and (mis)implemented in the early to mid 1960s when he was working (at least indirectly) as a “consultant” with the then Revolutionary government. He did not touch upon – much less analyze- the economic policies or methods of the current government and hence U Thet Tun’s recipe about “how not to” is perhaps incomplete. His speech however, was lively and filled with snippets and anecdotes not only of the economic foibles of the early years of “Burmese Way to Socialism”^[3] but also about a few of the personalities of that era.

One more “plenary session” could be mentioned here. It is the showing of a movie Thu-Kyun-Ma- Khan-Byi “Never shall we be enslaved” which was directed by Dr Myo Thant Tin who was present at the conference. The movie was three and a half hours long and even though it was occasionally fast-forwarded the audience (conference participants) did not have the chance to see the end of the movie. The movie is based on the novel of the same name written by the late Tekkatho Phone Naing which was first published in 1959. It deals with and is based on aspects of the palace intrigues and the resistance – mainly feeble and ineffective- that was offered to the invading British troops just before the fall of Mandalay (and the entire Burmese kingdom) to the British in November 1885.

Snippets from two Thai movies were also briefly shown. The Thai movies portray the bravery of some Thai villagers who stoutly resisted the invading Burmese forces in the late 18^th century just as the Burmese movie dealt in part about the invading British forces (“On the road to Mandalay”)^[4] of the late 19^th century. The anti-(British) imperialistic theme of Never shall we be enslaved pervades the entire movie. It is noteworthy though that just as there were murmurs or designations of “Orientalism” concerning foreign scholars’ research about Burma (by one Burmese “activist-scholar” as described above) there was also a comment by a (non-Burmese) participant – in one of the parallel sessions’ discussion period - that at least a few scenes in the Burmese movie showed “Occidentalist” assumptions or connotations.

This conference was perhaps the only Burma conference where there were parallel sessions for most of the paper presentations. More than one hundred papers were accepted for presentation at the conference. Even though the duration of the conference was nearly four and a half-days the sheer volume of the papers mandated that parallel sessions must be held if the conference were to conclude inside of a week. Hence sometimes the choices of which session to attend were hard and when one is giving a paper one “missed” hearing the presentations in the parallel session. There was a wide variety of topics in the parallel sessions. Non-traditional but in the light of the times inevitable topics would include those on “HIV and Aids”, “Health and Human Rights” and “Gender and Development”. I missed the presentation by Daw^[5] Khin Mar Mar Kyi of the Australian National University on the topic of “Representation of Burmese women in literature, film and songs” as I was in the “19^th