Energy, Governance and Security in Thailand and Myanmar (Burma).

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Author: Gould-Davies, Nigel
• Date: 01 April 2018

Energy, Governance and Security in Thailand and Myanmar (Burma). By Adam Simpson. Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2017. Softcover: 271pp.

Southeast Asia is the fastest growing region in the world, and this growth needs energy to fuel it. The International Energy Agency's 2017 report sees the region's energy demand rising by nearly two-thirds by 2040. Efforts to meet this demand have led to environmental damage, abuse of local community rights, and the disappearance and death of campaigners opposed to energy projects.

In his latest book, Adam Simpson explores resistance to four energy projects: the Yadana, Shwe and Salween dams in Myanmar, and the Thai-Malaysian gas pipeline in Thailand. Drawing on detailed research and extensive fieldwork, he provides a "thick description" of local activist networks that have mobilized against these projects, and the transnational ties they have developed. As he notes, these two states, though neighbours, are politically very different. During the period covered by this study (early 1990s to 2013), Myanmar was the most repressive, and Thailand the most open country in the region. A major, if perhaps unsurprising, conclusion is that environmental activism proved easier in the latter. By contrast, in the more repressive conditions of Myanmar, resistance was sometimes...