Myanmar/Burma: Inside Challenges, Outside Interests.

• Author: Mathieson, David Scott
• Position: Book review

Myanmar/Burma: Inside Challenges, Outside Interests. Edited by Lex Rieffel. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2010. Softcover: 212pp.

Most volumes of collected essays on Myanmar fall into two broad categories: those firmly rooted in academic inquiry, and the second aimed more at a general or policy oriented audience. Lex Rieffel's new volume, Myanmar/Burma: Inside Challenges, Outside Interests is clearly in the latter category. The product of a conference held in Washington D.C. in late 2009 and funded by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation and the Sasakawa Peace Foundation, this book comprises twelve chapters by prominent analysts on a range of contemporary issues.

Part One contains very strong essays by Myanmar scholars Kyaw Yin Hlaing and Maung Zarni on the theme of reconciliation. Kyaw Ying Hlaing analyses the "three main political forces" in the country, namely the military, the main opposition group led by Aung San Suu Kyi and her party the National League for Democracy (NLD), and the disparate ethnic opposition. He concludes that "(t)he (November 2010) election is unlikely to turn Myanmar into a democratic country immediately ...(a)t the present moment, no one knows for sure how the new government will deal with the opposition. Future political changes will depend on the new boundaries for political space set by the elected government and, in turn, on the ability of opposition groups and civil society organizations to exploit these opportunities" (p. 49). Maung Zarni's illuminating account of "track-two" mediation efforts he undertook in 2004 as a prominent Western-based antigovernment activist, is buttressed by a detailed analysis of the challenges of peace building in Myanmar. Zarni's efforts included a trip to Yangon to meet the then Prime Minister Lt. Gen Khin Nyunt, a process he refers to as "Peacemaking Without a License", because of the criticism he received from exiled Myanmar political groups. Although his efforts were ultimately derailed when Khin Nyunt and his military intelligence faction were purged in late 2004, this detailed account contains rare inside views of tension within the military regime over how to address political reconciliation. As Zarni states, "It is hard to see any efforts at reconciliation having any impact on the conflict landscape of Myanmar, however creative or imaginative or powerfully supported they may be, as long as the regime views national reconsolidation as simply the restoration of a...