Economies of conflict in Myanmar's 2011-21 political trajectory

本研究旨在了解国际社会与冲突经济体的接触如何导致缅甸十年自由转型的暴力转向，并被一场残酷的政变所打断。冲突经济- -植根于该国在过渡之前的威权控制和冲突动态的历史中的结构性寻租遗产- -在整个过渡时期普遍存在。该研究将着眼于国际社会与这些冲突经济体的接触，这些接触直接使军事权力结构与自由的和平建设治理模式一起运行，从而加剧了结构性暴力，而这种暴力已成为缅甸政治轨迹的特征。2011年，在经历了50年的军政府统治之后，缅甸出人意料地走上了改革之路，开始摆脱长达数十年的封闭独裁政权。国际社会高度乐观地欢迎该国开放的最初几年：​与此同时，随着这一全面过渡的进行，不久前才承认了自己的统治地位的军方，通过对关键政治杠杆的控制，以及至关重要的是，通过对该国大部分经济资源的管理，继续保持着权力的平衡，并从中收取可观的租金。这些寻租安排与全国各地军队和少数民族武装团体之间正在进行的内战错综复杂地纠缠在一起，并直接促进了军方控制的权力结构与过渡并行。这反过来又使军方得以精心策划一场不断深化的结构性暴力，随着时间的推移，这种暴力使这个国家陷入不确定之中，即使在广泛支持的自由主义建设和平改革进程同步推进的情况下。本研究采用定性、因果关系和解释性案例研究方法，采用半结构化访谈和文献数据，研究通过一系列关键改革，国际社会与这些寻租遗产的互动如何影响了转型的轨迹。为研究收集主要数据的海外实地调查将分两个阶段在泰国北部进行，那里有大量的缅甸政治演员、研究人员、活动家和少数民族武装组织的侨民和政治社区。

This study seeks to understand how the international community's engagement with economies of conflict contributed to the violent turn in Myanmar's ten-year liberal transition, interrupted by brutal a coup d'état. Economies of conflict - structural rent-seeking legacies rooted in the country's history of authoritarian control and conflict dynamics which preceded the transition - were pervasive throughout the transition period. The study will look at how the international community's engagement with these economies of conflict, which directly enabled military power structures to run alongside the liberal peacebuilding model of governance, contributed to the deepening structural violence that grew to characterise Myanmar's political trajectory.In 2011, following five decades of military governments, Myanmar was launched on an unexpected path to reform, commencing a move away from a decades-long, closed, authoritarian regime. High levels of optimism from the international community greeted the initial years of the country's opening up: the apparent willingness of the military to cede control of the country and the rise to power of Aung San Suu Kyi, the widely supported leader of the National League for Democracy previously banned from participating in elections, drew significantly increased flows of development assistance and foreign investment and Myanmar became the site of a post-regime transition anchored in market-oriented and democratic governance reforms. At the same time as this sweeping transition proceeded, the military, which had so recently conceded its stranglehold, continued to hold the balance of power, through its control of key political levers and crucially, through its management of large portions of the country's economic resources from which it drew substantial rents. These rent-seeking arrangements were intricately entangled with the ongoing civil war between the military and ethnic armed groups around the country and directly facilitated military-controlled power structures to run in parallel to the transition. This in turn enabled the military to orchestrate a deepening structural violence which over time, gripped the country in uncertainty, even as the widely endorsed liberal peacebuilding reform process progressed in tandem. Employing a qualitative, causal and explanatory case-study approach, this study uses semi-structured interviews and documentary data, to examine how through a set of key reforms, the international community's interaction with these rent-seeking legacies influenced the trajectory of the transition. Overseas fieldwork to collect primary data for the study will be conducted over two phases in northern Thailand, where there is a significant diaspora and political community of Myanmar political actors, researchers, activists and ethnic armed organisations.