This page features international research publications KRC researchers have produced.
‘Building Kachin’: Youth and Everyday Action in one of Myanmar’s Ethnic States
A peer-reviewed article titled “Building Kachin: Youth and Everyday Action in one of Myanmar’s Ethnic States,” co-authored by KRC’s Associate Director Ms. Ja Htoi Pan (Maran) is now featured in the peer-reviewed academic journal of Development and Change, Vol 5, No. 6, November 2019 issue. The article was first published online in April 2019.
The article was produced in collaboration with scholars from Institute of Development Studies in Brighton, United Kingdom based on field research done in Kachin State and Myanmar in 2015-2016.
ABSTRACT
In 2011, Myanmar started its political transition after decades of military rule. In Kachin State this coincided with the breaking of a 17‐year ceasefire between the Kachin Independence Organization/Army (KIO/A) and the state army, the Tatmadaw. For youth living in Kachin State, this meant that opportunities for civic and political participation opened up while at the same time their context remained volatile and uncertain. Using citizenship theory and the concept of the ‘everyday’, this article analyses how youth in Kachin State connect the challenges they experience to their sense of citizenship, and how this informs everyday forms of youth action as well as youth participation in policy processes. The article argues that young people act out of moral and political reasons to ‘build Kachin’, in response to deeply historically rooted experiences of discrimination and state repression. While the agency of young people living in conflict settings is often believed to be limited to tactical agency for individual and immediate survival, an analysis of youth’s experiences of citizenship shows that they also act strategically to advance the interests of their society.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/dech.12506#.Xbw1UduKT_A.linkedin
Burma/Myanmar: A Fulcrum Of Great Power Politics
A peer-reviewed article titled, Burma/Myanmar: A Fulcrum Of Great Power Politics By KRC Director Dan Seng Lawn is published in World Affairs: The Journal of International IssuesVol. 19, No. 4 (WINTER (OCTOBER-DECEMBER) 2015), pp. 108-129
Abstract
Burma/Myanmar lies at the crossroads of South, East and Southeast Asia and has thus always been affected by neighbouring powers and their strategic manoeuvrings for becoming regional hegemons. While the west and south were historically under India’s cultural influence, the northern and eastern hills are ethnically related to various Chinese populations. In light of these geopolitical realities, this paper scrutinises how the policies of great powers have shaped its political matrix; it traces the rise and fall of various Chinese dynasties and their repercussions, the coming of the British and their intense rivalry with the French in the nineteenth century, its regional impact and the resultant incorporation of the country into the British Empire. The paper also examines the current political scenario marked by the increasing rivalry between two Asian powers—a rising China and an emerging India—in their quest for regional supremacy.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/48505250?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
Kachinland Research Centre 