Description:
Abstract:
"The recent political and economic liberalization in Burma/Myanmar, while indicative of some positive
steps toward democratization after decades of authoritarian rule, has simultaneously increased
foreign and domestic investments and geared the economy toward industrialization and large-scale
agriculture. In rural areas, new institutional frameworks governing land, including a new Farmland
Law (2012) and Vacant, Fallow and Virgin Lands Management Law (2012) have effectively created a
land market through private land-use property rights and a new registration system with new land
administration bodies. In a country permeated by legacies of corruption, coercion and military-linked
cronies, land governance procedures and implementation tend to favour the more powerful and well-connected, with little protection mechanism for the majority smallholding farmers in the country. The Dawei Special Economic Zone (SEZ), in the southern Thanintharyi division of Myanmar, to be
developed trilateraly with Thai, Myanmar and Japanese investment, is set to become one of the largest
industrial zones in Southeast Asia, covering an area of approximately 200km.
The project plan
includes a deep sea port, industrial estate, power plant and cross-border road and rail link to
Thailand. The development of the SEZ, together with land speculation in surrounding areas and other
confiscations linked to agricultural concessions, mining and military constructions has been met with
collective mobilizations. The paper argues that
although resistance against land confiscations are
increasingly linked to global trends, such reactions are also responding to an expanding opportunity
structure in the national political context. Collective action in the Dawei area takes advantage of
histories of activism linked to democratic movements as well as human rights repertoires, social
networks and trainings across the border in Thailand.
Smallholding farmers, in alliance with activists,
are also contesting land confiscations conducted by
the military in the 1990s,
encouraged by a greater
political liberalization and testing the grounds for protest and engagement with the state. These
contestations have implications for democratization
and the transition of state-society relations more
broadly. Although embedded locally, this process engages with transnational networks and alliances
as well as global frameworks such as human rights, livelihoods and sustainable development."
Source/publisher:
Transnational Institute (TNI)
Date of Publication:
2016-02-04
Date of entry:
2016-03-01
Grouping:
- Individual Documents
Category:
Language:
English
Local URL:
Format:
pdf
Size:
490.57 KB