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THE ACTIVISTS AND ADVOCACY--PART.1. (r)



Hi U Ne Oo,
	I don't know how can you decide the situation of the deep inside
without knowing and without having any experience there?  Any way those
may be theories from some books, I think.  You haven't answer my question
about your statement (if someone wants to point out or change, work with
that group, you said.  I asked do you work with SPDC and BSPP to change
it?)  May be your ear is deaf and your eyes are blind now for not being
able to answer from your theory.  Ask the students in Australia who came
to Australia about their frustration and the reason why they had to leave
the struggle on the border.  Those will not be on your books.  Then you
can say the deep issue.....

Yours sincerely,
Kyaw Zay Ya



On 11 Jun 1998 uneoo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

> /* Written Thu 11 Jun 11:00am 1998 by drunoo@xxxxxxxxxxxx(Dr U Ne Oo) in igc:reg.burma */
> /* -------------" The Activists and Advocacy Pt.1 "--------------- */
> 
> COMMENTS ON ACTIVISTS AND ADVOCACY
> **********************************
> Recently, there have been some postings on the Net which attributed
> to the activism and advocacy in general. In the World of Internet
> mailing-list, the power to communicate is equal among all subscribers,
> regardless of their political leaning or background resources.
> Surely, we all have the right to speak our own mind on the Internet.
> However, a serious distinction has to be made between advocacy and
> non-advocacy; of true-activists and cynics.
> 
> On the surface, these postings do look like a rather objectionable
> form of usual "squabbling" within a movement. At a deeper level,
> however, there exists the underlying misconceptions about the true
> nature of (political) activism. It should be noted that this kind of
> political-illiteracy is not an isolated incident but rather
> prevalent among the Burmese population.
> 
> ADVOCACY AND NON-ADVOCACY
> *************************
> Contrary to some people's beliefs, the meaning of advocacy is not
> about preaching to the masses who, supposedly, are un-informed or
> un-sophisticated. The advocacy is not of an avenue to make
> oneself known to the public or to the powerful people within the
> community. The advocacy, certainly, is not about airing one's
> own personal grievances in a public arena -- no matter how this may
> justified from one's own perspective. Nor activism means to let
> loose one's frustration about its own life and therefore sought a
> revenge on the Establishments: i.e. society, governments and
> political system etc. What, then, are the meaning and purpose of
> advocacy and activism?
> 
> The advocacy, to my understanding, is about communicating to the
> general public or to the like-minded people on the matters of
> special concerns. The activist may put forward his/her own
> assessment of the situation, or personal view: rights and wrongs,
> justs and un-justs. He/she may further suggests how things ought to
> be done in particular circumstances. This is certainly different
> from preaching moral messages to the public. Sure, there has to be
> some element with ethical and moral leaning included in the
> communication because the activist needs to explain about what is
> right and what is wrong. But on the whole, the activists are simply
> seeking cooperation from the public on particular matters.
> 
> WHY DO WE ADVOCATE ?
> ********************
> There can be as many different motivations as the number of
> activists participating a campaign or a movement. Some may try to
> gain social status or to receive recognition from the public by doing
> advocacy and joining the movement. Others may just try to be involved
> in "activities" with colleagues and friends. Significant proportion
> of them may be genuinely unhappy with the socio-political situations
> or established systems -- in our Burma case, the military's holding
> onto power -- and therefore seeking changes by doing advocacy.
> (In our Burma advocacy cases, we can forget about the possibility of
> activists joining the movement to gain financial incentives -- it
> just simply impossible!)
> 
> People may join the advocacy, initially, for different reasons.
> However, in the long run, those who genuinely care about the cause
> and seeking genuine changes to the system are likely to be staying
> in the movement. The other types of participants may just come and
> go regarding the movement.
> 
> My personal reason to join refugee advocacy in few years back and
> becoming an activist was to seek improvement to the situation and to
> find a solution to the Burma's refugee problem. In these years, not
> only had I been -- and since then continue to have been -- a refugee in
> Australia, I have had much concerns about the Rohingya refugees
> especially. Among many of displaced people from Burma, the Rohingyas
> are somewhat under-represented, politically, because of their low
> political status in Burmese community. On the other hand, we had
> received various reports, through JRS and other refugee agencies,
> the egregious living conditions for Rohingyas in Bangladesh and a
> possible forced repatriation to Burma. My empathy about refugee has
> also been a driving factor. When having concerns about such
> vulnerable people and practically cannot do anything else, then
> there is only one thing left to do: urge the people who are in
> authority to "do something". That became my first engagement in the
> work for advocacy.
> 
> Looking a glimpse at the activists around the world, we can see
> differing causes they are striving to achieve: East-timorese
> activists for an independence of their homeland; Chinese and
> Indonesian activists for the transition to democracy;
> Australian-aboriginal right activists for a better social justice
> situation for the Indigenous Australians, etc. On their own, the
> objectives set out by those activists are clearly beyond their own
> personal capacity to achieve. Therefore, they must try to win the
> public support for their cause by doing advocacy.
> 
> FAITH IN HUMANITY IS ESSENTIAL
> ******************************
> At this point, we can visualize an "activist", a "cynic" and a
> "situation" that is beyond their capacity to solve. A cynic will
> certainly be complaining about situation but will not try to correct
> the problems. An activist, on the otherhand, will reach out to the
> people and seeking improvements, no matter how small and being
> insignificant. The activism, therefore, is being built-upon the
> faith in humanity. A person may never become an activist, no matter
> how articulate or having the power to communicate to the people, if
> he/she does not have concern for the others and is lacking the faith
> in humanity.
> 
> Engaging in advocacy is about becoming a service to the community
> with the purpose of furthering the cause and in helping to those
> vulnerable others. An activist must be open-minded and selfless in
> seeking cooperation from the community and providing solidarity to
> other activists. Without such spirit of cooperation, one would never
> become a successful campaigner for the cause.
> 
> The faith in humanity, of course, does not mean to take a refuge in
> the thought that everything in this world will turn out to be good
> in the end. It means that the trust in fellow human-being's
> willingness and ability to strive for the just and right causes.
> Activism, therefore, is built upon the positive nature of human
> society.
> 
> It may be true that the Burmese generally are not politically
> open-minded -- i.e. not quite receptive to the well-meaning
> activists and their advocacy. Even then, it is heartening that there
> are no shortage of people, particularly among Burmese expatriate
> community, who are being cooperative. Some people sought to complain
> about the Burmese expatriate community as "A 3 Burmese has to have 2
> political parties". Nevertheless, things are being done and many
> more are going to get done in this way.
> 
> POLITICAL SOPHISTICATION IS NEEDED
> **********************************
> As explained above, the principal requirement for activism is the
> good-heartedness towards others and the faith in humanity. However,
> in politics things will not be done simply by having a goodwill. For
> a successful advocacy, some level of political sophistication is
> required. The activists, at least, must have the working knowledge
> about the policy of various political actors, such as governments,
> United Nations and other entities. For example, when you advocate
> for the refugees to the United Nations, you must have the knowledge
> about various U.N.Refugee Conventions and government policies etc.
> Without such knowledge, your action will probably get to no-where.
> In other words, the activist who advocate to the public must know
> on what issue is he/she been talking about. It may be found that, in
> politics, it is not always easy to identify the important issue.
> 
> In studying the policies of governments and other political actors,
> to my experience, simply reading the policy statements is generally
> not enough. One may have a grasp of the "working policy" for a
> political entity only by observing it a fairly long time. Therefore,
> no activist can simply "swing into action" in advocacy work: the only
> path to political advocacy is via a process of gradual learning.
> 
> THE RIGHT TO ADVOCATE: MANDATE OF ACTIVISTS
> *******************************************
> There have been attacks on activists such as "self-appointed" judges
> by cynics and-- sometime by professional politicians. There has
> been a question of whether an activist has the right to advocate
> on behalf of the people who are in a dire situation -- such as
> people of Burma. The answer rest with the whole concept of
> (political or human rights) advocacy and political leadership.
> 
> As far as human rights advocacy is concerned, the activists
> certainly have the right to campaign on behalf of the oppressed.
> This is simply because campaigning for human rights means
> campaigning for the truth and justice. In other words, we need
> nobody's permission to tell the truth and we require nobody's
> blessing, including the oppressed, to serve justice. Therefore, it
> is quite wrong to accuse human rights activists as the
> self-appointed gurus.
> 
> The right to political advocacy (re: political leadership) is a
> little more complex. However, our Burma history has given us some
> good examples to look at on this question. It is as a matter of
> understanding the political actions of activists and leaders
> within the context of current socio-politics.
> 
> TWO DISCIPLINES OF POLITICAL ANALYSIS
> *************************************
> 
> /* Discussions to be continued on Part-2 */
>