Circumventing the Junta: How Burmese Exiles Use Independent Media to Foster Civic Culture and Promote Democracy
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CIRCUMVENTING THE JUNTA: HOW BURMESE EXILES USE INDEPENDENT MEDIA TO FOSTER CIVIC CULTURE AND PROMOTE DEMOCRACY by Daniel Gawthrop A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS in PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION We accept the thesis as conforming to the required standard ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr. Gilbert Wilkes, Thesis Faculty Supervisor Date School of Communication and Culture Royal Roads University ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr. David Black, Internal Committee Member Date School of Communication and Culture Royal Roads University ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Brenda Belak, External Committee Member Date ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Dr. Phillip Vannini, Thesis Coordinator Date School of Communication and Culture Royal Roads University ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Dr. Joshua Guilar, Director Date School of Communication and Culture Royal Roads University ISBN: 978-0-494-52181-6 Circumventing the junta 2 ABSTRACT Nearly five decades after toppling the last civilian government, Burma‘s military leaders continue to rule the once-prosperous country by subjecting its population to a litany of human rights abuses. In recent years, the advent of independent media has shed more light on the junta‘s brutality while allowing Burmese exiles to expand their pro-democracy networks. Independent media‘s influence has become all the more important since the ―Saffron Revolution‖ of September 2007 and Cyclone Nargis in May 2008. Research on independent media by Burmese dissidents provides valuable insight for journalists as well as human rights campaigners. Drawing from interviews with seven Burmese exiled media producers based in Northern Thailand, this paper applies network society theory to an examination of how Burmese exiles use independent media to foster civic culture and promote democracy. It concludes that independent media counter the effects of Burmanization by expanding the public sphere and crossing ethnic boundaries. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis would not have been possible without the assistance of the Vancouver Burma Roundtable, whose members welcomed me to their monthly meetings and led me to contacts in Northern Thailand where I was able to locate interview subjects. I owe a special debt of gratitude to Brenda Belak, who served as external reader for this project, for sharing her knowledge of Burma as well as her many contacts. In thanking my interview subjects for their time and insight I must single out Mu Laing Thien of Burma News International, who was generous in helping set up interviews and arranging travel to Mae Hong Son. To prepare the project I am grateful to my thesis advisor, Dr. Gilbert Wilkes, my second reader, Dr. David Black, and my thesis coordinator, Dr. Phillip Vannini, for their advice and wisdom. The library staffs of both Royal Roads University and Simon Fraser University were courteous and helpful at all times, and I‘m grateful to fellow program member Erin Mullan for her inspired document sharing and spirit lifting. Thanks should also go to the Canadian Union of Public Employees, which provided financial assistance that allowed me to complete the MA program, and my colleagues for covering my absences from work. Finally, I would like to thank my partner, Saw Aung Htwe Nyunt Lay, for his patience and support while I worked on the thesis project. Circumventing the junta 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction.....................................................................................................................................4 Background 6 The roots of authoritarianism in Burma...............................................................................6 Censorship, self-censorship, and dissent...........................................................................10 The Internet and Burma.....................................................................................................14 Literature Review...........................................................................................................................16 Public spheres and civic culture.........................................................................................16 Globalization......................................................................................................................17 Network society.................................................................................................................19 Independent media and human rights................................................................................21 Independent media and Burmese exiles.............................................................................23 Method...........................................................................................................................................28 Findings............................……………………………………………………………………….31 Identity Religious identity...................................................................................................31 Political identity.....................................................................................................34 Isolation..............................................................................................................................37 The effects of isolation...........................................................................................37 Countering isolation...............................................................................................40 Independence.....................................................................................................................44 External pressures – the opposition.......................................................................45 Credibility reduces fear..........................................................................................48 Enhancing the public sphere..................................................................................50 Conclusions....................................................................................................................................52 References......................................................................................................................................56 Circumventing the junta 4 Circumventing the junta: How Burmese exiles use new media to foster civic culture and promote democracy INTRODUCTION Nearly five decades after toppling the last civilian government, Burma‘s military leaders continue to rule the once-prosperous Southeast Asian nation by subjecting its people to a litany of human rights abuses (Maung Maung Gyi, 1983; Lintner, 1990; Skidmore, 2004).1 The junta, or Tatmadaw, also known as the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), is regarded as one of the world‘s most successful practitioners of Orwellian totalitarianism (Larkin, 2005a). Forced labour and relocation, rape, torture, and extrajudicial killings are facts of life in Burma. However, as with other successful totalitarian regimes (van Creveld, 1999), the generals avoid accountability while preventing the Burmese people from accessing a range of information sources that might reveal the extent of the oppression and encourage collective resistance to it. In the two decades between the August 1988 student demonstrations and Cyclone Nargis in May 2008, the international community has become better informed about human rights abuses in Burma under the military dictatorship. This is largely due to the efforts of exiled Burmese journalists and dissidents (Zaw, 2006), and their use of the Internet, cell phone technology, desktop publishing, and other forms of new media since the early 1990s (Maung Maung Oo, 2001; Brooten, 2004, 2006). Although the junta has found ways to suppress information in the wired age (Hachigian, 2002; Kalathil, 2002, 2003; Open Net Initiative, 2005), 1 In 1989, Burma’s generals changed the country’s name to the Union of Myanmar. Skidmore (2003) sees “Union” as the junta’s euphemism for the subjugation of Burma’s many minorities under the army’s control. “Myanmar” literally translates as “fast and strong“. At the time, the junta—then known as the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC)—claimed the new name was ethnically neutral and promoted national unity. While the United Nations accepted the name change, the Burmese opposition movement did not, and prefers ‘Burma’. Since usage has become an indicator of one’s political position with regard to the junta, I am declaring a bias here by using ‘Burma’ throughout. ‘Burman’ refers to the majority ethnic group, ‘Burmese’ to the language and the country’s various peoples and geography. Circumventing the junta 5 Burmese exiles in the diasporic pro-democracy movement continue to break down the junta‘s firewalls. The development of Burmese independent media networks has had a major impact, both in terms of facilitating access to family, friends, and allies inside Burma and in educating the broader international community (Eng, 1998; Everard, 2000; Troester, 2001). The importance of independent media‘s role in advancing human rights in Burma has become even more apparent since the ―Saffron Revolution‖ (Clapp, 2007; Talbot, 2007; Wasley, 2007) and Cyclone Nargis (Ball, 2008; Charney, 2009). This thesis is concerned with the