Responding to Strategies and Programmes of Myanmar's Military Regime: An Economic Viewpoint

Summary

Introduction

The Myanmar military regime's harsh crackdown on popular demonstrations in September 2007 has generated intense international condemnation as well as other responses. Most of the criticisms and policy proposals offered in these responses, however, have focused upon political reform. Relatively little in the ways of proposals or even concern has dealt with economic reform, the lack of which was the main grievance of the demonstrations and protests. This article seeks to shed light on the roots of the current economic crisis while also analysing a number of measures taken by the post-1988 military regimes in order to find ways to remedy their difficult and indeed perennial economic problems. It will assess the rationale behind these varying measures and their impacts upon Myanmar citizens, the economy, and the regime's survival and future prospects. The article emphasizes the need for simultaneously devising new strategies to put pressure upon the Myanmar military regime to undertake economic reforms that not only address inefficiencies and mismanagements, but most particularly resonant with the needs of the majority of the population in Myanmar.

Aftermath of the September Demonstrations

The Myanmar Government came under intense international pressure when it severely repressed, in September 2007, the public protests and demonstrations organized in response to the raising of subsidized fuel prices. The majority of international demands that followed in the wake of this repression, however, have been aimed at political rather than economic reforms. Most prominent among these have been calls for the release of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners, and an insistence upon opening dialogues among various ethnic opposition parties, the NLD (National League for Democracy), and the SPDC (State Peace and Development Council). Neither the government nor any of the international groups or actors, however, has managed to come up with concrete, workable, or sustainable plans to solve the economic crisis in ways that could or would address the needs of the country's various impoverished communities. Instead, the Myanmar government puts the blame on Western economic sanctions for the nation's economic woes.