Makiko Takeda - Women, Children and Social Transformation in Myanmar

Cover illustration: Harvey Loake

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This book draws attention to the need for deep-seated social change in Myanmar if the countrys democratic transition and peace process are to deliver tangible benefits for those that have long faced profound vulnerability and marginalisation. Drawing upon detailed case studies, the author showcases a range of initiatives taking place in Myanmar aimed at strengthening womens and childrens rights, improving education provision, and promoting respect for ethnic, religious, and linguistic diversity, as well as the challenges these initiatives face, and the foundations still needed for a more equal and socially cohesive society. The timely and insightful analysis presented in this book will be of value to all those interested in better understanding the challenges facing Myanmar and other highly diverse, and divided, countries.

Myanmar has experienced one of the longest periods of internal conflicts and militarization for more than half a century, and it has greatly affected the country and its democratic transition. Myanmar is rated as 149 out of 168 of the most extremely vulnerable crisis-affected countries (UNFPA, 2016).It is one of the poorest countries in the region. 26% of the population lives below the poverty line. Prolonged militarization has had a considerable effect on the human rights of the people, media freedom as well as resource extraction. Even if militarization is not gendered, both men and women experience it differently in terms of their vulnerabilities, responses, and life chances together with institutions and culture. The outcomes of both natural and man-made disasterspoverty, violence, breakdown of the social, economic, and physical infrastructure, unemployment, lack of capacity, and failures in empowerment from social capital benefits (such as education, technology, and knowledge)tend to impact women more severely than men. Indeed, more than 75% of those in need of emergency assistance are likely to be women and children (UNFPA, 2016). Recently, INGOs have funded local NGOs to promote gender issues, but only in regards to women and womens rights. This has led to hostility and a marked resistance to change gender realities in Myanmar. There is a popular truism that Myanmar has no gender discrimination; thus, there is no need to demand rights. Yet it is this same culture that believes that men are born with higher spiritual status; thus, decision-making positions are reserved exclusively for men. Prolonged militarizationwhere patriarchal culture and masculine values have been promoted for decadesthat has affected gender power relations and cultural transformation has not been properly researched. Gender is also intertwined with race, class, education, and social status. However, the cultural components of gender power relations in humanitarian assistance are simply overlooked. Lack of meaningful gender-sensitive humanitarian planning can further entrench existing gender inequalities.

Today, Myanmars democratic transition is led by an acclaimed female politician, Aung San Suu Kyi. With the whole-hearted support of Burmese female activists, who were also former political prisoners for their political activism and fighting against human rights violation, the numbers of female representatives increased. Yet, even under such a prominent female leader, Burma continues to have one of the lowest female political representations, as approximately nine out of ten Burmese parliamentarians are men. Indeed, until recently, the NLD committee was an exclusive male members club similar to the military regime and monastic institutions, and even the first-ever serving female leader has experienced a prolonged attack on her personalities since she became involved in democratic movement.

A vast amount of research has indicated the connection between women and militarization. Militarization is an extreme form of patriarchy and purity with the concept of war. Democracy, which was considered under war-like situation, conceptualise state affairs as male affairs. Therefore, when a patriarchal institution is challenged by a female opposition leader, not only are women excluded but also they are often victimised, particularly by gendered-specific violence as we saw with how Aung San Suu Kyi had been attacked by the regime for her marriage to an Oxford Buddhist scholar.

Women are defined as a social and sexual category with distinct experience of violence. Indeed, the regime that holds opposing notions of us and them further creates double jeopardy for women in general and ethnic women in particular. Indeed since 1996, ethnic women have systemically recorded rape as weapons by the regime, particularly by the Shan womens Licence to Rape (SHAN, 2002) and School of Rape reports to the United Nations Security Council. Gender-specific violence towards women and young girls continued un-noticed, leading to the 2019 UN fact-finding mission on rape cases and embarrassing Myanmars Tatmadaw. While the world has focused rightly on Rohingya issues, it has neglected ethnic people in Myanmar including Rakhine, Shan, Kachin, and Karen, and others who have been fighting and experiencing prolong attacks on their communities. Women in these areas also particularly suffer under prolonged conflicts and discrimination of their citizenship and basic human rights to use their own local language, culture, and ways of life. There are reports of people losing their own mothers language, as they have to learn Burmese in school and work. After all, militarization is an extreme form of patriarchy and using violence maintains their superiority over those who are marginalised. Indeed, the militarization has affected institutional culture, break-down of social fabric, and worthless education also has affected cultural change, and the structural nature of violence, which has far more negative effects on women and children in general and ethnic areas in particular. Today rape is the second largest crime in Myanmar, involving more than 60% of under-age children. Indeed, one of the most infamous attacks on a girl, famed as Nursery rape caused one observer to state We dont see her photo on our social media. We dont read her real name in the papers. But the whole country is talking about her and the sickening crime (Beake, 2019).