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Space, Place, and Political Consciousness along the Thai-Burma Border:

Examining the Social Identities of Displaced Burmese


Robert J. Byrne
Research Proposal for Senior Thesis
Georgetown University Department of Sociology

I. Research Question
II. Subtopics
III. Theoretical Framework
IV. Methodology
V. Timeline
VI. Burma Activism Survey
VII. Mae Tao Clinic
VIII. Mae La Refugee Camp
IX. Bibliography

I. RESEARCH QUESTION:
“How do displaced Burmese on Thai-Burma border identify with the Burmese pro-democracy
movement?”

II. SUBTOPICS:

Current goals and strategies of pro-democracy organizations.


- Have organizing goals changed over the past year in light of the 2010 election and
subsequent release of political opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi?
- What are political organizations projections for social change in the months ahead?
- Which models of social change have they employed?

Capacities to which different sects of displaced Burmese identify with the goals and strategies
of political groups, and how they exercise politics in their daily lives.
- What are the roles of “place” (need for security) and “space” (ideals of freedom) in
shaping political associations, or lack thereof?

How has the pro-democracy movement borrowed from other models of social change?
- How do political organizations and average displaced Burmese perceive the practice of
western organizing models?

III. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK:


The theoretical background for this research is grounded in social movement theory, anthropology,
and cultural geography.
I set out to examine the macro-level of what keeps Burmese pro-democracy
organizations operating and the micro-level of what this means to those who have left
Burma/Myanmar. Over the past twenty years, the dominant academic discourse surrounding a to-be
political transformation in Burma has chiefly addressed it as top-down process. Since the military junta
took power in 1989, Burma has by and large maintained closed opportunity structures for the majority
of its citizens. Since access to opportunity structures did not differ by particular factions, political
opportunity theorists assumed there would be diminished capacity for protest (Eisinger 1973).

However, Eisinger‟s theory that size of social movements and political opportunity correlate are
relevant to pro-democracy organizations, although it is not decisively known what each organization
considers political opportunity, although it is clear that the movement‟s political opportunity is
presently at its zenith since 1989 with the release of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. This project
seeks to absolve the present uncertainty of how pro-democracy perceive political opportunity, both
presently and historically. Furthermore, Marc Edelman has theorized four fundamental paradigm
shifts in models of social change: “mass behavior, resource mobilization, political process, and
new social movements”, which will be contextualized in my in-depth interviews of the organizations‟
historical and projected aims, goals, and strategies.
In terms of the micro-level, I will conduct ethnographic work in two distinct case studies of displaced
Burmese; one in a rural refugee camp and another in an urban border town. I expect my findings will
reflect much of cultural geographer Yi-Fu Tuan‟s work on place and space. Tuan considers the ways in
which people feel and think about space (a freedom they long for) and how they form attachments to
place (a confining geography), aka home, neighborhood, and nation, significantly shape the formation
of sociopolitical identities.

IV. METHODOLOGY:
For this project, I will employ both quantitative and qualitative methods in two main regions of
Thailand: Mae Sot and Mae La. Mae Sot is the main gateway between Burma and Thailand, Burmese
constitute about 90% of its population, and trade between the two nations provides the base for its
economy. Mae La is a mountainous, rural village located one hour outside of Mae Sot. A Burmese
refugee camp in Mae La will provide my sample group, and Dr. Cynthia Maung‟s Mae Tao clinic will
serve as my control group of random Mae Sot residents, as they serve a wide array of Mae Sot
residents including “refugees, migrant workers, and other individuals”. In comparing these groups, I
intend to look for ways space and place shape identity/ideology and orientation to the world.

Quantitatively, I will build upon, and contribute to, the Burma Action Survey (“BAS”). The BAS was
developed by Elliott Prasse-Freeman, a researcher at the Carr Center for Human Rights at Harvard
University. It measures the extent to which respondents consider themselves „activists‟ and associate
with pro-democracy ideologies. I will analyze Prasse-Freeman‟s raw data and determine the existing
patterns among Mae Sot residents and other displaced Burmese. I will distribute the same
questionnaire to my sample of „refugees‟ and control group of randomly-selected Mae Sot residents
and add to Prasse-Freeman‟s data. To examine the underlying mechanisms behind these patterns, I
will conduct ethnography in both Mae La and Mae Sot and in-depth interviews with leaders of pro-
democracy political organizations.

V. TIMELINE (2011):
January
Draft literature review.
Review Burmese language and cultural norms.
Finalize meeting dates with community leaders and contacts in Mae Sot and Mae La.
Touch base with professors, organizations, and other advisors in this project before
departing for Thailand.

February
Begin English teaching position at the Mae Tao Clinic.
Record observations of daily life in Mae Sot.
Meetings with community leaders to gather general feedback on life on the border and
political developments since the November election.
Analyze patterns in Prasse-Freeman‟s data.

March-April
Interview leaders of pro-democracy organizations.
Initiate initial survey collection in the Mae Tao clinic.
Continue English classes at Mae Tao Clinic.

May-June
Begin volunteer post in Mae La refugee camp.
Conduct Burma Activism Survey in Mae La refugee camp.
Record conversations and ethnographic research of daily life in the camp.

July-August
Synthesize data and ethnographic work.
Arrange for any other additional meetings, in-depth interviews, or other practices that
may aid in research.

VI. THE BURMA ACTIVISM SURVEY:

Conducted in partnership with the Carr Center for Human Rights at the Harvard Kennedy
School of Government. Summary here taken from:
http://www.hks.harvard.edu/cchrp/hrsm/projects/burmasurvey.php

Part of a longer on-going research project at the Carr Center exploring the way that social
movements operate, the Burma Activism Survey Project seeks to understand the goals,
values, and desires of „transnational‟ Burma activists (both Burmese and non-Burmese).

We are interested in analyzing the way the movement has grown and how it has functioned:
exploring the successes that the Free Burma movement has achieved; the challenges it has
faced – and how it has responded to them; and how activists conceive of and utilize human
rights, democracy, and other language in making appeals to both politicians and the public.
We are using a broad definition of „activist‟ for this study: those who consider themselves,
are considered, or at one point considered themselves Burma activists or, if not activists per
se, those who are otherwise involved in Burma issues and affairs.
The survey is online, available in English or Burmese, and is fully voluntary, confidential,
and anonymous. It will take between 30 and 60 minutes, and one can skip any questions
that one does not want to answer. Please feel free to take the survey using the links below.
If you would like more information on the project, please contact the lead researcher Elliott
Prasse-Freeman at prasse@post.harvard.edu or call 1-617-496-4548.
Elliott Prasse-Freeman is currently an Associate Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at
Harvard University, where he is researching human rights movements; human trafficking/modern day
slavery; and state power, development assistance, and human rights in Burma/Myanmar. An honors
graduate of Harvard College, Prasse-Freeman spent five years
working in international development for various agencies from the UN to international NGOs.

VII. THE MAE TAO CLINIC:

The Mae Tao Clinic (MTC), founded and directed by Dr. Cynthia Maung, provides free health care for
refugees, migrant workers, and other individuals who cross the border from Burma to Thailand.
People of all ethnicities and religions are welcome at the Clinic. Its origins go back to the student pro-
democracy movement in Burma in 1988. The fleeing students who needed medical attention gather in
a small house in Mae Sot, and that served as MTC‟s birthplace.

Since 1989 MTC has grown, from that one small house to a large complex of simple buildings that
provide a wide variety of health services to different groups of people. Today it serves a target
population of approximately 150,000 on the Thai-Burma border. Exact numbers are hard to calculate
because of the fluidity of the population. About 50% of those who come to MTC for medical
attention are migrant workers in the Mae Sot area; the other 50% travel cross-border from Burma for
care.

I will spend most of February and March as a participant observer in the clinic, getting acclimated to
Mae Sot and working as an English teacher in the Children‟s Development Center. The clinic runs a
school for children of migrant workers in Thailand. The children of MTC Staff also attend. The
Children‟s Development Center serves approximately 500 youths each year, many of whom are
learning English to prepare for their next stage of life in an English-speaking country. The school
consists of a day care center, nursery school, and primary school up to 6th grade. The school provides
boarding accommodation for about 160 boarders.

Image sources: www.maetaoclinic.org and Google Earth, respectively

VIII. Mae La Refugee Camp

The Mae La Refugee Camp is largely an agricultural village serving a predominantly displaced Karen
population. It is maintained by the Thai Burma Border Consortium (TBBC) who is generously
granting me access to the camp. It is worth noting that the camp was attacked in 1997 by DKBA
troops with support from Burma Army units. The TBBC web site states, “There have been no
incursions since then, but a mortar shell landed in Section A5 in March 1998. Every dry season, this
area is quite tense with concerns relating to camp security – threats of armed attack and/or attempts
to burn the camp.”

The area of Karen State lying opposite Mae La camp is very rural with no large settlements or
infrastructure. The Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) maintains its 7th Brigade Headquarters
nearby, and there are several Burma Army and Democratic Karen Buddhist Army outposts in the area
(the DKBA is a faction of the KNLA which split off and aligned itself with the Burma Army in 1994).

TBBC reports that the village serves approximately 40,000 displaced refugees.

Image source: www.tbbc.org

IX. BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Edelman, Marc. “Social Movements: Changing Paradigms and Forms of Politics” 2001: Annual
Review of Anthropology. Volume 30, pp. 285-317

Eisinger, Peter. “The conditions of protest behavior in American cities.” 1973: American Political
Science Review. Volume 81, pp. 11-28.

Klandermans, Bert. Methods of Social Movement Research (Social Movements, Protest, and Contention). St. Paul:
University of Minnesota Press (2002)

Low, Setha M. The Anthropology of Space and Place: Locating Culture. New York: Wiley-Blackwell (2003)

Loy, David. The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory. Canton: Wisdom Publications (1997)

Meyer, DS. “Protest and political opportunities” 2004: Annual Review of Sociology. Volume 30, pp.
125-145

Myint-U, Thant. The River of Lost Footsteps: A Personal History of Burma. New York: Farrar, Straus and
Giroux (2008)
Rieffel, Lex. Myanmar/Burma: External Interests and Internal Challenges. Washington, DC: Brookings
Institution (2010)

Staggenborg, Suzanne. Social Movements. London: Oxford University Press (2010)

Steinberg, David I. Burma/Myanmar: What Everyone Needs to Know. New York: Oxford University Press,
USA (2009)

Suu Kyi, Aung San and Clements, Alan. The Voice of Hope: Updated and Revised Edition. New York :
Seven Stories Press (2008)

Thai Burma Border Coalition (TBBC) 2010 Report: “Protracted Displacement and Chronic Poverty in
Eastern Burma/Myaynmar” <http://www.tbbc.org/resources/resources.htm#idps>

Tuan, Yi-Fu. Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. St. Paul: University of Minnesota Press (2001)

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