Chapter
10
Political opposition and Buddhism
Aung San Suu Kyi once commented that she wondered ‘if
the countries that embraced Buddhism did so because they needed it,
because there was something violent in their societies that needed to
be controlled by Buddhism.’
In saying this, she sought to explain the role of Buddhism as a critical value
to those opposing repressive government in Buddhist countries, both in
supporting the cause of the opposition, and in providing an acceptable idiom
with which to tone down the authorities' intransigence. In this chapter, I
wish to ask a relatively simple question, namely whether political opposition
has historically been phrased most effectively and most peacefully in terms of
Buddhist concepts and in mental states, rather than in people grouping
together under the banner of a party. In saying this, I am not arguing that
there is no scope for a secular political party. I am merely seeking to
understand why the idiom for political opposition in Burma necessarily draws
so heavily on Buddhist vocabulary. In other words, is nibbana, besides
representing the ultimate form of national independence and freedom, as
well as national unity and harmony, not also the idiom per se
for opposition?
If the concept ‘government’ is inadequate for either
the generals or the NLD, so also is the concept of ‘opposition’ to
designate the NLD. Opposition is generally taken to mean those who are in
opposition not to the Government in power, but to government – i.e.
‘anarchy’, ‘insurgency’, ‘terrorrism’, ‘foreign interests’.
The same ambiguities in the idea of government are therefore replicated in the
concept of ‘opposition’.
The regime and the national and international media
persistently sketch Aung San Suu Kyi as constituting and representing
opposition. However, Aung San Suu Kyi questions the connotations of this
designation for ‘the word “opposition” when applied to a party which won
the unequivocal mandate of the people takes on a peculiar ring’.
Victor was able to interview SLORC-SPDC members and academics, provided she
agreed not to contact ‘The Lady, or anyone else from what the government
referred to as the “political opposition”.’ She pointedly commented that
‘the fact they referred to Aung San Suu Kyi and other pro-democracy
advocates as the “opposition” was erroneous’, and proceeded to suggest
that the regime's choice not to recognize the election results ‘made them
the “opposition”.’
The question is what idiom the opposition uses. The
monastic population in 1997 was 167,562 monks and 239,341 novices, making a
total of 406,903 incumbents in 51,322 monasteries (the number of nuns is
recorded as 24,043). This is around the same size as the military. Even Saw
Maung hesitated when the opposition phrased their demands for democracy in
terms of the Buddhist mangala sutta, as he was forced to characterise
them as ‘all of them are good laws’.
It is perhaps no coincidence that Aung San Suu Kyi should have designated
(though prompted by Clements) the role of opposition in democracy as playing
‘the role of Devadatta for any legal government’ as ‘it stops the ruling
party from going astray by constantly pointing out its mistake.’ Devadatta
was the principal detractor of the Buddha and if we are to take the NLD as
representing government, this would equate the generals to Devadatta. In my
view, Buddhism is the only idiom open to the opposition that elicits any sort
of dialogue – such is not open to ‘secular’ opposition.
Opposition
is illegal
Judge Rajsoomer Lallah, the United Nations Special
Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights, concluded in October 1996:
‘there is essentially no freedom of thought, opinion, expression or
association in Myanmar. The absolute power of SLORC is exercised to silence
opposition and penalize those holding dissenting views or beliefs’.
What is opposition in Burma? Except where it concerns
opposition to the foreign invader, in Burma the concept of opposition [Atiuk\AKMx
Sn\>k¥c\Pk\] is broadly associated with negative qualities in the
context of
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ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman. Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics.
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p213/392
pre-colonial and post-national independence politics for three
reasons.
First, with the centralisation of power lying with a king
or general, there is no place for the peaceful existence of political
opposition, and opposition invites immediate retribution from the political
authorities. The regime views opposition with suspicion and is unwilling,
perhaps even unable, to allocate it a place in its political scheme.
-
Daw Suu Kyi's actions have gone beyond the limits of an
opposition leader and she is actually holding a hostile attitude toward the
State Law and Order Restoration Council. Big nations of the West bloc are
coaxing her by flattery. Indeed, the State Law and Order Restoration Council
is a government discharging a historic duty. There is no need for any
opposition group. All that is necessary is cooperation for traversing a period
of peaceful political transition.
The authorities in Mindon's time shared this same
attitude. In 1874, King Mindon heard that Prime Minister Gladstone's party
lost in the British elections, to which he said ‘then poor Ga-la-sa-tong
(Gladstone) is in prison I suppose. I am sorry for him. I don't think he was a
bad fellow’.
It never occurred to him that when a political opposition party loses the
elections that it might not end up in prison. Indeed, political opposition,
unless it is sufficiently strong to extort respect, would appear to
necessarily imply exile, imprisonment or death. This is why in Burma, those
who declare themselves opponents to the regime are either extremely courageous
or extremely foolish – there is little in-between. Thus there is no working
concept of opposition in Burmese politics, and it is therefore not accorded
any respect by the authorities who simply do not have mechanisms to deal with
it.
Second, and by association with the first, expressions of
opposition are thereby necessarily equated with confrontation, and therefore
armed force. This indeed underlies Aung San Suu Kyi's characterisation of
authoritarian governments as seeing ‘criticism of their actions and
doctrines as a challenge to combat’ and opposition as ‘equalled with
“confrontation”’ [Y40].
Just laws which ‘uphold human rights’ as the necessary foundation for
peace and security can ‘only be denied by closed minds which interpret peace
as the silence of all opposition’ [E32]. Without a working concept of
opposition, the idea arises that opposition, if it is to survive, must be
highly circumspect; it must be silent, it must make no noise, and so it must
be stealthy.
With the regime experiencing expressions of opposition as
stealth, the authorities in turn, become ever more paranoic and scrutinise for
the slightest expression of conspiracy by the opposition, whatever form it
might take. They demand immediate revocation of such expressions. For example,
it was soon said that Aung San Suu Kyi's actions had ‘gone beyond the limits
of an opposition leader’, and that she had ‘a hostile attitude toward the
SLORC’. For that reason she had become ‘no opposition leader’, i.e. she
was classed as an ‘insurgent’. The regime's mass media
portray returning refugees as saying the regime is ‘flexible’ because it
is willing to take back refugees who fled oppression and organised resistance
abroad. In return they call for the opposition to stop being
‘uncompromising’ and adopt a ‘more flexible approach’, to conduct
their affairs in a ‘more pliable manner’.
Third, opposition is seen as threatening to ‘harmony’
and ‘national unity’. Indeed, the overarching emphasis on national unity
means that the idea of opposition is literally equated with the ‘destruction
of unity (nyi-nyut-yeì)’.
For example, rather than seeing the process of political discussion with the
opposition as improving overall government, the regime portrays opposition as
based entirely on ‘selfish’ views by factions unwilling to co-operate
selflessly along with all Burmese in the grand project of nation-building for
the good of the motherland.
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p214/392
Fourth, and as a result of this, opposition in
post-colonial history is seen as posing an immediate threat to national
independence, for in disagreeing they are weakening the hold of authority over
the national boundaries. Opposition is, therefore, particularly interpreted as
foreign influence and non-Burman behaviour.
Fifth, and this is the highest order perception,
opposition is frequently associated with being ‘wrong-viewed’ in the
Buddhist sense. The boundaries here are not just boundaries of the state, but
they are portrayed as the righteous boundaries determined by right and correct
behaviour based on Buddhist morality and Buddhist principles.
Though the very concept of political opposition is being
altered by recent events, these attributes of opposition are therefore a
singularly unattractive proposition for increasing one's following as an
opposition leader. Only when the regime is perceived as absolutely
illegitimate by acting against Buddhist interests, and when people see that
their battle is not only a fair one, but one that can be won, as when they
could play off the British and Japanese interests in Burma (it would be a
fight for both freedom and national independence), can the opposition
have the power to move things along.
Though the army has been less tolerant than most, the
struggle for national independence itself did not lead to a marked increase in
tolerance for the political opposition on the part of the majority of Burma's
colonial and post-colonial political leaders. As Nemoto points out, the idea
implied in the Dobama ‘Us-Burmans’ movement that arose in the 1930s is
that, while Dobama were positioning themselves against the British, they were
at the same time excluding any claims by their political opposition
represented by ‘Their-Burmans’ [qUtiu>bma]
who were sympathetic to the British. The army grew out of this movement, and
it has perpetuated this intolerance for opposition. Throughout post-war
democratic political history there was a one-party system, albeit an elected
one, until 1962. This is the legacy of the collective fight by most political
factions under the umbrella of the AFPFL in opposition to the Japanese, and
later the British. So opposition has unqualified positive connotations only
where it aims for the united liberation from foreign powers so as to secure
and maintain national independence. However, wherever opposition threatens the
ideal of unity that permits this fight to succeed, the concept has
historically had negative connotations. The current regime sees itself as both
government and opposition rolled into one.
In other words, in Burma opposition very quickly becomes
a choice between imprisonment, excommunication, exile or death. At the best of
times, these are not an attractive proposition for increasing one's political
following or public reputation.
The fact that the co-operation Saw Maung demanded for
this ‘traversing period’ has already lasted a decade, and mirrors Ne Win's
regular promise of moving towards democracy between 1962–88 leaves little
faith in the view that we are moving into an era of multi-party
representation. The fundamental flaw is in the military regime itself for not
recognizing the concept of opposition as valid, for not incorporating the
principle now, and for asphyxiating all indigenous support for organised
opposition.
Despite the regime having hampered the movements and
activities of the opposition in every imaginable way, making it quite
incapable of functioning as an opposition party, the regime feels it has to go
so far as to accuse the opposition for actually being responsible for holding
up the process of democratization. For example, by October 1998 the NLD, tired
of the derailment of government reform, called for the meeting of parliament.
The regime responded saying that ‘efforts made for the establishment of a
genuine democratic nation and bringing about all-round national development
are delayed and dimmed due to the acts of NLD to obstruct all undertakings of
the Tatmadaw government.’ This does not square,
however, with the accusation also made of Aung San Suu Kyi that she is
ineffective among Burmese people, and only cohorts with foreigners. The press
is full of statements that she has no following and that all Burmese oppose
her. If Burma is, indeed, a totally self-sufficient country her actions
certainly would have no adverse effects.
Furthermore, military intelligence serves as the regime's
arm of ‘wisdom’. In short, it has a conspirational view of the political
landscape in which the communists and foreign interests manipulate opposition
groups such as the NLD entirely for selfish ends, and so its depiction of
these groups is largely of the ‘puppet-mode’ type, in which the opposition
is directly tied to strings pulled by its unpatriotic, selfish and un-Burman
masters.
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Buddhism
and humanitarianism
What can political opposition do when there is no
political space? At Aung San Suu Kyi's keynote address presented as a video at
on 31 August 1995 to NGO Forum on Women, Beijing '95, Aung San Suu Kyi argued
that the Buddhist monastic tradition of mutual forgiveness (pavarana)
was ‘a forerunner of the most democratic institutions, the parliament’
[Y20], [I2]. Furthermore, she implied that the international UN organizations
are a much needed neutral ground for Burma, much in the way that the monastery
is: ‘the watchfulness and active cooperation of organizations outside the
spheres of officialdom are necessary to ensure the four essential components
of the human development paradigm as identified by the UNDP: productivity,
equity, sustainability and empowerment’. To permit some limited role for
opposition, then, it is necessary to draw on Buddhist terminology.
If Aung San Suu Kyi sees in the Buddhist tradition a
ground ‘outside the spheres of officialdom’, this function is indeed born
out when we look at the history of the Sangha. Monks have historically
interceded to abolish or reduce the sentences of prisoners. For example, under
Bayinnaung (1551–81), after his march on Chiengmai, rebels destroyed Pegu in
1564, and Bayinnaung rounded up several thousand rebels and put them in cages
to be burnt alive. However, it was the Burmese, Mon and Shan monks who came
out to feed the caged prisoners, who were not allowed food, and who entreated
his Majesty so that they ‘finally obtained the lives of them all save
seventy ringleaders’.
Sangermano describes an extreme example when Bodawpaya's predecessor ordered
capital punishment, upon which monks ‘issued from their convents in great
number with heavy sticks concealed under their habits, with which they
furiously attacked the ministers of justice, put them to flight, and unbinding
the culprit conducted him to their [monasteries]’. This habit of monks
interceding on behalf of prisoners meant that they were often forbidden to
attend executions.
Monks have also cared for lost sailors, who would have been seized with ship
and all by the king. Here, ‘as in so much else the harshness of the rulers
was mitigated by the humanity of the monks; if the distressed mariner wandered
into a monastery he was sage, for the monks would bind up his wounds, feed
him, clothe him, and send him as if in sanctuary from monastery to monastery
till he could reach Syriam, there to await the chance of some passing ship.’
Monks have also sometimes acted to protect the King
himself, as was the case with King Thalun (1629–48) when several hundred
monks defended him with sticks against his enemy.
And furthermore, they have acted as intermediaries and on peace missions; to
Yunnan with the Chinese under Narathihapate subsequent to the successful
Chinese advance in 1283; in a mission to Sri Lanka by Bayinnaung in 1574; and
on several other occasions.
Though not always, these efforts by monks often elicited
a response, where the perpetrator sometimes showed mercy. When King Minhkaung
(r 1401–1422) suffered defeat under Razadarit, and was at a loss as
to how to respond, an eminent monk Pinya came forward ‘saying he had
eloquence enough to persuade any king in the universe, and he would undertake
a parley’. This resulted in the monk speaking ‘holy words on the sin of
bloodshed and Razadarit inclined his ear … He consented to withdraw … he
even rebuked his men for taking the heads of forty of the Shwekyetyet pagoda
slaves.’ Similar peace missions, to which aggressors responded positively,
took place under King Tabinshwehti (1531–50), and under King Alaunghpaya
(1752–60).
Some have attributed the relatively rare large-scale
slaughter of monks by kings in Burmese history to the idea that kings
recognized the monks' political influence, and that in order to gain complete
victory they also had to eradicate this form of opposition. Thus the killing
of 360 monks by the Shan king Thohanbwa in 1540 has been attributed to his
perception that ‘the monks led the people in resistance’.
Again, Alaunghpaya (1752–60) supposedly threw more than 3000 monks to be
trampled by elephants for their part in the defence in Pegu.
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It has been common practice at momentous state occasions,
such as the coronation of the king, to release detained persons and animals,
and for a short period not to hunt or catch animals such as fish. Such
occasion of liberation would be the time for the king to affirm his vows to
rule as a righteous king respectful of Buddhist precepts and the sanctity of
life. ‘On 16 June 1854 the ceremony of Opening the Throne Room shall be
held; synchronising with the time of this ceremony set free all prisoners
without exception and all caged animals and birds; this Order applies to all
captives in both capital and provinces …’ In Burmese this is known
as ‘cleaning’ or ‘emptying the prison’ [eTac\Kå]. This is also done to gain the approval and co-operation
from monks country-wide who, as the main educators and guardians of the
Burmese value system, are the most influential and omnipresent force in the
politics of the country.
Burmese kings historically aspired to the ideal of bodhisattva,
and strove after their own eventual enlightenment with the aim to emancipate
all creatures from samsara. In other words, their duty is not to
imprison, but by the instrument of their own eventual Buddhahood, to behave
according to the Buddhist code of ethics and deliver substantial benefit to
the people, including setting them free from samsara, the ultimate
Buddhist concept of imprisonment. Thus, King Alaungsitthu prayed in 1131 that
‘as this great being [the Buddha] has fulfilled the Ten Perfections (parami)
and attained omniscience, releasing all from bondage, so may I fulfil the Ten
Perfections and attain omniscience and loose the bonds of all …’. He hoped
that his works of merit would lead him to build a causeway across the river of
Samsara where ‘all folk would speed across’ so that he can ‘drag the
drowning over’ and himself ‘freed, set free the bound’. He would also
want, with his act of merit, to behold Arimettaya, the future Buddha, who
‘sets free Samsara's captives by his holy word.’
Harvey refers to the Sangha as ‘representing the public
conscience’, the approval of which ‘every king strove to win’.
As Rewatta Dhamma said with reference to the regime, ‘in Buddhist countries
an expression of the social dimensions of Dhamma is the guiding and softening
influence which the ordained Sangha has traditionally exercised over rulers.
Where this influence declines, we see the rulers become ever more cruel and
irresponsible … No amount of pagoda building or formal respect for the
Sangha can substitute for their mutual [including the Sangha] responsibility
to serve the people and the Dhamma.’
Monasticism
and career mobility
Members of the Sangha and their close relatives were
traditionally free from taxation and services, and had unparalleled
independence when compared to the ordinary villager who was obligated to the
king in various ways. Certain privileges were even extended to villagers
cultivating monastic lands, thus permitting the idea that performing work for
monks permitted some protection from an unjust government.
This was in part related to the monastery as an institution that legitimated
the king, but the institution was also the recruiting ground for the king.
Burma inherited a new form of government at national
independence, very different from that of the royal period. No longer could
the monk's career path end in high government service. A seemingly impermeable
barrier was now placed between humanitarian, freedom-loving and fiercely
independent monks, and the career path of the civil servant, bureaucrat and
politician. Prime Minister U Nu sought to reintroduce permeability by
fostering Buddhist practices – and in particular vipassana practice
– in government, which he hoped would be adopted in secular political life,
and imbue it with the ethical values that might moderate the excesses of greed
and corruption that was quickly overtaking inexperienced government officers.
However, by imposing a secular model on government, and
centralizing power in the army which no longer allows monks to follow the
career path to government and office, the regimes since 1962 have kept at bay
this tradition of accommodating Buddhist ethics which might have ameliorated
their excesses and greed. By substituting it with the ethics of a professional
army, based on hierarchy and command, and demanding unwavering loyalty, a
political environment has been created which is less amenable to yielding in
compromise and humanitarian gesture than was even the royal system of
government, which was inflexible
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enough. No U Hpo Hlaing could emerge in this
system, who left the monkhood to become Minister of the Interior and who
advocated liberal values and reform in government along the awza
principles I elaborated earlier. After 1992, the use of Buddhist concepts to
justify this state of affairs adds to the indignity of what is still regarded
world-wide as the most intensely Buddhist country in the world, governed by a
group of officers apparently little moved by calls to adopt higher Buddhist
practices and to work on the basis of legitimacy through awza.
Monasticism,
revolution and political opposition
Monks maintain a vow of chastity and their mobility,
together with their independent minds sharpened by mental culture, makes them,
like young students with no family responsibilities, revolutionary kegs that
could light up any time. The difference with monks, however, is that they have
grass-roots influence in the remotest villages where they are trusted and
where their advice is sought. They are, therefore, potentially the more
significantly revolutionary force than the students.
Monks have played an important role in particular in the
early anti-colonial movements of the 1920s, but also in the 1980s and 1990s.
However, the greatest limitation on the revolutionary role of monks has been
their inability to keep up with secular political ideologies. Nevertheless,
since leftist ideologies have adapted Buddhist terminology, it is often
difficult to separate leftist ideology from Buddhism. This has ensured
perpetuation of the relevance of the practices of mental culture even within
otherwise secular ideology. Buddhism has thus always been an indispensable
element in revolutionary politics, even in communist and socialist ideology.
It is this autonomy of the Sangha which permitted the
emergence of ‘political monks’ such as U Ottama and U Wisara who were very
effective in organising protests against the British in the 1920s. U Ottama
did ‘for nationalism in Burma part of what Gandhi did for it in India by
transforming an essentially political problem into a religious one’. They
presented Buddhism as ‘allegedly being attacked; the monks were being
mistreated by police and courts; the dignity and pride of the Burman nation
was, therefore, being outraged …’. They used prophesies and magic as well
as direct agitation to turn the people ‘against the foreign government, the
police … the tax collector and even the village headman’. Their overt
political role did cause some splits within the Sangha, but through their
political associations, such as the General Council of Sangha Associations (GCSA),
founded in 1922, they provided the force in the villages which aspiring
nationalists needed, and if ‘nationalist politicians in Burma wanted popular
backing, they had little choice but to line up with the political pongyis,
who alone swayed the village Wunthanu Athins’.
Not having permitted any sort of alternative political
organization, and in the absence of credible local leaders in whom the people
have confidence, the military regimes since 1962 have left themselves entirely
open to the reassertion of local monastic leadership, which in more recent
times organised and kept order at the protests and rebellions under the the
SLORC–SPDC, in particular in Mandalay. The sudden shift in formal support
for Buddhism on the part of the regime did not come until 1992, when it
realised that it was without means to influence the population. This explains,
as I have already noted, why Saw Maung called the elections ‘in accordance
with the request made by the State Sangha Maha Nayaka Committee Sayadaws on 10
August 1988’.
Buddhism
and the idiom of liberation
I have already noted that the Sangha provided the
discourse for national unity. However, here we have seen it does more – the
Sangha also provides an idiom for opposition, a softening influence on
government, and a career for government servants in the past. Also, as we have
seen, the Sangha provides the idiom of liberation in terms of which the avenue
to freedom may be conceived. In practice this idea of freedom can take many
forms, but it must always in some way relate to the ultimate concept of
freedom, which is nibbana. This is how we must understand Aung San's
characterisation of national independence as loka nibbana.
This transcendental aspect of Buddhism is a fundamental
aspect of the traditional Burmese State, and it is unimaginable to propose a
system that brings political order without this. It was used by Anawratha to
weaken the feudal hold local spirit cults (and local landlords) had over the
Burmese population,
and
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ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman. Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics.
ILCAA Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p218/392
permitted new forms of inter-ethnic and inter-state forms of politics not
hitherto possible by means of the feudal model. It permitted much mobility and
cross-regional co-operation. The introduction of a universalistic Buddhism,
therefore, necessarily involved coming to terms with the limitations on the
powers of the local spirit cults (a common belief is that practising vipassana
means no longer fearing spirit ‘possession’). The delicate balance between
these two systems helped propagate the unique qualities of the Burmese
Buddhist state.
The spirit cults provide the immobile centres which
orient themselves towards the royal and supernatural centres at Pagan, Mount
Popa and Taungbyon, and which play a role in conceptualizing duty towards the
state; the monks, on the other hand, in their aspiration to unconditioned nibbana
with no duties or obligations, provide an element of centreless mobility by
means of which geographical and ethnic opposites can be reconciled. Though
kings and their subjects wavered between the two systems, and interests were
by no means perfectly synchronised between these systems, both were necessary
to keep the political system in balance during the royal period. This
mechanism was in play when Htin Aung observed in the advent of Buddhism that
‘the [Burmese] outlook suddenly became international’ so that ‘the
pattern of Burmese history became a chequer board with black squares of
insularity and white squares of internationalism, with the Burmese sometimes
fleeing to the safety of a black square, and at other times going forward
along the white squares.’ U Hpo Hlaing and U Nu, as
well as the senior NLD leaders, mostly stand on the white squares hemmed in by
the forces of ana, which is why vipassana was an important
element in their politics; the current regime, however, developed the idea
that they can redesign the chequer-board, for the black squares have been
invaded by ‘foreigners’ who must be expelled onto the white squares to
which they belong. In doing so, not only are they, like a small child angry at
losing, altering the rules of the game, but the game has also thereby become
unplayable for, in not permitting white squares as ‘Burmese’, they have
lost their legitimacy and the ability to influence.
With its roots deep in every village where people have
integrated support for the Sangha into their everyday lives, and a long
history of monk mobility all over the country, the Sangha exercises a
formidable influence on political opinion. They are the custodians of the
techniques of mental culture that, as we have seen, permit liberation from the
prison-as-samsara.
Kings not only authorize inter-regional monastic
exchanges, but they need it. Lieberman once described the monk as allowing the
king ‘to advance the spiritual welfare of the population’ which was ‘the
ultimate purpose of Burmese monarchy’.
Sometimes this support permitted an avenue of escape from persecution. For
example, during the large-scale conscription under King Nandabayin
(1591–99), a large number of Mon sought to free themselves from their
obligations by entering the Sangha.
Unprepared to elevate the Sangha out of ordinary human
society by permitting them their own courts, the British nevertheless were
forced to recognize that monk prisoners should have some form of separate
legal space. Though monks were not permitted to wear their robes, Sir Reginald
Craddock nevertheless permitted prisoner monks to keep their uboneí
twice a month within a special temporary ordination space (thein) of an
open space ten feet by ten feet, marked off by temporary posts within the
prison.
U Nu had been working towards a separate legal space for the Sangha to keep
them out of prison altogether. The introduction of the 1950 Vinicchaya Act
took the monkhood out of the secular legal space which the British had
imposed, once again permitting them their own law courts. Furthermore, U Nu's
policy of cleaning up Buddhism through positive support for its activities,
rather than repressing the institution itself, which the military regime has
done in the 1980s and 1990s, was responsible for actually raising the leverage
that government was able to exercise over rogue monks while at the same time
developing a ‘distinctive nationhood’.
Without a separate space for secular political opposition
within Burma's political culture, this would explain why Aung San Suu Kyi has
developed special relationships with the Sangha and its transcendental
Buddhist idioms. Historically this has been the only autonomous institution
mastering the only ideology and
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ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman. Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics.
ILCAA Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p219/392
practices of freedom to operate in Burma that
are capable of organising opposition to the state.
This legally independent space was legitimated by the Buddha himself.
Immediately after his enlightenment, the Buddha instructed his five disciples
at Isipatana, the deer sanctuary, saying: ‘I am free from all bondage and
shackles; you all are free from bondage and shackles too. Go now, Bhikkhus,
wander through the land as teachers out of compassion for the pain-ridden
world, for the good of many, for the welfare and happiness of many, for the
benefit of men and devas.’ This freedom transcends
the grounded black squares of the spirit cults as much is it does the casual
reach of the royal or military arm and the prison.
The
Sangha and Ne Win
The Sangha took the lead in questioning the legitimacy of
Ne Win's post-1962 regime. In particular, they questioned the wholesale
nationalisation of production methods in the name of socialism, which were
interpreted contrary to first precept not to steal, and as a form of
communism, which would end up starving the monks of their means of support.
This was first tested in April 1963 with the Mahamyatmuni Pagoda, when monks
successfully protested and the Ne Win regime backed off from taking
custodianship of this nationally famous pagoda. In October 1963, the 83 year
old monk U Kethaya made speeches to crowds of up to ten thousand people,
arguing that General Ne Win would meet his death in due course. Monks also
protested against demonetization that had impoverished their supporters.
By 1965, the Ne Win regime repealed all U Nu's acts in
support of Buddhism which observers predicted would lead to future problems
for the regime with the Sangha.
-
Unlike all previous governments of independent Burma, the
present Ne Win regime has adopted policies which are clearly inimical to the
long-range prestige and power of the Sangha. Unlike all previous governments,
it does not enjoy the support of any significant monastic organization. It
seems likely that more active Sangha opposition to the regime will be one
factor in future developments.
In that same year in Hmawbi, monks refused to accept
government control over them and Ne Win arrested more than seven hundred
monks, some of whom were abused and imprisoned.
During the arrangements for U Thant's funeral in 1974,
several monks were bayoneted and six hundred were arrested. In 1976, the
regime sought to discredit La Ba, a monk persistently critical of the regime
who was accused of murder and cannibalism. In 1978, more monks and novices
were arrested, disrobed and imprisoned. Monasteries were closed and their
property seized. Also in that year Sayadaw U Nayaka died in jail after being
tortured.
Despite efforts since the 1980s to unify the Sangha,
Mendelson's generalization still holds that the strength of the Sangha in
Burma is found ‘not in its national ecclesiastical structures’, but in
‘such fundamental areas as its adherence of the Vinaya, its taga and tagama
[sponsor] relationships, its role as culture carrier in education, and, most
importantly, its ability to discipline itself through the formation of small,
(self)governable monastic groups such as taiks or sects, which are the
Sangha's best defense against the efforts of those who would use it for
secular ends.’
Any Burmese government must come to terms with this heritage of the Burmese
Sangha as an independent decentralized force, but one that needs material
support and protection, and therefore can be persuaded to support certain
causes. Paradoxically, it is only when the Sangha is supported, that it can be
won over to support national development; this is something this regime cannot
credibly do.
In separating the state from Buddhism, and in making
political parties illegal, the problem emerged of the use of Buddhism by
political groups. The Ne Win regime attempted to constrain the monastic
prerogative to ordain and liberate people from all backgrounds by declaring
the validity only of Nine Sects in Buddhism. The regimes since 1988 came to
view senior monks who ordain men irrespective of background as ‘acting in
collusion with illegal political parties’.
The
Sangha and the democratic movement
Smith argues that ‘Buddhism is not only compatible with
democracy but also provides some important
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values which strongly support
it’.
Since 1988, the Sangha has played a vital role throughout the period of
protests. This force of the Sangha was recognised when Saw Maung called the
elections, he said, after being pursuaded by the Sangha. The fact is, the
Sangha is the only entity that the regime recognises it can not
incorporate into its ‘legal fold’. Though they wish to exercise underhand
influence by corrupting the Sangha with expensive luxury donations, for such
would weaken strong monks, even in their concept the Sangha does not belong in
the legal fold.
Of course, in the 1920s, following the assertion of
Buddhist culture in the guise of the YMBA, but before the appearance of
secular political parties, monks like U Ottama and U Wisara rallied Burmese
political consciousness by becoming martyrs for the cause of freedom when they
were imprisoned in colonial jails. The British saw them as ‘political
monks’. In this decade of Burmese powerlessness to advance their nationalist
cause, the Sangha has also taken up the mantle of political opposition, for
there is no alternative space for opposition.
Monks similarly played a leading role in the 1988
protests. According to some estimates, six hundred monks were killed during
August and September 1988, and when Saw Maung took over on 18 September
hundreds of monks fled to the jungle near the borders. This was followed by an
increase in surveillance, harassment and arrests of monks suspected of having
been involved in the protests. In June 1989, a young Mandalay monk U Koweinda
was arrested and sentenced to ten years in prison, extended to fifteen years
in 1990 supposedly because he was a leader of a Mandalay prison riot. He died
there in October 1994, only in his early thirties. Another U Kowainda, was
arrested for his involvement in the 1988 protests. Accused of being a
communist, he died in by September 1991. It is suspected that both monks were
tortured to death. On 6 July 1989, the army barricaded Shwedagon and searched
all pilgrims, and at a scuffle attributed to the army, eleven monks and
seventeen students were killed.
Hence, by end November 1989 the regime had used up any
goodwill it might have had from the Sangha. The regime, however, accused the
Sangha of harbouring political opposition. Saw Maung, for example, asserted on
10 November 1989 that the army knew what students were doing in which
monasteries, but that they took no action as they ‘were worried there would
be religious problems’.
In particular, he suspected that insurgents would come ‘disguised as
monks’.
Democratic
parliament under the Sangha
In the face of the SLORC's stalling, and its clampdown on
all forms of political opposition, monks took over the leading role in the
demand for parliamentary democracy. As I have already pointed out, not only
were they the primary agency to whom the military offered the 1990 multi-party
elections, but members of the Sangha offered to house parliament in a
monastery themselves. For their front line role in the demands for government
reform, the Sangha was subject to increased repression by the army. This took
the relationship between the Sangha and the regime to an extreme low,
prompting the Sangha to call a strike against the regime, never before
recorded in Burmese history.
The events unfolded as follows. When elected NLD
representatives met at Gandhi Hall on 29 July 1990, they issued the so-called
Gandhi Declaration in which they called upon the SLORC to transfer power to
the NLD in accordance with a revised version of the 1947 constitution, to
convene the parliament (Hluttaw) before 30 September, to permit freedom of
expression, and to release NLD members and leaders from prison and house
arrest.
However, the SLORC in anticipation of the Gandhi Hall meeting, issued
Declaration 1/90 on 27 July, which stated that the SLORC ‘is not an
organisation that observes any constitution, it is an organisation that is
governing the nation by martial law’.
Instead, citing the need to protect ethnic minorities in particular, the SLORC
proposed that no parliament could convene until a new constitution was
drafted.
In proposing such delays, and in proclaiming that the leading role in any
future
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p221/392
government was to be played by the army, the regime affirmed that it
was unwilling to hand over power under an interim constitution.
The NLD was coming under increasing public criticism for
inaction, while the SLORC experienced great fear of popular revenge by the
people.
Indeed, during this general state of fear in this very year Aung San Suu Kyi's
Freedom from fear came out. U Kyi Maung said in a broadcast that
‘people such as Khin Nyunt might reasonably feel themselves pretty
insecure’, to which Khin Nyunt replied that he was a soldier and ‘I never
anticipate fear’.
In the ethnicity question the SLORC saw an opportunity to find outside support
and leverage its influence over the NLD. It proposed to give all parties equal
representation, which would enhance not only the ethnic minority
representation, but would also give the NUP the same representation as the NLD.
They even proposed to create new ethnic states. However, about half of the
ethnic minority vote with the NLD anyway, and there was no prospect of the
ethnic minorities entering into a political alliance with the army.
Impatient with the delays, monk and student organisations
came forward promising to provide three thousand monks and two thousand
students to keep order if the NLD was prepared to hold its first parliamentary
session in defiance of the SLORC in a monastery in Mandalay.
On 8 August 1990, over seven thousand monks and novices
walked in line accepting alms in Mandalay in commemoration of the second
anniversary of the 8.8.88 massacre. Soldiers confronted the line and shot four
people dead, two of whom were monks and several others were wounded.
This moment of crisis brought to the fore struggle in
spiritual terms, or as Mya Maung put it, ‘ … the tradition-bound Burmese
… turned to traditional protests by reading signs, symbols, and omens for
the downfall of the military junta’.
By the last week of August, it was reported that the left breast of a Buddha
image near Mandalay was swollen. This sign soon spread to other Buddha images
across Burma, including the oozing of blood from the eyes of the Buddha. The
military surrounded the pagodas and cut off access to the shrines, taking away
images. This was popularly interpreted ‘that the next ruler of Burma is
going to be Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’.
In other words, the swelling of the breast indicated a woman would take over
leadership of the country.
The
monastic boycott
On 27 August 1990, at a meeting of more than seven
thousand monks in Mandalay, mostly belonging to the Monks’ Union (Sangha
Sammagi), senior monks led by U Yewata called for the ultimate and final
instrument of disapproval of government at their disposal, namely a boycott
against the military. Known as pattam nikkujjana kamma, ‘overturning
the bowl,’ it signified that alms would not be accepted from military
families and no services would be performed for them. This is sanctioned in
the Vinaya, which permits ostracising of laity who commit any of eight
offences: striving for that which is not gain, striving for that which is not
benefit, acting against a monastery, vilifying and making insidious
comparisons between monks, inciting dissension among monks, defaming the
Buddha, defaming the Dhamma and defaming the Sangha. These infringements
permit the Sangha to refuse all contact. It did not remain with sanctions, as
some monks were reported as kneeling in front of soldiers, intending to elicit
shame and fear.
On 30 August the NLD and the second largest vote-winning
party in the 1990 elections, the United Nationalities League for Democracy
(UNLD), announced they would jointly set up parliament in September. In the
course of September senior NLD leaders – including U Kyi Maung – were
arrested.
It became clear from Saw Maung's press conference on 7
September that he saw the monks as belonging to an entirely different legal
sphere, equivalent to the international ‘white squares’ mentioned earlier,
where he could not get at his political opponents. He said that:
-
For members of the religious order, we have respective rules.
For us Buddhists, there is Vinaya and prohibitions. As for those [lay people]
residing within the territories of Myanmar, there should be a constitution, as
a country should have a constitution in order to conduct its international
relations.
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ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman. Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics.
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p222/392
By contrasting the proposed National Constitution with
the Vinaya code, and by referring to himself as functioning like ‘a king’,
in this speech it was clear that Saw Maung was again dealing with the
underlying Buddhist meaning of national unity discussed earlier. The king's cetana
creates balance in the relationship between the black and the white squares.
At this point Saw Maung was unable to reconcile his politics with the
animosity of the monks, and he became increasingly irrational. General Khin
Nyunt took over the press conferences.
The SLORC's stance against the monks was first intimated
in Khin Nyunt's press conference of 11 September, in which he informed monks
that he would remove ‘bogus monks’ from amongst them, while nevertheless
attributing national unity to their influence. Khin Nyunt warned the monks not
to be misled by the Burma Communist Party.
-
At this point, I wish to make this appeal to the senior
abbots, the monks and holy people. In the same way as we, your humble
disciples, have been doing everything possible to make the country peaceful
and prosperous and the teachings of noble Buddha flourish in a pure, stable
and glorious way, may you – our teachers – bless us with Buddha's
teachings and help make the whole country peaceful. Amongst you, holy people,
who have attained such a pure and high standing simply by being monks, are
bogus monks who are trying to blemish Buddhism and lower your prestige, and I
believe they should be removed with proper caution.
The NLD made overtures for negotiation with SLORC on 19
September, which were rebuffed. By 17 October the NLD had seen no progress in
its relationship with the SLORC, and so it announced that it would convene a
new national legislature and would be holding its first meeting on 22 October,
and it would prepare to draft a new constitution and set up departments that
could evolve into ministries.
The next day, on 18 October, Saw Maung met with senior
monks. He demanded an end to the boycot and characterised his actions against
the monks as bearing comparison to King Anawratha's purification of Buddhism
(See App I.7).
However, monks were not taken aback by this. The
sanctions had by then already spread to Rangoon by 13 October, and all over
the country monks refused alms from, and refused to attend religious services
organised by military personnel and their families. On 15 October, leaders of
the Committee of Monks in Mandalay called for General Saw Maung to apologise
to monks on radio and television, to release all arrested monks and not to
keep troops in religious buildings. The regime, in despair, began to invite
Thai monks for donations.
On 19 October, Yaiwata, the most politically active
Buddhist monk, was arrested, jailed and disrobed. The monks were mainly
accused of possessing anti-SLORC literature, including articles by the NLD,
and writing inflammatory poems in their diaries and notebooks. However, monks
were also accused of breaking the Vinaya by gambling, illegally possessing
jade and heroin, and were even accused of rape. Announcements on the radio,
however, merely confined themselves to accusing the monks of working with the
Communist Party of Burma.
On 20 October, Saw Maung issued Order 6/90 that banned
all ‘unlawful’ Sangha organizations, except the nine sects, which had been
declared legal in 1980 under the Ne Win purification of the Sangha. This made
action possible against political parties for the ‘misuse’ of religion for
political purposes. Also, he demanded revocation of the religious boycott
against the military.
On 21 October, SLORC Order 7/90 was passed which
authorized army commanders to bring monks before military tribunals for
‘activities inconsistent with and detrimental to Buddhism.’ These
tribunals imposed punishments ranging from three years’ imprisonment to
death, and military commanders were empowered under martial law to disrobe and
imprison monks for boycotts or protests.
Finally, on 30 October, a code of conduct was issued for
Buddhist monks to observe, with penalties attached for its violation.
In November the regime then clamped down on the Sangha.
-
Monasteries were surrounded by armed troops, and monks were
trapped inside. Electricity, water, and communication lines were cut, and
monks were prevented from going on their daily alms rounds. After maintaining
the blockade for one week, armed troops entered the monasteries and arrested
the leaders. People living near some of the monasteries were also forced to
move, and their homes were destroyed. More than 350 monasteries were raided,
and more than 3,000 monks and novices were arrested. Twenty monasteries were
seized and expropriated.
An explanation of these actions was not given until Khin
Nyunt's press conference on 7 December, in which he delineated the whole thing
as a conspiracy against the State by the Communist Party, the NLD,
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various
other factions, and monks organisations. The SLORC tried to remove evidence of
the arrests. However, Amnesty International compiled a list of seventy-five
monks, ‘arrested in October and November 1990, solely for exercising their
rights to freedom of expression and association.’ In their search of the
monasteries the regime proclaimed to find evidence of Communist affiliations
and many Vinaya irregularities.
Therefore, monks have most certainly fulfilled a vital
role in maintaining the impetus in the fight for democracy, while people and
elected politicians were prevented from acting. Many monks were punished for
their role in the boycott. Here, I will just mention the two most senior
monks. U Thu Mingala was arrested after he refused to condemn the boycott on
legal grounds. A highly respected monk, he was abbot of a monasteries at Kaba
Aye in Rangoon, and one of only five monks in modern Burma to have memorized
the entire Buddhist canon. He was disrobed and sent into internal exile in
Kachin State, but continued to observe the Vinaya as best he could. After his
release in 1995, he returned to Rangoon where he managed to resume his
monastic life. Another senior monk experiencing SLORC vengeance was Jotika, a
professor at the Sangha University in Rangoon. Despite suffering from
intestinal cancer, he was denied medical treatment and died shackled to his
bed in December 1992.
Also, it was reported that in May 1996, a monk named U
Kaythara was arrested near Bandoola Park for writing on the palm of his hand
that the SLORC should have a dialogue with the NLD and for holding a piece of
paper also saying that the SLORC should start a dialogue. It was further
reported that his trial took place on 15 August and that he was sentenced to
seven years imprisonment under section (5)j of the 1950 Emergency Provisions
Act. Sporadic protests by monks continued while I
was in Burma in September 1998.
Since the Sangha is the only institution that has any
potential to operate ‘outside the fold of the law’ within government
controlled territory, it fulfils a vital function for political opposition.
However, as the Sangha could provide no shelter for the NLD, ultimately the
NLD took the decision that there was no prospect for convening parliament in
Burma – on 18 December 1990 was set up the National Coalition Government of
the Union of Burma (NCGUB) in exile, the only place left where the regime
could not get at the opposition.
Democracy is often described as a system crucially
founded upon constitutional liberalism, in which a free market exists, and
where there is true freedom to raise and accumulate capital and economic
resources in private and non-governmental hands. However, such independent
sources of income would permit a political opposition to strengthen itself
considerably. When the British introduced constitutional liberalism in Burma,
the liberalisation of markets was a major affront to established interests on
the part of the Burmese nobility. When the economic crisis hit Burma in the
1930s, Burma's politics made its transition from resistance phrased almost
entirely in terms of Buddhism, to a mixture between Buddhism and
‘external’ ideas, in particular Marxism and socialism. Both Buddhism and
Marxism, however, fit the general idea that property needed to be centralised
outside private hands. In Burma independent wealth was viewed suspiciously, in
particular during army rule between 1962–88 when nationalisation took place
of business and severe censorship was introduced. Only the former has been
loosened out of economic necessity, but the latter remains more firmly in
place than ever. We also know from the discussion above that, in spite of the
free-market reforms reform since 1988, the UMEHL remains the instrument
perpetuating army control over the main production factors.
This attitude towards independent wealth is related to
the system of royalty. The royal mode of government in Burma was mostly
incapable of dealing with status and influence arising from the accumulation
of wealth by agencies independent from the state. Winichakul has argued that
Thai royalty thought economics as divisive, and that King Vajiravudh (r.
1910–25) even banned the first economics text book, because ‘economics
might cause disunity of disruption because it concerns social strata of rich
and poor’. His view was that economic philosophy should simply be based on
the Buddhist precept ‘that one should be satisfied with what one has’.
In Thailand, legislation against the teaching of economics was passed
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ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman. Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics.
ILCAA Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p224/392
in 1927,
and writing on economics was forbidden.
With no free-market system, independent wealth was not
tolerated. However, since surplus wealth was mostly spent on Buddhism,
independent political opposition in Burma has always worked through Buddhism
where the nation's wealth has been historically concentrated. The SLORC-SPDC
are extremely fearful of finance for political parties, such as during the
election campaigns, when on 3 October it threatened legal action unless all
political parties cleared their campaign expense accounts with them within two
weeks.
Unlike Thailand, where the Sangha is centrally controlled
by a hierarchy of ministers parallel to government, and where monasteries and
ordination may not take place without permission from these ministers, in
Burma the Sangha has operated with great independence from the state, in
particular during and since the colonial period once the appointment of monk
Patriarchs called thathana-baing [qaqnapiuc\]
fell into disuse. The modern state never was able to assert the kind of
control over the Sangha that had been asserted in Thailand. Despite efforts by
the Ne Win regime to subordinate the Sangha, Burma has no king, and therefore
has no symbolic central supporter of the sasana. With the military's
commitment between 1962–88 to divorce Buddhism from government, it was
unable to generate sufficient support to reinstitute constraints on the
Sangha, for its interference in Buddhism was not seen as motivated out of a
desire to patronise benevolently. Today the regime is attempting to compensate
for the bridges that were burnt during that period by becoming more
‘Buddhist’ than any government before. But what kind of Buddhism is this?
The above then, are some of the reasons why not only
imprisonment, but also political opposition, inclines people in Burma to
Buddhism. No secular ideology could possibly suffice to penetrate and come to
terms with this prolonged suffering under this authoritarian regime. This
experience is routinely addressed through Buddhism. It is historically through
Buddhism that the arguments for government reform are made, and it is in the
shadow of the Buddhist monasteries and pagodas that historically opposition to
government has operated. It is no surprise, therefore, that many prisoners and
potential prisoners have found protection in monasteries and have found their
dignity through Buddhist practice. Not only does the monastic population
provide numerically a counterbalance to the army, but it provides the
transcendental element that places limits on the authority of the king,
general and politician to invade peoples' lives. This is how we should read
the appeal of Buddhist values.
The generals argue that human rights are a foreign
invention incompatible with ‘local’ values. The concept ‘human rights’
once translated into Burmese becomes ‘the matter of human
permissions/rights’ [lu hkwín yeì lUKæc\.er:].
This does not warm peoples hearts for several reasons. First, the term is a
recent invention in Burmese and bears no deep, or even superficial relation to
Buddhism, thus losing the overlap with Buddhism as the avenue for freedom per
se. Second, hkwín Kæc\.
means both ‘permission’ and ‘rights and privileges’, suggesting that
one first needs permission to have rights – i.e. as a concept it is unable
to shake off unjust authority (ana) in favour of freedom. Third, the
idea of linking rights to the status of human beings timelessly as against
other forms of life militates against the ideas in a society where life goes
through rebirths, and where many other forms of life have been or will
eventually evolve into human beings. To talk to the generals about ‘human
rights’ does not elicit a meaningful response. However, to say that local
people do not conceive of human rights at all is to miss the point that these
rights are attained through the idiom of Buddhism, not culture. When Aung San
Suu Kyi spoke about human beings as having the ability to attain nibbana,
and the possibility for human beings (lu) to eventually attain
Buddhahood, the implications of this statement reverberated right across the
country, eliciting immediate responses from monks and generals. If human
rights do not touch the heart strings of the Burmese masses, nibbana
will. We must accept and be sensitive to the fact that certain idioms such as
human rights come across very differently in the Burmese vocabulary compared
to the English. Nevertheless, though this is a locally held value, it is a
comparable one, for it proposes universal freedom transcendent of the bounds
of loka that aim to tie people into samsara as created through
the Myanmafication programme.
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ILCAA 1999 - Gustaaf Houtman. Mental Culture in Burmese Crisis Politics.
ILCAA Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia & Africa Monograph Series
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1999, ISBN 4-87297-748-3, p225/392
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