A few days ago a report from Myanmar on a New York Times blog caught my eye. The reporter, who was revisiting the country after an absence of three years, was impressed by the evidence of serious economic growth and modernization in the main city of Yangon, and the country itself in the last three years. During its long period of isolation under military rule, Myanmar was isolated and poor, not part of the global economy, and strictly authoritarian, ruled with an iron fist by the army. Its most celebrated citizen was Aung San Suu Kyi, who led the opposition to military rule and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991; she spent 15 years as a political prisoner, under house arrest.
I had visited Myanmar myself in 2001, during that long period of isolation. Aung San Suu Kyi, who was by then, perhaps, the most celebrated political prisoner in the world, had been under house arrest most of the time since 1989. The NYT reporter’s description of the economy and society when he visited in 2014 is much the same as my memory of 2001—poor, crumbling infrastructure, cell phone service almost non-existent, a strictly cash economy, no sign of imports on the shelves of stores, and the like. In the reporter’s words, “daily life was untethered” from the global economy. In the 13 years between my visit and his, the economy remained basically unchanged.
Now, according to the reporter, “everyone seems to walk around with their face in a smartphone, usually at one of the many shiny new malls downtown. ATMs and fancy shops are everywhere. Grocery shelves are filled with Korean, Japanese, and Western imports, alongside the usual dried fermented shrimp.” Of course, what has happened is that in 2015 Aung San Suu Kyi led her party to an overwhelming electoral victory, the constitution was rewritten, the military ostensibly stepped down and suddenly Myanmar was off the pariah list and onto the list of countries that companies around the world and particularly in Asia wanted to invest in. Suddenly the economy is booming, and its people have taken to the idea of modernization, not just smart phones, but to the idea that economic progress is good and the government that produces it is worth supporting and believing. Rapid modernization, however, leads to major social changes—large-scale migration from the rural to the urban areas, increases therefore in the population density in the cities, and thus to change and/or confusion in how people are organized socially, and to how they interact politically. These changes can change the calculus of those who rise in society.
The big news these days out of Myanmar is not the economy, and certainly not the political changes; it is the vicious, murderous, campaign of ethnic cleansing against an already oppressed and downtrodden Muslim minority known as Rohingyas. The world is aghast at the brutality of the campaign, eyewitness reports of inhumane atrocities, seem not to be overstated. Over 500,000 Rohingyas are known have fled already to neighboring Bangladesh, and experts believe that is an underestimate, and also only a precursor of things to come. The Myanmar army seems hell bent on getting rid of all the Rohingyas one way or another. And as far as I can tell, the divided international community is helpless in the face of this onslaught.
The NYT report caught my attention not because I wanted to write about the Rohingya crisis, although that is enormously disturbing. The fact that what is clearly ethnic cleansing, and a very overt and large example of it, cannot focus the entire international community on stopping the Myanmar government from committing such awful abuse is depressing. The behavior of India, China, and Russia on this is deplorable. The fact that Aung San Suu Kyi will not lend her powerful voice to the chorus shouting “stop” is a great disappointment. But I really want to widen the focus to one of the factors that people seem to overlook.
That factor is the rapid growth of a middle class, which contrary to traditional modernization theory, does not always lead to the spread or strengthening of democracy and liberal values. It can and does bolster authoritarian tendencies already there, and can exacerbate ethnic and social tensions which may make authoritarianism more attractive. Worse, as in the case of Myanmar, it can lead to bloody sectarian and ethnic conflicts, as it exposes, maybe more fully, identity divides. Through no fault of their own, the Rohingyas seem to have always been regarded as outsiders, of both a different ethnicity and a different religion. The upwardly mobile classes in Myanmar seem on the whole not to object to the genocide their army is now committing. Of all the disturbing things the NYT reporter wrote, the most disturbing is that the military, hated by all for decades because of its oppressive rule, is suddenly more popular in Myanmar, and mainly among the young.
But Myanmar is not alone in this. I have been working on a project that traces the rise of authoritarianism in Bangladesh. Ironically, of course, Bangladesh is where more than half a million Rohingyas have fled for shelter and succor. And while densely populated Bangladesh is not pleased to be hosting all these people, they are of similar ethnicity and the same religion, so I expect they will receive shelter, and if the international humanitarian community can rise to the occasion, succor also. But in this project, looking at the rise of a de-facto if not de-jure one-party state in Bangladesh, I have wondered why civil society, so strong, secular and democratically minded when I was there 25 years ago has not pushed back more firmly against the authoritarian government. One reason, I am sure, is that the Bangladeshi middle class has grown exponentially, and the upper middle class, the garment entrepreneurs and such perhaps even more; though I still do not have enough evidence to prove the case, I suspect strongly, the “parvenues” of this burgeoning middle and upper middle class say to themselves in the polling booth, “I’m all right, Jack” and vote for the incumbent no matter how authoritarian it gets.
And I suspect we are seeing and will continue to see some variation on this theme in many other countries. The emergent middle class in countries in which that class is growing disproportionately will be attracted to governments that serve its interest, and those interests are not always democratic and liberal. When they involve security or identity, they can be downright illiberal and undemocratic. In fact, the authoritarian appeal, as exemplified by China, is growing stronger as liberal democracies grow old and more dysfunctional.
But another variation may be found in Pakistan, in which pleasing the growing youth bulge may the key to political success. And what do the Pakistani youth want? Jobs, for sure. Upward mobility, for sure. But given what I understand are the weaknesses of Pakistan public education, as well as a sputtering economy, and a possible paucity of good jobs or a surfeit of jobs that require higher skills than the education system has not provided them, the youth bulge may look beyond the traditional parties of today, and even beyond the army. Parties or forces that offer millenarian solutions may have great attraction. Such solutions are often religious, but are also secular, and are by definition transformative. I have always thought that Pakistan might one day face a real revolution. I wonder if the Pakistan Army has considered this kind of future.
The author is a Senior Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington DC, and a former US diplomat who was Ambassador to Pakistan and Bangladesh
I had visited Myanmar myself in 2001, during that long period of isolation. Aung San Suu Kyi, who was by then, perhaps, the most celebrated political prisoner in the world, had been under house arrest most of the time since 1989. The NYT reporter’s description of the economy and society when he visited in 2014 is much the same as my memory of 2001—poor, crumbling infrastructure, cell phone service almost non-existent, a strictly cash economy, no sign of imports on the shelves of stores, and the like. In the reporter’s words, “daily life was untethered” from the global economy. In the 13 years between my visit and his, the economy remained basically unchanged.
The emergent middle class in countries in which that class is growing disproportionately will be attracted to governments that serve its interest, and those interests are not always democratic and liberal. When they involve security or identity, they can be downright illiberal and undemocratic
Now, according to the reporter, “everyone seems to walk around with their face in a smartphone, usually at one of the many shiny new malls downtown. ATMs and fancy shops are everywhere. Grocery shelves are filled with Korean, Japanese, and Western imports, alongside the usual dried fermented shrimp.” Of course, what has happened is that in 2015 Aung San Suu Kyi led her party to an overwhelming electoral victory, the constitution was rewritten, the military ostensibly stepped down and suddenly Myanmar was off the pariah list and onto the list of countries that companies around the world and particularly in Asia wanted to invest in. Suddenly the economy is booming, and its people have taken to the idea of modernization, not just smart phones, but to the idea that economic progress is good and the government that produces it is worth supporting and believing. Rapid modernization, however, leads to major social changes—large-scale migration from the rural to the urban areas, increases therefore in the population density in the cities, and thus to change and/or confusion in how people are organized socially, and to how they interact politically. These changes can change the calculus of those who rise in society.
The big news these days out of Myanmar is not the economy, and certainly not the political changes; it is the vicious, murderous, campaign of ethnic cleansing against an already oppressed and downtrodden Muslim minority known as Rohingyas. The world is aghast at the brutality of the campaign, eyewitness reports of inhumane atrocities, seem not to be overstated. Over 500,000 Rohingyas are known have fled already to neighboring Bangladesh, and experts believe that is an underestimate, and also only a precursor of things to come. The Myanmar army seems hell bent on getting rid of all the Rohingyas one way or another. And as far as I can tell, the divided international community is helpless in the face of this onslaught.
The NYT report caught my attention not because I wanted to write about the Rohingya crisis, although that is enormously disturbing. The fact that what is clearly ethnic cleansing, and a very overt and large example of it, cannot focus the entire international community on stopping the Myanmar government from committing such awful abuse is depressing. The behavior of India, China, and Russia on this is deplorable. The fact that Aung San Suu Kyi will not lend her powerful voice to the chorus shouting “stop” is a great disappointment. But I really want to widen the focus to one of the factors that people seem to overlook.
That factor is the rapid growth of a middle class, which contrary to traditional modernization theory, does not always lead to the spread or strengthening of democracy and liberal values. It can and does bolster authoritarian tendencies already there, and can exacerbate ethnic and social tensions which may make authoritarianism more attractive. Worse, as in the case of Myanmar, it can lead to bloody sectarian and ethnic conflicts, as it exposes, maybe more fully, identity divides. Through no fault of their own, the Rohingyas seem to have always been regarded as outsiders, of both a different ethnicity and a different religion. The upwardly mobile classes in Myanmar seem on the whole not to object to the genocide their army is now committing. Of all the disturbing things the NYT reporter wrote, the most disturbing is that the military, hated by all for decades because of its oppressive rule, is suddenly more popular in Myanmar, and mainly among the young.
Rapid modernization, however, leads to major social changes-large-scale migration from the rural to the urban areas, increases therefore in the population density in the cities, and thus to change and/or confusion in how people are organized socially, and to how they interact politically. These changes can change the calculus of those who rise in society
But Myanmar is not alone in this. I have been working on a project that traces the rise of authoritarianism in Bangladesh. Ironically, of course, Bangladesh is where more than half a million Rohingyas have fled for shelter and succor. And while densely populated Bangladesh is not pleased to be hosting all these people, they are of similar ethnicity and the same religion, so I expect they will receive shelter, and if the international humanitarian community can rise to the occasion, succor also. But in this project, looking at the rise of a de-facto if not de-jure one-party state in Bangladesh, I have wondered why civil society, so strong, secular and democratically minded when I was there 25 years ago has not pushed back more firmly against the authoritarian government. One reason, I am sure, is that the Bangladeshi middle class has grown exponentially, and the upper middle class, the garment entrepreneurs and such perhaps even more; though I still do not have enough evidence to prove the case, I suspect strongly, the “parvenues” of this burgeoning middle and upper middle class say to themselves in the polling booth, “I’m all right, Jack” and vote for the incumbent no matter how authoritarian it gets.
And I suspect we are seeing and will continue to see some variation on this theme in many other countries. The emergent middle class in countries in which that class is growing disproportionately will be attracted to governments that serve its interest, and those interests are not always democratic and liberal. When they involve security or identity, they can be downright illiberal and undemocratic. In fact, the authoritarian appeal, as exemplified by China, is growing stronger as liberal democracies grow old and more dysfunctional.
But another variation may be found in Pakistan, in which pleasing the growing youth bulge may the key to political success. And what do the Pakistani youth want? Jobs, for sure. Upward mobility, for sure. But given what I understand are the weaknesses of Pakistan public education, as well as a sputtering economy, and a possible paucity of good jobs or a surfeit of jobs that require higher skills than the education system has not provided them, the youth bulge may look beyond the traditional parties of today, and even beyond the army. Parties or forces that offer millenarian solutions may have great attraction. Such solutions are often religious, but are also secular, and are by definition transformative. I have always thought that Pakistan might one day face a real revolution. I wonder if the Pakistan Army has considered this kind of future.
The author is a Senior Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington DC, and a former US diplomat who was Ambassador to Pakistan and Bangladesh