Monthly Archives: August 2014
Counteracting hate speech
Written on August 29, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
A particular concern in Myanmar, as in other R2P watch-list states, is hate speech. There have been efforts to counteract it, notably the Panzagar (flower speech) campaign launched by prominent blogger Nay Phone Latt in April of this year. Nevertheless, it’s hard to say the problem is anything like solved. In these circumstances, one section…
Global R2P talk
Written on August 28, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
There’s not enough R2P talk inside Myanmar, and that’s a negative. Globally, though, debate does take place, and that has to be viewed as a positive. Granted, the range of people involved is very limited, rarely stretching beyond a small humanitarian elite. Still, at least R2P is examined and thereby remains a dynamic, rather than…
GCR2P and the Rohingya
Written on August 27, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
I only just noticed that the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect placed an op-ed in last Friday’s Jakarta Post – “ASEAN has responsibility to protect the Rohingya from genocide” by Casey Karr and Naomi Kikoler. In a couple of respects, that’s good – important to remind ASEAN of its substantive regional duties, and…
Healthcare in Thandwe
Written on August 26, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
It’s hard to know how healthcare actually works (or fails to work) on the ground inside Myanmar – still harder of course in peripheral communities in the midst of, or close to, zones of conflict. From the BSC programme, Céline Coderey’s paper therefore looked really interesting. Well, maybe not from the title – “Implementation and…
The R-word
Written on August 25, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
The past few days have seen a debate surface among western commentators about use of the R-word in Myanmar politics – R for Rohingya, that is. The orthodox position was spelt out by UN Special Rapporteur Yanghee Lee on July 26 at the end of her first visit to the country, and reproduced by Derek…
Literate Myanmar
Written on August 22, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
In the Irrawaddy, Alma Freeman has a nice interview with Thant Thaw Kaung, who heads both the Myanmar Book Aid and Preservation Foundation, and the Daw Khin Kyi Foundation’s mobile library project. Asked to explain why, at 95 percent, Myanmar has one of the most impressive literacy rates in the region, Thant Thaw Kaung gives…
Internet profiling
Written on August 21, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
Yesterday I read a fascinating New York Times article by David Leonhardt. It has nothing to do with Myanmar, but it does have interesting implications for societies pretty much the world over. A core statistical exercise involved analyzing every county in the US to determine the easiest and toughest places to live, based on six…
Black, red, white and censored – Melissa Carlson
Written on August 20, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
I spoke on the same panel as Ian at BSC, and for my presentation wanted to provide audience members with a guide to better understand the unique constraints facing artists in Burma during the censorship period. My talk focused on the mechanics of censorship of painting, and how it imposed limitations on artists’ channels of…
Artists in denial
Written on August 19, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
Back to BSC, my own talk focused on art and protest in Myanmar. As censorship is rolled back, art can be used, indeed is being used, as a tool of dissent. In the new environment not every creative artist or intellectual seeks to make a political statement, and that’s just fine. But many do, and…
Wilson and international society
Written on August 18, 2014 at 12:05 am, by Ian Holliday
Ted Widmer has an excellent New York Times op-ed on President Woodrow Wilson, World War I and American idealism. At the start of the Great War, Wilson aligned himself with established presidential tradition in holding both that the US should steer clear of foreign entanglements, and that grandiose schemes for human betterment were best avoided….