In Geneva on Monday, Tomás Ojea Quintana delivered to the UN Human Rights Council his final report as Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar. Close to the end of a six-year mandate, he reflected on changes witnessed both recently and across a total of nine official missions. He grouped his findings under nine main headings.

First, he welcomed 15 presidential amnesties since May 2011 that have released more than 1100 prisoners of conscience, bringing the current number down to double figures. Second, though, he expressed concern about conditions of detention. Third and fourth, he praised extensions of freedom of opinion, expression, peaceful assembly and association, and at the same time noted that a great deal more needs to be done in every area. Fifth, he outlined human rights problems arising from development. Sixth, he surveyed partially improved conditions in ethnic border areas. Seventh, he dwelt on Rakhine State, where “the situation continues to worsen from an already dire state” because of “systematic discrimination and marginalisation of the Rohingya community” and failure to “turn the tide of impunity”. Eighth, he examined general challenges linked to the democratic transition and the rule of law. Ninth, he briefly renewed an existing plea for mechanisms of truth, justice and accountability.

To assess progress since 2008, Ojea Quintana looked back to four core human rights elements specified at the start of his mandate: legislative and constitutional review, release of political prisoners, reform of the armed forces, and reform of the judiciary. He found that only in the second domain, release of political prisoners, has real progress been made. Separately, he repeated an earlier assertion that “the pattern of widespread and systematic human rights violations in Rakhine State may constitute crimes against humanity as defined under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court”. This allegation met with a withering riposte from the Myanmar government: “This is too pessimistic a view incompatible with his status. It is regrettable that he is not mindful enough to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.”

What to make of all this? Clearly there is great resistance inside Myanmar to much that Ojea Quintana writes. The full government response to his final report, running to 28 paragraphs (and promising more), bristles with indignation. On the whole, though, the work of the Special Rapporteur must surely be supported, for there are no circumstances in which the UN can turn away from the business of bearing witness. At the same time, however, the local consequences of global action do need to be thought through. Notwithstanding the harassment he often faced, Ojea Quintana could have done more over the years to minimize the negative impacts of his reports. Where in particular did he fall short?

On occasion inside Myanmar, he was visibly disrespectful of majority Buddhist culture and sentiment. In the region he did little to help develop a sense of what is and is not permissible inside sovereign states. Within the UN system he missed opportunities to channel support for grassroots trust-building activities.

A reasonable verdict thus looks to be two cheers for Quintana. In very challenging circumstances he bore witness. By and large he presented a balanced assessment of the human rights situation in Myanmar. He could have done more, though, to facilitate the emergence of solutions to the many human rights problems he encountered.

In May, the mandate of the Special Rapporteur will pass to Professor Yanghee Lee from South Korea’s Sungkyunkwan University. Professor Lee has been a member of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child since February 2003, and was its chair from 2007 to 2011.

Though not much concerned with anything currently happening in Myanmar, or indeed in most other individual states, the Human Security Report 2013 released last week by Canada’s Simon Fraser University provides an important backdrop to humanitarian work the world over. It looks particularly at the thesis advanced by Steven Pinker in The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined, published by Penguin in 2011. The summary of this book presented in the first dozen pages of a 120-page report is outstanding.

Taking a huge span of more than 12 millennia stretching back at least to 10,000 BCE, Pinker argues for a clear fall in global deaths from warfare and murder, and also in extreme forms of violence such as torture, rape and slavery. He acknowledges that there have been ups and downs along the way, that real reversals have always been a key part of the picture, but nevertheless maintains that the overall worldwide pattern is declinist.

Just as interesting as the data are five trend changes Pinker identifies as layered drivers of this long-term reduction in violence. The first is a pacification process traceable across thousands of years that saw hunter-gatherer and hunter-horticulturist communities give way to settled agricultural societies and then to modern nation-states. The second is a civilizing process dating from the late medieval period and associated with growth and consolidation of the European state system. The third is a humanitarian revolution starting in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that secured abolition of the institution of slavery and committed action against torture and other cruel and inhumane practices. The fourth is the long peace that dawned at the end of the Second World War and triggered the elimination of great power wars, a dramatic fall in the deadliness of other global conflicts, and the creation of international legal constraints on war. The fifth is the new peace that emerged after the collapse of the Cold War and resulted in fewer conflicts within states plus innovations in global security governance.

Perhaps most interesting to Myanmar watchers in all this is the final contention about the post-Cold War role of what Michael Barnett calls the “humanitarian international”. Spearheaded by the UN and embracing major aid agencies, donor governments and INGOs, it has created an evolving system of global governance that remains, in the words of HSR 2013, “inchoate, disputatious, inefficient, and prone to tragic mistakes”. Nevertheless, in recent decades that system has contributed to a clear reduction in the number and deadliness of armed conflicts.

HSR 2013 notes that Pinker’s is, in part, a structural analysis of how “long-term changes in culture and material circumstance have, over time, permitted the better angels of human nature to prevail over its inner demons”. It stands as a major contribution to our understanding of the wider context in which contemporary events in states like Myanmar play out.

In 1989, Bangladeshi photographer Shahidul Alam created art agency Drik to promote the use of photography as a tool of social justice. “I wanted to ensure that the only identity of Bangladesh would not be an icon of poverty”, he’s quoted as saying in a recent New York Times article by Amy Yee. A quarter-century on, Drik has evolved into a multipurpose arts hub. It’s also the host, since 2000, of Chobi Mela, Asia’s largest biannual contemporary photography festival.

Part of the interest of this story lies in its exploration of art and public outreach in Bangladesh. In 2013, Chobi Mela took images to the streets of Dhaka on bicycle carts. “Social engagement is part of what we do”, noted Alam. In 2009, Britto Arts Trust, an incubator formed by local artists in 2002, staged public exhibitions in Old Dhaka, registering 15,000 participants in a single day. While not everything runs smoothly in the Bangladeshi art world, such initiatives are important in expanding its social impact.

Of greater interest are the possibilities these initiatives open up for cross-cultural collaboration. With galleries such as Yangon’s Pansodan Scene starting to pursue parallel projects, cross-border artistic partnerships could now be formed to bridge a growing divide. Indeed, at a clearly difficult time in bilateral relations, engagement through public art shows mounted sequentially in Bangladesh and Myanmar would be one viable, though of course small, way to stimulate fresh thinking.

Today’s post picks up on yesterday’s refutation of the claim that the Rohingya can be easily classified as a “racial” identity. First, as a general defense, let me say that my article that posited Burman ethnic identity as a privileged identity similar to White privilege in the West was intended mainly to show the utility of the framework of privilege in a Burmese context and to demonstrate that it was indeed transferable. It’s clear that any given context will contain multiple axes of privilege and even a single person will find herself privileged in one situation based on one aspect of her identity and oppressed in the next based on another aspect. It’s probably not even fair to claim that ethnicity is the most significant axis of privilege in the country, although it probably is the most publicized. Ian has raised the issue of race with regard to the Rohingya but gender privilege is all the more entrenched and is particularly challenging because of the presence of strong myths that insist (falsely) on a tradition of gender equality in Myanmar.

The initial challenge is that there are no words in Burmese that clearly map onto either “race” or “ethnicity”. The most commonly used word is lu myo, which literally translates as “type of person”. Discrete categories of race or ethnicity arose in the West and were generally transplanted to other countries through colonial practices of classification and categorization. This doesn’t mean that people didn’t have discernible identities prior to colonialism (or that there wasn’t discrimination), but rather that the boundaries were more permeable and not necessarily based on things such as birth culture or skin color.

When you ask a Burmese person what lu myo she is, the most common response will probably be related to ethnicity. But, given that some common identities in Myanmar are in fact national identities, one might also hear “Chinese” or “Indian”. Indeed, if someone asked me this question, not having an ethnicity in the Burmese sense, I would respond “American lu myo” and this would make perfect sense. (Even though there is a separate term to indicate “citizenship”, it’s not usually used in this context.) In some situations, the response might also be a religious identity, more likely a non-Buddhist identity, but I and several colleagues have heard people respond to this question by saying, “I’m Buddhist”. (It’s also worth noting that, reflective of their insensitivity to the complexity and specificity of local understandings of identity, the UNFPA, that is advising on the current census, simply and unproblematically equates lu myo with ethnicity.)

Another term that refers more directly to ethnicity is tain yin tha. This is used mostly to refer to the ethnic groups more generally, although, as I point out in the article, it is still not very precise because it is not clear whether the term includes the Burman majority or not. I have argued that the vague referent of this term is actually a reflection of Burman majority privilege because, in everyday speech, tain yin tha is taken to refer to the non-Burman ethnic groups, but occasionally Burmans can strategically include themselves in the category if they want to de-emphasize their majority position and portray themselves as simply one among many ethnic groups in the country.

Yesterday’s post ended up noting the conceptual confusion between Ian’s characterization of the Rohingya as a racial identity and his use of primarily religious terms. Admittedly, these elements are often effectively intertwined in Myanmar, which leads me to a provisional conclusion that, while incorporating a “racial” category might not be the proper corrective to my focus on ethnicity, a more productive approach could be to focus instead on the ways in which particular configurations of identities (Burmese Muslim versus Rohingya Muslim, or Shan Buddhist man versus Burman Buddhist woman) combine to create different levels of privilege or oppression. Here the important point is not simply recognizing the range of privileged identities in Myanmar, but also advocating on behalf of those who, like the Rohingya, find themselves at the bottom of the hierarchy, oppressed at every turn.

For me, separating out ethnicity was not only a manageable way to approach the challenge of talking about privileged identities, it was also a way of acknowledging the particular suffering that non-Burman groups have experienced that Burmans never have. But (as I point out in a recent piece in Asia Times Online), discussions of inclusion and exclusion in Myanmar cannot be confined to ethnicity. I thank Ian for initiating this reflection with his critique and hope that others might add their own perspectives.

Matthew J Walton is Aung San Suu Kyi Senior Research Fellow in Modern Burmese Studies at St Antony’s College, University of Oxford. He can be reached at [email protected].

One of the challenges of studying a country like Myanmar is making sense of the complex overlapping networks of identity that have fuelled inequality and conflict over the last century, if not longer. Ian has helpfully offered a constructive critique of my lens of ethnic privilege that compels rethinking how a clearly marginalized and oppressed group such as the Rohingya might fit into the framework. I have split this provisional response (that I hope will encourage more discussion) into two parts, the first of which looks specifically at the classification of Rohingya as a “racial” identity. The second part will deal more generally with the question of how usefully to analyze race, ethnicity, and identity in Myanmar.

The important consideration with regard to the first question seems to be how the Rohingya are perceived by others in Myanmar. Certainly the dominant trend of describing them as “Bengalis” aims to highlight their foreignness. This would suggest a primarily national identity that positions them not just outside of the Burmese nation (culturally) but also outside of the nation-state (as evidenced by the denial of citizenship).

Closely connected to the refusal of most people in the country – including most in the government – even to acknowledge their self-identity as “Rohingya” is the insistence that they are not one of the country’s ethnic groups. The implications of this claim are less clear. I would expect that most people in the country, even many who happily repeat the government line that there are 135 distinct ethnic groups, recognize that this was an arbitrary figure that has never mapped on to actually existing identities. Insisting that the Rohingya are not an ethnic group is a way of mapping them outside of the boundaries of those who have a right to be considered indigenous in some way, but this again suggests a foreignness more akin to a different national identity. In this case, they’re not even given an opportunity to be an oppressed minority ethnic group, which lends credence to Ian’s claim that something other than ethnicity is operating in their exclusion.

The term “race” is itself rather vague. If by it Ian means to suggest nationality, then he’s probably correct in saying that race and racial privilege are relevant identities. In this case we might imagine a time far in the future when ethnic reconciliation and effective devolution of power have more fully incorporated the various ethnic groups into a diverse and vibrant national community, but these other identities perceived as national or racial – the Chinese, Indians, Rohingya – remain outside of those boundaries. All of these groups have, of course, suffered discrimination and repression in recent Burmese history although there are many members of the first two that are relatively well integrated into their communities and not necessarily considered to be outside of the national boundaries.

In a western context race usually refers to skin color and the Rohingya case also contains that element. Skin color has long been a marker of privilege in Southeast Asia, where it supposedly reflects an elite status, not having had to do manual labor out in the sun. Certainly there is a stigma attached to darker skin in Myanmar, where the word kala (in the past simply a marker of foreignness, but these days more often used as a slur) is sometimes indiscriminately applied to people of darker skin, whatever their country of origin. The Rohingya, being of Bengali descent, are darker-skinned than most Burmese and are, in many cases, recognizable as different from Rakhines. Even though globally, race as skin color has never been a clearly defined marker and is probably characterized more by assumptions than clear perceptions, skin color is undoubtedly a relevant factor in this case.

Religion also marks the Rohingya as different from the national norm, possibly more than other Muslims in Myanmar. Anecdotal accounts attest to the prevalence among Rohingya of adherence to Deobandi, a more conservative form of Islamic practice. This means that their dress and practices might set them apart even further. Despite the presence of Muslim communities in Myanmar for many centuries, Islam has increasingly been configured as not only foreign, but a direct threat to Myanmar’s dominant Buddhist culture.

Language and other cultural practices also further alienate the Rohingya from common notions of what it means to be Myanmar. While a significant (but unknown) percentage have lived in the country for generations, many are more recent arrivals (some illegal). Given their conditions of poverty and hardship, they have not effectively assimilated aspects of Myanmar culture and many do not speak Burmese. Note that I make this observation not as a criticism of the Rohingya (there is no reason to expect them to give up their own culture and assimilate and, even if they wanted to, the Burmese state has not assisted their integration into society) but as part of an analysis of how they are labeled.

Having thought through some of the ways in which the Rohingya are perceived and categorized, I’m not certain that we can call the discrimination they face “racial”. Ian’s insight that ethnic borders may be permeable upwards (allowing non-Burmans possibly to become more accepted members of the national community) but racial borders only permeable downward is at first glance a useful separation. But in explaining the downward permeability of “racial” borders, he mentions the ways in which other Muslims have found themselves pushed down the social hierarchy close to the Rohingya. That’s certainly a religious rather than racial categorization. Tomorrow’s post will consider more broadly the implications for analyzing identity in Myanmar.

Matthew J Walton is Aung San Suu Kyi Senior Research Fellow in Modern Burmese Studies at St Antony’s College, University of Oxford. He can be reached at [email protected].

The Myanmar census, which many rights groups wish to see modified or postponed, now seems likely to go ahead as planned in less than a month. Alongside controversy about its racial and ethnic classifications, the exercise has generated hope among Muslim minorities. Most are not included in Myanmar’s 135 ethnic groups, and see a chance to rectify that. However, accompanying this hope is a debate among Muslims. Should they adopt “Pathi” as a racial identity, or “Myanmar Muslim” as a religious identity?

Muslims’ official identity has experienced many changes over the years. Well-known historian Ba Shin recorded that in the late eighteenth century the term “Pathi” was used by King Bodaw Paya, the sixth monarch of the Konbaung Dynasty. Ba Shin saw this as a corruption of Parsi, widely used to designate Persian Muslims. The British colonial government used the terms “Zerbadee” and “Burmese Muslim”. In the 1973 census, Ne Win’s government listed six Muslim ethnic groups among 143 in total: Burmese Muslim, Arakanese-Chittagong, Myedu, Arakanese-Kaman, Burmese-Indian and Burmese-Chinese (Panthay). However, in the 1982 citizenship law it reduced the overall number of ethnic groups to 135. Five of the six Muslim groups disappeared, with only Kaman remaining.

Muslims see the 2014 census as an opportunity to recover some of the ground lost in 1982. However, there is currently no consensus among them. Some argue for “Pathi”, while others advocate for “Myanmar Muslim”. In a series of briefings on the census at Yangon mosques in January 2014, Muslim scholar U Myint Thein stated that Pathi is a racial category that can be affiliated with any faith. He cited former UN Secretary-General U Thant as an example, arguing that he was a Pathi through his Muslim father who nevertheless practised Buddhism. Against this, advocates of “Myanmar Muslim” hold that Pathi is limited to one group of people only, and contend that a wider umbrella identity is needed to bring together Muslims of distinct racial backgrounds, without losing the religious dimension.

There are also different religious interpretations. On January 27, 2014, in response to a query from Muslims, a well-known Islamic school in Yangon issued a fatwa stating that it is permissible to use “Pathi”. A few weeks later, another school published an announcement encouraging Muslims to identify with the religion so as to comply with Quranic teachings.

Although the Myanmar government maintains that the census is a purely statistical exercise, it does have political implications particularly for under-represented minority groups. There are, for instance, constitutional provisions (in articles 161b and 161c) for political representation in regional and state legislatures for recognized minority groups with populations larger than 0.1 percent of the total population. Current debates are therefore very important, raising issues not only of social and cultural identity, but also of political power.

Zaw Htet is a PhD candidate at the University of Hong Kong.

Act I: A distant Myanmar town in the mythical recent past

Senior General Nabucco leads a tatmadaw advance in Myanmar’s sputtering civil war. Rebel militia are cornered and pray for salvation. They hold as hostage Nabucco’s daughter Fenena, who is secretly in love with rebel soldier Ismaele. Their passion was kindled when Fenena helped Ismaele escape from a tatmadaw prison. Fenena’s elder sister, Abigaille, enters the town with tatmadaw soldiers disguised as rebel militia. She is furious when she discovers Ismaele with Fenena, for she too loves him. She presents him with a choice. If he stays true to Fenena, Abigaille will expose her treachery in aiding his prison break. If he abandons Fenena, Abigaille will petition Nabucco on behalf of the rebels. Ismaele spurns her and pledges his life to his people. Nabucco and his men attack the town. The rebels threaten to kill Fenena if he does not withdraw. Ismaele saves Fenena and delivers her to her father. Nabucco orders the destruction of the town, and the rebels denounce Ismaele as a traitor.

Act II: Senior General Nabucco’s villa in Naypyitaw several months later

Fenena rules on Nabucco’s behalf while he wages war against the rebels. In Nabucco’s files, Abigaille has found a document proving she is not in fact his daughter, but rather the offspring of rebels. She reflects bitterly on her fate. A report circulates that Fenena has started to release rebel prisoners. As rumours spread that Nabucco has died in battle, Abigaille plots to take control. That night, Fenena formally joins the rebels, and Ismaele is pardoned for saving her. Reports of Nabucco’s death are confirmed, and Abigaille and Fenena contest the succession. Before the issue is resolved, though, Nabucco abruptly returns and proclaims himself ruler for life. He orders the execution of the rebel prisoners, and erupts in anger when Fenena tells him of her defection. However, a bolt of lightning renders him insane and Abigaille seizes command.

Act III: The statues of the kings, Naypyitaw, a short while later

Abigaille is under pressure to confirm the execution of Fenena and the rebel prisoners. Nabucco enters, still insane, and Abigaille tricks him into signing their death warrants. This triggers a recollection in him, however, and he searches for the document proving Abigaille is not his blood daughter. She tears it to pieces in front of him. Nabucco pleads for Fenena’s life, but Abigaille is unmoved. Engaged in forced labour on a river project, rebel prisoners dream of their homeland.

Act IV: Naypyitaw in the mythical present

Nabucco wakes from a bad dream to see Fenena being taken for execution. Desperate, he prays to the rebels for forgiveness, promising to reconstruct their town. His sanity is instantly restored, and he pledges to rescue Fenena and the rebel prisoners. Before the statues of the kings, executioners stand ready. Nabucco rushes in and orders the destruction of the statues. He frees the rebels and tells them to return home and rebuild their town. Abigaille enters having taken poison, and dies begging Fenena and the rebels for forgiveness. On both sides, people commit to work together for peace and national reconciliation.

I confess that this post is quixotic – but I can explain. Nearly 20 years ago, I drove with my friend Martin Burch from Manchester to Liverpool to watch Welsh National Opera’s 1995-96 production of Verdi’s Nabucco, conducted by Carlo Rizzi. It was a controversial staging, because it was set during the Holocaust. That worked to some degree as the opera is about an oppressed people, its most famous moment being the sublime chorus of the Hebrew slaves (“Va, pensiero, sull’ali dorate”). Ultimately, though, the production was problematic because the opera has a happy ending, closing with Nabucco, King of Babylon, granting freedom to the Israelites. That’s hard to square with Adolf Hitler’s treatment of the Jews.

Nevertheless, I think it’s important to consider how this opera might speak to modern concerns. I decided to write about it today because Nabucco had its premiere at La Scala 172 years ago on March 9, 1842. It was Verdi’s first major success, catapulting him to national fame at the age of 28, and placing him on the path to sustained international acclaim. At private and public funeral services in Milan following his death on January 27, 1901, crowds sang the chorus of the Hebrew slaves.

A Myanmar link emerges through the opera’s core theme of tyranny. True, the actual locations used by Verdi and his librettist Temistocle Solera were Babylon and Jerusalem in 587 BCE. But it’s standard practice to stage operas in different times and places. My feeling is that putting Nabucco in a Myanmar context is an interesting way both of exploring its contemporary resonance, and of bringing the country before people who rarely give it a thought.

Tomorrow’s post will therefore be even more quixotic: an attempt to sketch some brief production notes for a Nabucco set in Myanmar. I should state here that the one major theme I have dispensed with in this retelling is religion. As written, that aspect of the opera simply cannot be made to work in this context. I accept that’s something of an issue. I feel my version still holds together, though ultimately of course that’s for others to judge. I’d love to see it on stage.

In contemporary Myanmar, it’s not at all fashionable to look to Bangladesh. When it comes to pro-poor development strategies, though, this nation of 155 million people is a global leader. At a time of great tension, it might therefore make sense for Myanmar to turn to its western neighbour for policy guidance – and in this way supplement the many negatives dominating public discourse with a few positives.

I have to admit that the available data do not paint a clear picture. UNDP’s Human Development Report 2013 placed Bangladesh marginally above Myanmar: 146 to 149 on the 2012 human development index. But all the way back to 1980 the two countries have been reasonably close, with Bangladesh always slightly ahead. On other key indicators, Myanmar currently has a much better rank than Bangladesh: 80 to 111 on the 2012 gender inequality index, for instance. Maybe, then, there’s not much to learn?

Still I think there is. In November 2012, the Economist carried a lengthy analysis arguing that Bangladesh, with a huge population boxed into a flood plain swept by cyclones and devoid of major natural resources, had done surprisingly well at improving the lives of the poor. Its data showed that in the previous two decades some of the biggest human development gains had been registered in this, the original “basket case”.

From 1990 to 2010, life expectancy rose by a full 10 years from 59 to 69, infant mortality more than halved from 97 deaths per thousand live births to 37, child mortality fell by two-thirds, and maternal mortality was cut by three-quarters. From 2000 to 2005, female enrolment in primary school doubled to more than 90 percent, raising it slightly above male enrolment. In almost every respect, Bangladesh now outperforms not only Myanmar, but also India (ranked 136 on the 2012 human development index).

How did all this happen? The Economist notes that the general backdrop is not good: dysfunctional politics and a stunted private sector. Against it, though, four main factors have come into play to drive development. First, women have been empowered through family planning, investment in primary education, employment in garment factories, and microcredit initiatives. Second, agricultural improvements and remittances have helped to sustain household incomes. Third, the political elite, though deeply divided, has maintained a consensus in favour of social programmes. Fourth, the government has been unusually NGO-friendly, enabling stellar local agencies like BRAC and Grameen to flourish.

Bangladesh is far from perfect, and many challenges have not yet been successfully addressed. Yet there is in its recent development record a great deal for countries across the global South to learn. As Myanmar continues to piece together a development strategy, it surely has nothing to lose and much to gain from looking to Bangladesh.

Last night I attended a launch event on campus at the University of Hong Kong for Professor Joseph Chan’s Confucian Perfectionism: A Political Philosophy for Modern Times, which was recently published by Princeton University Press. Joseph is my friend, colleague and office neighbour – none of which in any way informs my judgment that his book is a very important contribution to contemporary political theory. I write here about both the event and the book.

At the event, Joseph prefaced his presentation with the story of how he came to embark on his project. Some 30 years ago when he was finishing up undergraduate studies at Chinese University of Hong Kong, he asked some of his teachers whether he should pursue a career in political theory. Almost all of them advised against, noting that the subject is difficult, jobs are scarce, and so on. They suggested Chinese politics or public administration as better options. Only one teacher, Professor Kuan Hsin-chi, was supportive of the idea. Arguing that China had no practicable political philosophy to guide its development, he urged Joseph to go ahead. I trust that at least some smart young Myanmar students will be given equally sound advice in the years to come.

In his book, Joseph attempts to integrate the best of China’s Confucian tradition with the best of western political thought, notably the commitment to liberal democracy that is one of its key strands. He traces his motivation to the fact that he grew up in Hong Kong, a hybrid society where East meets West. Myanmar shares some of this composite nature, having also been marked by British imperialism. Equally, though, the same conclusion can be reached by another route, which is to note the overwhelming power of western modernity that confronts societies all over the world. Either way, then, an amalgam of indigenous and western ideas and ideals seems to be a necessary way forward for most countries in the global South.

Joseph’s central question is this: Can we develop a viable political philosophy that is able to deal with contemporary political problems yet retain the essence of Confucian thought? His study is therefore an exercise in non-ideal theory, which he argues has been standard practice in the tradition since at least the time of Confucius himself 2500 years ago. He makes a case for adopting liberal democratic institutions that are shaped by the Confucian conception of the good rather than the liberal conception of the right, holding that this can strengthen them both.

Currently, the person best placed to perform for Myanmar a synthesis of traditional Buddhist values and contemporary liberal democratic principles is Matt Walton at Oxford. In the longer term, though, academic institutions inside the country and overseas, fully supported by committed donors, need to find ways to encourage local scholars to take on the project of building a public philosophy for Myanmar.