Hard Target: Forcing Myanmar to Change
Abstract
This article discusses the direct and indirect strategies that the United States, the European Union, the United Nations, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations have used to influence the behavior of Myanmar. The article argues that sanctions used by the West against Myanmar have had mixed effectiveness as viewed through the sanctions framework developed by Hufbauer et al. It also argues that the ability of the West, and particularly the United States, to influence Myanmar more broadly has been limited due to differing interests among international actors.
The military junta ruling Myanmar (formerly Burma) has been dodging the will of the international community for approximately fifty years.1 Known as either the Tatmadaw (Burmese for armed forces) or State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), the military junta transformed itself into a nominally civilian government at the end of 2010 and beginning of 2011.2 The transition has made the junta an even more elusive target for the international community because, in the face of continued human rights violations, it can claim that it is in the process of democratizing.3 The SPDC single-handedly drafted the country’s new constitution and its attempts at seeking ratification by Myanmar’s citizens were a sham.4 A byproduct of this flawed process is that, for the most part, elections don’t matter: political parties controlled by former Tatmadaw generals will continue to have executive authority and will control the parliament. The first elections under the new constitution, which took place in November 2010, were widely criticized by the international community. Some argued, however, that even sham elections were better than the status quo.5 This confusion led to a disjointed response from the international community with some denouncing the elections and others taking a wait- and-see approach. Some stalwart proponents of sanctions, including the United States (US) and the European Union (EU), are using this potential crack in the long-unbroken authoritarian armor to reconsider their sanctions policies.6
Whether this approach to dealing with Myanmar will lead to continued opening by the regime is unclear. Regardless, these recent events are only the latest in a long series of exchanges with the international community in which the SPDC has successfully withstood pressure for reform on anything but its own terms. This article applies a sanctions framework described by Hufbauer et al. to the Western sanctions regime against Myanmar and finds that the framework provides a compelling explanation for the mixed effectiveness of sanctions. The article discusses the approaches of the United Nations (UN) and a regional organization, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), to Myanmar. It also argues that the ability of the West, and particularly the United States, to influence Myanmar has been limited due to differing interests among international actors. The article concludes by discussing recent policy developments that will impact US-Myanmar relations in the coming years.
The article argues that sanctions used by the West against Myanmar have had mixed effectiveness as viewed through the sanctions framework developed by Hufbauer et al. It also argues that the attempt of the West, and particularly the United States, to influence Myanmar more broadly has been limited due to differing interests among international actors.
BACKGROUND ON MYANMAR
Under colonial rule, Burma, as it was then known, was administered as the eastern province of the British Raj.7 It gained independence from the United Kingdom in the aftermath of World War II through the efforts of General Aung San, who is regarded as the father of national independence. Civilian leaders took control of the government and held regular multiparty elections until 1958, when the military seized power in a bloodless coup.8 After a brief restoration of civilian government from 1960 to 1962, the military seized power again and installed the dictator Ne Win.9 His efforts to implement the “Burmese Way to Socialism” lasted for more than twenty-five years and led to economic ruin in a country that, during the colonial era, was the most prosperous nation in Southeast Asia.10
After yet another military coup removed Ne Win from power in 1988, pro- democracy demonstrations swept the country and Gen. Aung San’s daughter, Aung San Suu Kyi, emerged as a charismatic opposition leader.11 When the new junta came to power, it promised to transfer authority to a civilian government and called nationwide elections in 1990, the first in thirty years.12 However, when Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy unexpectedly won 60 percent of the vote, the junta annulled the results of the election, imprisoned democracy leaders, and renamed the country Myanmar.13 They held power until the elections at the end of 2010 and wield great power to this day.14
During the 2000s, the junta came under increasing pressure from the West and from ASEAN for its abuses of human rights, its imprisonment of Aung San Suu Kyi, and its inability to move the country forward economically. The junta also escalated the civil war against ethnic minorities living along the country’s periphery. This conflict, which has been ongoing since 1948, remains the longest uninterrupted armed conflict in the world.15 In 2003, the SPDC announced a “roadmap toward discipline-flourishing democracy” that would supposedly bring the country from military-authoritarian rule to a limited version of democracy, but many observers were skeptical of the extended timetable for change.16 The regime began drafting a new constitution in 2004 through a highly controlled National Convention, which was first convened in 1993.17
In 2007, a rise in fuel prices led to massive anti-government demonstrations led by Buddhist monks, which the SPDC violently subdued. Monks and civilians alike were killed and thousands were arrested.18 The following year, Cyclone Nargis devastated the coastal Irrawaddy River delta killing over one hundred thousand people. Many blamed the SPDC for failing to provide adequate warning about the severity of the storm, for its inability to provide shelter and relief to the displaced, and especially for its refusal to accept emergency aid from foreign nations.19
In the immediate aftermath of the cyclone, the junta held a public referendum on its new constitution – a document that does not value the consent of the people and that guarantees the military junta veto power over both houses of the new legislature. Despite widespread chaos and the massive number of citizens displaced from their homes, the referendum passed with over 92 percent of the vote amid charges of widespread vote tampering.20
In August 2010 the junta announced that nationwide elections would take place just a few months later. The United States and EU member countries criticized the process as unfair and illegitimate.21 Within a matter of weeks, SPDC chairman Than Shwe traveled to neighboring countries to secure regional support for the elections; for his efforts, China, Thailand, and even India kept any criticisms of the process to themselves.22
The elections of November 2010 took place after limited campaigning, a highly restrictive party registration process (that excluded Suu Kyi’s party, the National League for Democracy), and widespread voting irregularities.23 Even though the junta’s party of choice claimed an overwhelming victory, the elections were unprecedented for three generations of Burmese citizens.24 One indication of the fragile political atmosphere leading up to the elections is that after voting concluded on the night of November 7, an armed Karen militia exchanged fire with Tatmadaw forces in the eastern border town of Myawaddy, forcing more than 20,000 Karen villagers to seek refuge on the Thai side of the border for two days.25
In a display of confidence in their control of the situation, however, the SPDC released Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest just days after the election and allowed her to travel across the country and engage in political speech with some degree of freedom. Nevertheless, as the distinguished legal scholars Abram Chayes and Antonia Handler Chayes have pointed out: “When a state’s conduct is inconsistent with legal norms that it has affirmed elsewhere, the state must respond, and show that the facts are not what they seem to be, or that there is a good reason for non- performance.”26 Even if the constitutional referendum and the elections were far from perfect, the Burmese people can now engage in political speech in a parliamentary system and demand that leaders follow constitutional law. This was not possible a year ago.
A FRAMEWORK FOR UNDERSTANDING SANCTIONS AGAINST MYANMAR
Chayes and Chayes write that “[t]he essence of the international legal process is that it creates a dialectic that, through the participation of both the state imposing the sanctions and the target state, generates pressure for compliance.”27 Pressure has been applied to Myanmar for a number of years through sanctions and other bilateral and multilateral means like “naming and shaming” that isolate the regime from the rest of the world. However, these approaches have yielded few tangible results. Western countries have led the charge to apply pressure because they view authoritarian rule in Myanmar as a global concern and as an affront to their values. Tatmadaw military attacks in the areas along international borders periodically cause refugees to flee into Bangladesh, India, China, and Thailand, which is destabilizing for the entire region.28
As a cover article in Foreign Affairs recently pointed out, the Indian Ocean and its nations may be “Center Stage for the 21st Century.” In particular, China’s sphere of influence has been growing rapidly, crowding out the United States and India, the major democratic nations in a position to compete.29 The junta’s burgeoning relationship with Pyongyang is also a source of concern because it indicates that the generals are interested in developing nuclear technology, which would have grave consequences for regional security.30
Countries like the United States may attempt to change such behaviors by using sanctions policies that are coercive and norm reinforcing. Since coercive economic sanctions attempt to place a quantifiable burden on the target country by forcing it to relent, sanctions have been the subject of much scholarly attention. Gary Hufbauer, Jeffrey Schott, Kimberly Elliott, and Barbara Oegg performed a key study on sanctions in 1990, updated in 2007.31 They analyzed every economic sanctions case in the history of modern international relations and drew conclusions about why some sanctions policies worked and others did not.32 The result is a list of recommendations to inform the design of new sanctions policies or refine existing policies. As it happens, almost all sanctions imposed on Myanmar by the United States or the European Union violate the following recommendations for effective coercive sanctions:
(1) “Don’t Bite Off More Than You Can Chew.”33 The goal of US and EU sanctions is to stop gross human rights violations and end policies that the SPDC thinks are necessary for its survival. These are ambitious, not modest, policy goals;
(2) “Friends Are More Likely to Comply than Adversaries.”34 Myanmar is neither a friend nor a close trading partner of the United States or the European Union, and can survive without Western trade because it can trade with China instead;
(3) “Beware Autocratic Regimes.”35 As the authors say, “it is hard to bully a bully,” and this is particularly true when there is not a mechanism like elections through which the bully is held accountable by its people; this allows it to transfer the burden of sanctions down the economic ladder without repercussion; and
(4) “Slam the Hammer, Don’t Turn the Screw.”36 This is nearly impossible because neither the United States nor the European Union has enough trade leverage with Myanmar to shock its economy and regional trade partners are unwilling to apply or enforce sanctions.37
Unilateral Western sanctions are also likely to be ineffective because the rest of the world is not interested in cutting off trade with Myanmar.38 As Chayes and Chayes describe, “[t]he broad consensus necessary for the legitimacy of sanctions is extraordinarily difficult to assemble and maintain,” which is particularly true regarding UN sanctions. According to the UN Charter, “[e]conomic measures, if they are to operate with binding force on all members,” must be passed through the Security Council over the veto of China, Russia and others who advocate a policy of nonintervention by the international community.39
That the United States and European Union have persisted with sanctions in the face of these challenges suggests they may have a strong norm-reinforcing component. Even if the coercive component of a sanctions policy is ineffective, the norm-reinforcing symbolism of sanctions allows countries to define behavior that they consider unacceptable, sending the message to others that they will face marginalization in the international community if they behave similarly. In the case of Myanmar, sanctions by Western governments reaffirm their opposition to human rights abuses, the imprisonment of political dissidents, the repression of political freedom, the use of forced labor, and the use of armed forces to dislocate ethnic minorities from their homes.
However, these sanctions, while conveying a symbolically important message, simultaneously create real-world consequences that undermine that message. More specifically, in countries that are repressive, one-party states, like Myanmar, the impact of the sanctions on the well-being of the general population weighs heavily against the intended message of the sanctions and the probability of positive political change. In such cases, the country imposing the sanctions may be seen by the international community as doing more harm than good, undermining the legitimacy of the sanctions policy.
UNILATERAL US SANCTIONS
Since the SPDC annulled the result of a free and fair election in 1990, the United States has used coercive, unilateral sanctions against Myanmar’s military junta to change its behavior. For better or worse, the United States has employed unilateral sanctions numerous times since the end of the Cold War, and was forced to do so in this case because of the inaction of the UN and Myanmar’s neighbors.40 (Several EU countries have enacted their own unilateral sanctions.) The primary, operative unilateral sanctions in effect against Myanmar include:
• Customs and Trade Act of 1990; 42
• Foreign Relations Authorization Act of 1994/1995
• Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 1997;43
• Burmese Freedom and Democracy Act of 2003;44
• Burmese JADE (Junta’s Anti-Democratic Efforts) Act of 2008;45
•Various executive orders.
The federal courts became involved in US unilateral sanctions when EarthRights International initiated a lawsuit against Unocal for working with the SPDC to develop the Yadana gas fields in the Andaman Sea.47 EarthRights filed the claim on behalf of thirteen Burmese farmers who said that Unocal had been complicit in the human rights violations committed by the SPDC, including forced labor, torture, and murder. The court found subject-matter jurisdiction under the Alien Tort Statute and allowed the lawsuit to go forward. Unocal eventually entered into a confidential settlement with the victims when its motion for summary judgment did not succeed (and when it was about to be acquired by ChevronTexaco).48 However, Unocal’s decision to engage in costly litigation to recover settlement losses from its insurance company indicates that the settlement amount was substantial.
Elliot Schrage, formerly of Columbia Law School, concluded that the case was significant because “[i]t puts companies on notice that their relationships with foreign governments, and in particular with foreign militaries, can become the subject of judicial review in the United States.”49 By making it more risky for big business to get involved with governments that are politically unstable and that routinely abuse human rights, the Doe v. Unocal case set a valuable precedent that is as powerful a tool, if not more powerful, than many unilateral sanctions. This conclusion points back to one of the Hufbauer et al. recommendations: “Friends Are More Likely to Comply than Adversaries.”50 The approach of the Unocal litigation was to influence the risk-taking behavior of transnational businesses with operations in the United States, which is more straightforward than trying to sway the leaders of an inward-looking military junta halfway around the world.
With regard to the success or failure of US unilateral sanctions policies, it is a complicated task to disentangle the economic relationships that support the regime in Myanmar, and that means it is even harder to test the following counterfactual proposition, which is of critical importance: “What would Myanmar’s economy be like if the United States hadn’t imposed sanctions?” However, it is increasingly clear that two permissive conditions have made it easier for Myanmar to evade coercive sanctions: its close relationship with China and India’s desire – so far unrealized – for an equally close relationship. China has used its Security Council veto to shield Myanmar from coercive pressure (discussed in the next section) and the two countries have also developed close and mutually beneficial economic links that serve to immunize Myanmar from Western assaults. Meanwhile, one would expect that as the world’s largest democracy, India would be a natural US ally pushing for reform in Myanmar. However, it is playing a game of catch-up with China and has no interest in lecturing its neighbor on human rights or free elections – it is interested in energy contracts instead. President Obama made waves in New Delhi when he said as much in a speech to the Indian parliament just before Myanmar’s elections in November 2010.51
MYANMAR AND THE UNITED NATIONS
Myanmar’s transition from insider to outsider status in the international community was swift. In 1961, the respected Burmese diplomat U Thant was selected as the third Secretary General of the UN and served for ten years.52 During the same period, the dictator Ne Win seized control of Burma and turned it from a country with a promising future into an international pariah state.53 Though Myanmar commands little power in the United Nations today, it is remarkably good at staying off the agenda of the Security Council (with the help of China) and has also received scant attention from the General Assembly.
When the United States and the United Kingdom attempted to pass a draft resolution condemning Myanmar’s response to the monk-led protests in 2007, China, Russia, and South Africa issued a multiple veto—the first since 1989.54 The American and British Ambassadors presumably knew the vetoes were coming but called for a vote anyhow to put the members of the Security Council on record. The Chinese and Russians contend that conflict and instability in Myanmar do not constitute Chapter VI or Chapter VII “threats to international peace and security” and that the matter does not belong before the Security Council.
The UN General Assembly has passed non-binding resolutions with respect to Myanmar (e.g., Resolution 61/232 regarding human rights), but many have wondered whether internal conflict in Myanmar rises to the level of a Chapter VII enforcement action, and if not, why. A 2005 study prepared by the law firm DLA Piper and commissioned by Václav Havel and Bishop Desmond Tutu calls attention to the inaction of the Security Council by conducting a historical review of cases in which the Security Council has determined that a state is a threat to international peace and security.55 They highlight five factors that have caused states to cross this threshold: (1) the overthrow of a democratically elected government; (2) conflict between ethnic groups; (3) widespread human rights violations; (4) outflows of refugees; and (5) other cross-border problems including drug trafficking and HIV/AIDS.56 As a result of one or more of these factors, the Security Council has put aside the UN principle of noninterference to pass Chapter VII enforcement resolutions on Cambodia in 1990, Liberia in 1992, Rwanda in 1993, Haiti in 1993, Yemen in 1994, Afghanistan in 1996, and Sierra Leone in 1997. The DLA Piper study then points out that all five factors have been chronic problems in Myanmar, and that the Security Council has ignored them, even though “[a]ll of the factors in tandem threaten peace and stability [at home] as well as [in] the entire region.”57
The case of Haiti provides an interesting counterexample because of its similarities and differences. Like Myanmar, Haiti had long been ruled by a strongman and held an election in 1990 that produced an unambiguous result – the Rev. Jean-Bertrand Aristede was elected president.58 But unlike in Myanmar, when a military coup d’état overthrew the Haitian government nine months later, a regional organization – the Organization of American States (OAS) – swiftly took action and issued a resolution condemning the coup and calling for economic and diplomatic sanctions to isolate the provisional government.59 However, the OAS Charter does authorize the use of binding sanctions and does not have a mechanism for enforcement. The UN Security Council became involved two years later when the OAS sanctions were floundering and the United States demanded that it act because of the steady stream of refugees landing on the Florida coast.60
In Myanmar’s case, the overthrow of a democratic election in 1990 flew under the Security Council’s radar. Unlike Haiti, which is in the backyard of the United States, Myanmar is in China’s backyard, and any attempt to raise the issue before the Security Council would likely have been blocked. And since Myanmar had not yet joined ASEAN, there was no regional organization like the OAS to mount a first response from the international community by referring the matter to the United Nations via Chapter VIII of the UN Charter.
MYANMAR’S PLACE IN ASEAN
This section discusses the history of ASEAN and its relationship with Myanmar. Regional organizations can play a critical role in driving compliance with international law in member states. The OAS was the first actor in the chain of events leading to UN Security Council action after the Haitian coup d’état in 1991. However, ASEAN operates under unique legal and precedential standards and is heavily influenced by internal politics and the bilateral policies of the ASEAN nations toward each other.
ASEAN was founded on August 8, 1967 by five of the current member nations: Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Indonesia. Unlike many regional organizations, ASEAN was organized by a short, five-article declaration rather than a charter. The Bangkok Declaration states that the purpose of the regional organization is, among other things, “to promote regional peace and stability through abiding respect for justice and the rule of law in the relationship among countries of the region and adherence to the principles of the United Nations Charter.”61 The principle of noninterference is mentioned in the nonoperative section of the Declaration as follows: “[the countries of Southeast Asia] are determined to ensure their stability and security from external interference in any form or manifestation in order to preserve their national identities in accordance with the ideals and aspirations of their peoples.”62 However, the principle has been repeatedly reaffirmed and is reflected by the fact that ASEAN does not have the authority to impose sanctions against member nations; doing so would constitute undue interference.63 In the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia signed in 1976, “Non-interference in the internal affairs of one another” is defined as a fundamental principle.64
ASEAN’s firm stance against intervention was rooted in the domestic political instability of its founding members during the 1960s and 1970s.65 As Singapore’s Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong described in 1992, “we don’t set out to change the world and our neighbors. We don’t believe in it. The culture of ASEAN is that we do not interfere.”66 This policy was part of what became known as “the ASEAN way” of engagement, characterized by consensus building and quiet diplomacy. As a result, ASEAN nations have only recently begun acting responsively to human rights abuses by member states.67
In the 2000s, ASEAN’s absolutist policy on nonintervention began to soften as individual countries became more willing to criticize the junta openly. When the rotating chairmanship of ASEAN was scheduled to pass to Myanmar in 2006, a regional and international outcry pressured ASEAN to skip Myanmar in the rotation because of its human rights abuses. In particular, the United States and the European Union threatened to pull out of ASEAN regional trade meetings and vowed to marginalize ASEAN’s role on the world stage if Myanmar was allowed to take the chairmanship. In response, ASEAN “openly urged the junta to release political prisoners,” including Aung San Suu Kyi, and “agreed to send a delegation to investigate the situation” at a summit meeting in December 2005.68 They went on to prevent Myanmar from taking the chair in 2006.
This is one of the few instances in which American and European attempts to coerce international actors with regard to Myanmar were successful. ASEAN’s compliance is consistent with two of the Hufbauer et al. recommendations for successful sanctions policies, even though no actual sanctions were imposed: (1) policies with limited aims are more successful; and (2) friends are more likely to comply than enemies.69 The goal of this policy – that the ASEAN chairmanship skips Myanmar – was discrete and achievable. In addition, the ASEAN nations that decided the matter have close relationships with the United States and European Union and had something to lose individually and collectively from frayed relations with the West.
After Myanmar was passed over for the chairmanship, ASEAN freely criticized the junta for its policy toward Aung San Suu Kyi and political prisoners and for its violent crack-down on monk-led protests in the summer of 2007. ASEAN foreign ministers expressed their “revulsion” that violence had been used to quell peaceful demonstrations in “the sharpest rebuke ever sanctioned” by the ASEAN governments.70
In 2007, ASEAN negotiated a charter and member nations ratified it in 2008.71 The charter formalizes the relationship between the members and sets them on an ambitious path toward integration.72 The process also highlighted disagreements among member nations about Myanmar. Some members complained that to accommodate Myanmar, the charter had to be “watered-down to irrelevance.”73 For example, the new charter has no provision to enforce compliance with human rights standards and places heavy emphasis on Asian values-style governance language rather than on democratic values.74 In recent years, older members of ASEAN have been willing to criticize Myanmar’s treatment of its citizens, and some still view it as “a diplomatic embarrassment that needs to be handled through careful pressure and persuasion.”75
RECENT DEVELOPMENTS AND CONCLUSIONS
Just after the elections in 2010, the SPDC released political prisoner Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest, where she had spent 15 of the last 21 years.76 This had been one of the sticking points preventing closer dialogue between the generals and governments in the West. Though dissident political leaders inside the country support the Western sanctions regime, Suu Kyi’s release prompted reflection about their necessity. ASEAN announced that Western sanctions on Myanmar should be dropped and Suu Kyi told Time magazine in December 2010 that “I am ready to reconsider my support of sanctions if it is for the benefit of all of us.”77 But after reacquainting herself with the country and conferring with members of the National League for Democracy, she concluded that the sanctions hurt the military more than civilians and urged Western governments to keep them in place. In response, EU officials decided in April 2011 to extend current sanctions for one year, except that an asset freeze and visa ban was lifted for four civilian members of the military government, including Myanmar’s foreign minister to spur increased dialogue with the West.78
When the Obama administration entered the White House in 2009, it began a comprehensive review of US policy toward Myanmar.79 The administration considered pulling back on the US sanctions posture but instead settled on a policy of “pragmatic engagement” that will be more responsive than the old policy to both good and bad behavior on Myanmar’s part. In April 2011 the administration named Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Affairs Derek Mitchell as the First US Special Envoy to Burma to encourage a regular flow of dialogue with the emerging government, an idea that has long been discussed in policy circles but that has finally found its moment.80
In the fall of 2011, Myanmar president Thein Sein surprised many in the international community by releasing political prisoners and relaxing laws on freedom of speech. He also met several times with Aung San Suu Kyi, leading many to conclude that a new era of political openness is beginning.81 US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called these reforms the “first stirrings of change in decades,” and noted that the United States would be a friend to Myanmar if it continues to reform.82 However, the reason for these reforms is unclear. Some contend that Myanmar is playing regional politics and has no desire to democratize.83 On the other hand, economist and Myanmar expert Sean Turnell contends that no matter how you interpret the president’s actions, “there is a positive shift underway. Incomplete yes, fragile certainly, but I think it is safe to say that certain elements within the new government, including the president, are of a reformist bent.”84
These reforms proved to be strategically important because they influenced the ASEAN debate over Myanmar’s next opportunity to chair the organization in 2014.85 At a November 2011 summit in Bali, all ASEAN member states supported Myanmar’s bid for the top seat because, according to the Indonesian foreign minister, “the overwhelming sense is that there are positive conditions for Myanmar’s chairmanship [and] we hope that this chairmanship would bring more momentum for change in Myanmar.”86 To further spur momentum for change, President Obama announced on November 18 that Secretary Clinton would make an official visit to Myanmar in December, the first such visit by an American secretary of state in more than fifty years.87
As US-Myanmar relations enter a period in which more sanctions may be dismantled than imposed, it is worth reflecting on the successes and failures of the sanctions policies of the past and to take stock of their effects on both the target and the source. Revisiting the engagements and disengagements described above may shed light on important policy choices that have yet to be made. For those of us in the international community who want Myanmar to continue opening to the outside world, to express the will of its people and, eventually, to flourish, applying these lessons will be one of the most important factors determining the tenor of Myanmar’s relationship with the West in the future.
Endnotes
1 In 1989, the junta unilaterally changed the name of the country from Burma to Myanmar, which is the name used by the majority of the international community today. The United States and other Western governments have not recognized the name change and continue to use Burma. “Burma” and “Myanmar” are used interchangeably throughout the paper with an emphasis on Myanmar because of its use in international organizations and in most academic literature.
2 The SPDC was originally known as the State Law and Order Restoration Council, or SLORC, and many have speculated that it changed its name in 1997 in part because of the unfortunate-sounding English acronym. David I. Steinberg, Burma, the State of Myanmar (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2001), 76.
3 “Burma,” The World Factbook, US Central Intelligence Agency, https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/bm.html.
4 Current Realities and Future Possibilities in Burma/Myanmar: Options for U.S. Policy, Asia Society Task Force Report (New York: Asia Society, March 2010), 20; “Burma ‘approves new constitution’,” BBC News, May 15, 2008, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7402105.stm.
5 See, for example, Bruce Matthews, “A Nation at Cross-Roads: Myanmar’s 2010 National Election,” Canada-Asia Agenda 13 (Vancouver: Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, November 5, 2010), http://www.asiapacific.ca/sites/default/files/filefield/nov_5_burma_matthews_v3.pdf.
6 “EU extends Myanmar sanctions, but opens door,” Agence France-Presse, April 13, 2011.
7 George Orwell famously served as a colonial police officer in Burma and his novels remain popular reading there today (if covertly so).
8 David I. Steinberg, Burma/Myanmar: What Everyone Needs to Know (New York: Oxford, 2010), 54–55.
9 Ibid., 62–65.
10 Ibid.
11 George Packer, “Drowning: Can the Burmese people rescue themselves?” New Yorker, August 25, 2008.
12 Ibid.
13 Steinberg, Burma, the State of Myanmar, 45.
14 Kocha Olarn, “Myanmar swears in new president,” CNN World, March 30, 2011.
15 Richard Lloyd Parry, “Burma: world’s longest war nears its end,” The Times (London), March 24, 2009, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article5963064.ece.
16 Steinberg, Burma/Myanmar, 130.
17 Current Realities and Future Possibilities, 55; “Chronology of the National Convention,” Human Rights Watch, July 18, 2007, http://www.hrw.org/legacy/english/docs/2007/07/18/burma16412.htm.
18 Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro, Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, UN Human Rights Council, 6th session (UN Doc A/HRC/6/14), December 7, 2007.
19 Thomas Bell, “Burma cyclone response was ‘crime against humanity’,” Telegraph
(London), February 26, 2009.
20 “Burma ‘approves new constitution’,” BBC News.
21 “Clinton: Myanmar Elections Sign of Repression,” Associated Press, November 6, 2010.
22 See, for example, Paul Fraioli, “Blind Men and an Elephant: How the Indian and Chinese Press Cover Myanmar,” Journal of International Affairs 64, no. 2 (Spring/Summer 2011).
23 Hla Hla Htay, “Pro-junta party claims victory in Myanmar election,” Agence France- Presse, November 9, 2010.
24 Ibid.
25 “20,000 Myanmar refugees start heading home,” Associated Press, November 9, 2010, http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/nov/09/20000-myanmar-refugees-start- heading-home.
26 Abram Chayes and Antonia Handler Chayes, The New Sovereignty: Compliance with International Regulatory Agreements (Cambridge, MA: Harvard, 1995), 119.
27 Chayes and Chayes, The New Sovereignty, 112.
28 See, for example, Sky Canaves, “China Copes With Influx of Myanmar Refugees,”
Wall Street Journal, August 29, 2009.
29 Robert D. Kaplan, “Center Stage for the 21st Century,” Foreign Affairs (March/April 2009).
30 Wai Moe, “Burma’s Nuclear Ambitions ‘Threaten Regional Security’,” Irrawaddy, June 4, 2010.
31 Gary Hufbauer, Jeffrey Schott, Kimberly Elliott, and Barbara Oegg, Economic Sanctions Reconsidered (Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics, 1990); Hufbauer et al., Economic Sanctions Reconsidered, third edition (Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics, 2007).
32 Hufbauer et al., Economic Sanctions Reconsidered (2007), 160–77.
33 Ibid., 162.
34 Ibid., 163.
35 Ibid., 166.
36 Ibid., 168.
37 Ibid. The United States and European Union could use leverage by closing loopholes that allow Chevron and Total to continue doing business in Myanmar, providing the regime with billions of dollars in natural-gas profits. However, it would take massive amounts of domestic political capital to do so and the void would undoubtedly be filled by regional energy companies, probably from China.
38 Chayes and Chayes, The New Sovereignty, 64.
39 Ibid., 49.
40 Nyun, “Feeling Good or Doing Good,” 466.
41 This law requires the president to impose “such economic sanctions upon Burma as the President determines to be appropriate,” unless certain conditions pertaining to human rights and drug trafficking have been met. US Customs and Trade Act of 1990, Pub. L.
101-382, § 138, 104 Stat. 706; Michael F. Martin, “U.S. Sanctions on Burma,”
Congressional Research Service Report (January 11, 2011), 1, http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R41336.pdf.
42 This law amends the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 to withhold US contributions to international organizations with programs in Burma. Foreign Relations Authorization Act (FY 1994 and 1995), Pub. L. 103–236, § 431(a)(1), 108 Stat. 459195; Martin, 1.
43 This law imposes various sanctions on Burma unless the President certifies that human rights and democracy standards have been met. Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act of 1998, Pub. L. No. 105-118, § 2, 111 Stat. 2390 (1998); Martin, 1.
44 This law requires the President to impose a ban on imports from Burma, freezes the assets of certain Burmese officials, blocks US support for loans from certain international financial institutions, and ban visas for certain Burmese officials. Burmese Freedom and Democracy Act of 2003, Pub. L. No. 108-61, § 2(4), 117 Stat. 864, 864 (2003) (codified
at 50 U.S.C. § 1701 (2000)); Martin, 1.
45 This law bans the import of all products containing Burmese jade and rubies, expands the list of Burmese officials subject to visa bans and financial sanctions, and restricts the use of correspondent US bank accounts to provide services to Burmese officials.
Burmese JADE (Junta’s Anti-Democratic Efforts) Act of 2008, Pub. L. 110-286, 122 Stat. 2632; Martin, 2.
46 President Clinton and President George W. Bush issued executive orders imposing further sanctions under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1997 (authorizing the imposition of international trade or financial sanctions to deal with regarding to foreign policy) and the National Emergencies Act (authorizing the President to declare a national emergency in certain circumstances). The International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1997, Pub. L. 95-223, 50 U.S.C. 1701, et seq. The National Emergencies Act, Pub. L. 94-412, 50 U.S.C. 1601, et seq.; Martin, 2.
47 Doe v. Unocal, 248 F.3d 915 (9th Cir. 2001).
48 Mark D. Kielsgard, “Unocal and the Demise of Corporate Neutrality,” California Western International Law Journal 36 (2005): 183.
49 Daphne Eviatar, “A Big Win for Human Rights,” The Nation, May 9, 2005, http://www.thenation.com/article/big-win-human-rights.
50 Hufbauer et al., Economic Sanctions Reconsidered, 160–77.
51 Simon Montlake, “Why India offers tepid response to Burma’s release of Suu Kyi,”
Christian Science Monitor, November 22, 2010.
52 “U Thant, Third United Nations Secretary-General,” Biography, Secretaries-General of the United Nations, http://www.un.org/News/ossg/sg/stories/thant_bio.asp.
53 Thant Myint-U, The River of Lost Footsteps: A Personal History of Burma (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2006).
54 Edith M. Lederer, “China, Russia Veto Myanmar Resolution,” Associated Press, January 14, 2011, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp- dyn/content/article/2007/01/13/AR2007011300296.html.
55 “Threat to the Peace: A Call for the UN Security Council to Act in Burma,” DLA Piper Rudnick Gray Cary US LLP, September 20, 2005, http://www.unscburma.org/Docs/Threat%20to%20the%20Peace.pdf.
56 Ibid., 50.
57 Ibid.
58 Domingo E. Acevedo, “The Haitian Crisis and the OAS Response,” in Enforcing Restraint, ed. Lori Fisler Damrosch (New York: Council on Foreign Relations Press, 1993), 129–30.
59 David Cortright, George Lopez, and Jaleh Dashti-Gibson, “Helping Haiti?” in The Sanctions Decade, ed. David Cortright and George Lopez (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2000), 87–106.
60 Ibid., 91.
61 The Bangkok Declaration, August 8, 1967, http://www.aseansec.org/1212.htm.
62 Ibid.
63 Ruukun Katanyuu, “Beyond Non-Interference in ASEAN,” Asian Survey 46, no. 6 (November/December 2008): 825–45.
64 Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, February 24, 1976, http://www.aseansec.org/1217.htm.
65 Katanyuu, “Beyond Non-Interference in ASEAN,” 825–45.
66 “Myanmar’s monsters,” Economist, February 29, 1992, 19–20.
67 Hiro Katsumata, “ASEAN and human rights: resisting Western pressure or emulating the West?” Pacific Review 22, no. 5 (December 2009): 619–37.
68 Katanyuu, “Beyond Non-Interference in ASEAN,” 839.
69 Hufbauer et al., Economic Sanctions Reconsidered (1990), 94.
70 Jürgen Haacke, “ASEAN and Political Change in Myanmar: Towards a Regional Initiative?” Contemporary Southeast Asia 30, no. 3 (December 2008): 351–78.
71 The ASEAN Charter (Jakarta: ASEAN Secretariat, January 2008), http://www.aseansec.org/publications/ASEAN-Charter.pdf.
72 Wayne Arnold, “Historic Asean Charter Reveals Divisions,” New York Times, November 20, 2007, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/20/world/asia/20iht- asean.1.8403251.html?pagewanted=all.
73 Ibid.
74 Ibid.
75 Ibid.
76 John Simpson, “Burma releases pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi,” BBC News, November 13, 2010, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11749661.
77 Hannah Beech, “Aung San Suu Kyi: Burma’s First Lady of Freedom,” Time, December 29, 2010, http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2039939-3,00.html.
78 “EU extends Myanmar sanctions, but opens door,” Agence France-Presse, April 13, 2011, http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/seasia/Story/STIStory_656173.html. 79 Sourabh Gupta, “U.S.-Burma Relations: ‘Pragmatic Engagement’ Greets ‘Discipline- Flourishing Democracy’,” Asia Pacific Bulletin, January 26, 2010, http://www.eastwestcenter.org/fileadmin/stored/pdfs/apb046.pdf.
80 “Obama nominates US envoy to Burma,” Agence France-Presse, April 15, 2011, http://www.dvb.no/news/obama-nominates-us-envoy-to-burma/15289.
81 Daniel Ken Tate, “Myanmar Poised to Helm ASEAN in 2014 in Sign of Political Change,” Bloomberg Businessweek, November 15, 2011, http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-11-15/myanmar-poised-to-helm-asean-in- 2014-in-sign-of-political-change.html.
82 Margaret Talev and Daniel Ten Kate, “Obama Sending Clinton to Myanmar to Fan ‘Flickers of Progress’,” Bloomberg Businessweek, November 19, 2011, http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-11-19/obama-sending-clinton-to-myanmar-to- fan-flickers-of-progress-.html.
83 Bertil Lintner, “China behind Myanmar's course shift,” Asia Times, October 19, 2011, http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/MJ19Ae03.html.
84 Sean Turnell (Associate Professor, Department of Economics, Macquarie University), in an e-mail with the author, November 13, 2011.
85 “Asean ministers ‘to approve’ Myanmar as 2014 chair,” Agence France-Presse, November 16, 2011, http://globalnation.inquirer.net/18301/asean-ministers-to-approve- myanmar-as-2014-chair.
86 Ibid.
87 Jackie Calmes and Thomas Fuller, “Clinton to Visit Myanmar as Activist Rejoins Politics,” New York Times, November 18, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/19/world/asia/clinton-to-visit-myanmar-next-month-as- aung-san-suu-kyi-rejoins-politics.html.