Myanmar’s Modernization After Independence: Political Development And Ethnic Problems

Since Myanmar’s Thein sein government took office in2011, The newgovernment started to implement the democratic reform, bring great changes toMyanmar, attracted many scholar around the world to study about this. Althoughrecently the research on Myanmar increased dramatically, but there are seldomresearch used the perspective of historical development to analysis Myanmar’s reform.As a matter of fact, today Myanmar’s reform closely connected with history,especially the history after Myanmar independence. In this paper, the writer willsummarized the Myanmar’s history since1948,the year of the Myanmar’sindependence. Then referenced the political development theory of Huntington’s,used the perspective of historical development to summarized two outstanding issuesin Myanmar’s modernization development: political development and ethnic minorityissues.The paper will divided four periods according to Myanmar’s history. The firstchapter is Parliamentary Democracy Period(1948.1-1962.3), the Western-styledemocracy could not adapt to Myanmar’s national conditions. U Nu government’sineffective governing led to political unrest, ethnic minority issues begun to intensify,these failure caused the military launched a coup to overthrow the U Nu government.The second chapter is Ne Win Military Rule Period(1962.3-1988.9),Ne Wintransformed the regime which so called “Burmese socialism”, but the consequence isworsen to Myanmar: military ruled the Myanmar dictatorially; ethnic minorityestablished there own arms to against the government; Myanmar’s modernizationprocess fall in stagnation. Finally, Ne Win government downfall with the democraticmovement in1988.The third chapter is Military Junta Period(1988.9-2011.3), the youngergeneration of the military controlled the nation and refused to hand over thegovernment to National League For Democracy(NLD), which led by Aung San SuuKyi, won the election in1990, How to democratize became the main theme of thisperiod. At last, junta carried out “Seven Roadmap to Democracy”, to ensure the predominance of military in future elected government. In2010, Union Solidarity andDevelopment Party(USDP) won the election. Next year, junta transfer of power to thenew government.Ethnic minority issues became easier in early, but the issue turn toworsen in2009.The last period is Thein sein new government period(2011.3-),president Theinsein pushed forward a series of reform measures, had achieved great achievements.Whereas the two main problems are have not still gotten completely settlement:Although NLD legalized and took part in the parliament, however the2008constitution sill has many restriction to NLD, Aung San Suu Kyi appealed to changethe Constitution, but nothing happened; Ethnic minority issues is still serious,president Thein sein pushed forward the peace deal, but nothing happened, either. Inaddition, religious conflicts getting serious, due to rise of extreme nationalism,Myanmar is facing a serious of new challenges.In conclusion, Myanmar’s regime at present adapt to the national situation,whereas still facing great challenges. In short term,2015election will be the biggesttext to the regime, NLD and USDP are all possible to won the election, the failure foreither wether or not turn to impede the regime are totally unknown. In long term, nomatter who control the government, they all must find the way to solve the problemwhich troubled the successive governments after Myanmar’s independence, such asethnic minority issues, legal system building, government capacity, economicdevelopment, educational problems, social stability. So the author suggest thatcompare with expect Myanmar to be truly democracy state, the future governmentwether can solve these problems properly is more significant and reality.