Papers (Part 1)

• Formality-Fobia: Fear of Formality in Justice Provision in Myanmar Myat Thet Thitsar Enlightened Myanmar Research Foundation

  This paper explores formality-phobia in Myanmar with a particular focus on justice provision and dispute resolution. The concept of ‘formality-phobia’ refers to people’s discomfort and feelings of anxiety when they encounter formal environments and settings, like the police, courts and state administrations, as well as customary institutions that use formal procedures. The paper argues that the fear of formality is the main reason why ordinary Myanmar citizens are very reluctant to address the official courts and even those customary disputes settling mechanisms that carry features of formality. Instead, the majority of people prefer to use what I refer to as “social means”, which includes negotiation and mediation by local elders and religious leaders, who have mediation skills and knowledge of local customs. People prefer to resolve their disputes in an unreserved environment through interactive and open conversations. They want restorative and retroactive justice rather than punitive justice. They are reluctant to use the formal justice system, or any other system that applies strict rules and procedures. These insights echoes qualitative research findings in various rural and urban settings of Myanmar, but this paper draws particularly on research conducted in Kachin state. The paper explores the main reasons behind formality-phobia, which reflects not only a wider distrust and fear of the state due to decades of military-rule and corruption, but also cultural beliefs. Particularly I focus on the cultural factor, which create fear or discomfort relating to the formal institutions as well as the formalities embedded in the justice sector even if these are applied by non-state customary justice systems. Cultural factors, I argue are shaped by religious beliefs and the socially cohesive nature of societal norms.

• Seeking Local Justice and Evading the State in a Hpa-An Ward Lue Htar Enlightened Myanmar Research Foundation

  This paper explores state evasion through the lens of seeking justice in crime cases and social disputes, based on ethnographic fieldwork in an urban ward of Hpa-An (2016-2018) where the majority identify as Karen and as Buddhists. As other recent research on Karen state and Myanmar as a whole equally show, the residents of the ward prefer crimes and disputes resolved at the lowest level possible within their own neighbourhood. Indeed, a minority of cases are submitted to the official justice system. Instead, elders and ward leaders are the main providers of everyday justice. If these leaders fail to find satisfactory solutions, people seldom proceed to the higher state levels, but either give up on the case or seek help from religious-spiritual actors, notably monks and spirit mediums. These different local actors co-participate in evading the state, by diverting cases away from the official judicial institutions. Intriguingly, this co-participation also includes the ward administrator and lower ranking police officers, who are recognised as part of the state apparatus, while also being local residents. State evasion reflects a shared distrust in the state to provide the kinds of justice processes and outcomes that ward residents prefer and are comfortable with. Drawing on legal and political anthropological understandings of justice and state evasion, the chapter explores how ward residents go about resolving disputes and crimes by evading the state and by articulating local, non-legalistic notions of (in)justice. We also analyse why this form of state evasion takes place in contemporary Hpa-An. Our analysis is built up around two in-depth case-studies on property loss, and while all cases vary, we use these as examples of common tendencies related to local justice seeking behaviour and state evasion, which cut across the 52 cases that we followed in the ward during 2016.

Papers (Part 2)

• Are We so Different? Inter-Religious Collaboration in a Rural Karen-Muslim Village in Hpa-An Township Than Pale University of Yangon

  ‘Identity politics’ play a significant role in both violent and non-violent conflicts, and yet identity construction is increasingly understood as fluid (Butler 1990), and the role of ethnicity and religion in both self-identity and othering are important. Thus, identity is multi-layered and can shift according to context and time. Recent communal violence in Myanmar has been framed primarily as an ethnic/religious conflict. This assumes, however, the primacy of ethnic and religious aspects of identity - a point which, this paper challenges. This paper explores how Karen and Muslim collaborate in disputes resolution process in rural Karen-Muslim village, situated in Hpa-An township in Karen State. Based on ethnographic research during 2016-2018, this paper explores how Muslim and Buddhist residents of the same Karen village in Hpa-An State, despite being from different religions, settle local disputes and deal with community security through mutual collaboration. I use two in-depth case studies - one about public disturbance by young people drinking in the Muslim area and one theft case in the Karen are – to illustrate this collaboration. The case also shows how Karen ethnic armed group actors support the village leaders in resolving problems. Muslims have lived in this village for over one hundred years, and Muslim men have been involved in village leadership since then. In addition, the Muslims can speak Karen language and have good communication with the Karen Buddhists. Muslims also participate jointly with the Buddhist Karen in social activities like celebrating the Karen New Year and sharing food at ceremonies. In this case, self-identity is derived more from a sense of locality and place (being born and living in the same village) rather than from ethnic or religious aspects. This provides a common identity which is enacted and reinforced through their collaboration in dispute resolution. Despite growing ethnic and religious tension in Myanmar, this communal identity and it’s application to dispute resolution has enabled the two religious communities to live peacefully together and avoid larger conflict. This kind of identity construction, and its expression in everyday justice, offers a hopeful paradigm for different kinds of legal pluralism, where belonging is defined by your locality, and not by ethnicity or religion.

• The Shadow Power of Armed Actors: Justice Seeking Practices in a Rural Pa-O Self-Administrated Zone Mi Thang Sorn Poine Enlightened Myanmar Research Foundation

  This paper explores everyday justice seeking strategies and security practices in a rural Pa-O village, which have been under the mix-controlled of the Pa-O national organization (PNO) and the self-administrated zone’s government since 2011. Based on fieldwork in 2017 and follow up in 2018, we show that the area is characterised by legal pluralism. Until the PNO and its armed wing, the Pa-O National Army (PNA), signed a ceasefire in 1991, people in the area utilized only village principles to deal with disputes and crimes. Today there is both collaboration between and a separation of the following: the Pa-O village system, the PNO/PNA and the Myanmar state, including its village leadership system and its justice system. In addition, this pluralism is influenced by the overall political system of the SAZ and the armed group. We argue that due to the long history of armed conflict followed by ceasefire, men with guns still, in the shadow of, underneath and beneath, the plural system influence how crimes and disputes are addressed. This is not very open, but when people complain about land confiscations and drug problems, they always fear the armed men. We draw on two cases to illustrate this point, and to show how the men with guns influence the security situation. The PNO/PNA is generous and represents the Pa-O people, by giving them land and security, but they are also exploitative by taking land and selling drugs. So overall, the history of armed conflict and the continuity of armed actors influence what problems the villagers have and how they are able to resolve the problems.

• The Strength of Customary Justice Practices in the Changing Political and Social Landscape of the Naga Self-Administered Zone Myat The Thitsar Enlightened Myanmar Research Foundation

  This paper explores the role of customary law and legal practices of Naga tribal groups in Laeshi Township, which is one of the townships included in the Naga Self-administered Zone in northwest Myanmar. The paper is based on qualitative fieldwork in mid-2017 and early 2018. The study found that the customary legal practices are still important part of different Naga tribal groups in terms of dispute resolutions at different levels, from the blood-related household groups (Pha-thar Su) to the district administrative-level. In addition, the study observed significant trends of institutionalizing the customary law and legal practices, which form part of an effort to maintain ethnic identity in the changing political and social landscape. In the 1990s the Naga ethnic leaders organized the Naga culture and literature committee central (NCLC-C), which purpose is to ensure equal and fair justice for all the different Naga tribes as well as to create a shared Naga language and literacy. Then NCLC-C codified the Naga customary law book in 2003, which can be widely applied to deal with all kinds of crimes and disputes, including severe crimes. In this paper we argue that there are three main factors, which can help explain the continued significance of Naga customary law, including: (i) a strong sense of maintaining ethnic identity, (ii) the social-cultural structure of the Naga, namely the Pha-thar Su, which strongly nits together the Naga society from the smallest unit to the inter-tribal institutions; and; (iii) continuous mistrust in the official Myanmar state institutions. The paper presents three supportive case studies. The first case highlights how the customary legal mechanisms of the Naga contest the state legal procedures and actors. The second case study reflects how the Naga Pha-thar Su serves as an important dispute resolution mechanism in Naga communities, and the third case study observes how the customary legal practices have become hybrid in terms of its adaptation into gender sensitive perspectives and women rights, as a result of the work of civil society organizations and the Baptist church.

Abstract

Keywords

• Conflict
• Ethnicity
• Justice
• Myanmar