Aung San Suu Kyi: Confronting the National Army Created by Her Father

The landslide victory of Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) in the Myanmar (Burma) general election is a clear demonstration of the people's desire to completely eliminate the military that has continued to hold the control over politics, administration, and the judicial system following the establishment of the nation's nominally democratic government. While the military was able to annul the NLD's decisive election victory twenty-five years ago, it has no choice but to accept the results of this election, an election that was conducted on the basis of the constitution that the military itself enacted. At the same time, it is also true that this election result poses only a minor irritation to the military.

As has been well documented in the Japanese media, there are several reasons for the military's lack of concern. Aung San Suu Kyi, whose sons are foreign nationals, is unable to become president due to the provisions of the present constitution which bar anyone with foreign offspring from assuming the presidency. Furthermore, the military is guaranteed a certain amount of authority within the government. For example, three key posts––including the position of Minister of Home Affairs, who controls the police force––are reserved for members of the military. Above all, the military is certain that it can block proposals for constitutional revision due to the fact that in a parliament in which 25% of seats are allocated to unelected military representatives, constitutional revision requires support from at least “75% of all members and one more member” of parliament.

As has already been seen during the administration of President Thein Sein, who has overseen the transition to civilian government, Aung San Suu Kyi and other NLD members gained 37 seats in the lower house and 4 seats in the upper house at the bye-election which was held in April 2012. Since then, they have energetically pursued constitutional revision, inspiring significant public support. However, their tireless efforts came to nothing in the face of complete opposition from the military and the incumbent party.

The NLD's lack of success in their pursuit of constitutional revision led the people of Myanmar to begin to lose hope that they would ever be able to do anything about the military's influence. However, just days before election day, Aung San Suu Kyi stated that she would “be above the president,” giving the people renewed hope and encouraging them to make the vote that provided such a dramatic demonstration of their hopes for the nation.

Of course in the context of the politics of a developed nation, this statement would seem like the declaration of a dictator seeking to push aside constitutional government. However, such a strong declaration was surely just what was needed by a nation whose people have constantly felt powerless against the unjust tyranny of the military.

As a matter of fact, advising the president is not prohibited under the constitution. In my opinion, Aung San Suu Kyi intended her statement to respond to the people's expectations by promising to compensate for the obvious flaws of the constitution without going against its provisions.

For Aung San Suu Kyi and the NLD, the real challenges will undoubtedly begin now that they have been elected to take over the reins of government.

The only possible means of achieving their promise of constitutional revision––and thereby fulfilling the hopes of the majority of the nation's people––is to reconcile with the military and secure its cooperation.

It is hard to imagine that the military will quickly cast off their distrust of Aung San Suu Kyi, who has consistently stood up against the military government. Yet at the same time, she is also the daughter of one of the founders of the army, General Aung San, who is revered as a national hero and Myanmar's “father of independence.” Far from criticizing the military, she has repeatedly expressed her respect for the army that her father created. If the military is able to respond to her respectful stance and return to its origins in the time of General Aung San, a time when the army was dedicated to protecting the people, it may be possible for the military and the NLD to reach reconciliation.

Once the NLD has established itself in government, it will naturally also be expected to provide solutions to various issues that are more relevant to people's daily lives.

In this regard, however, the NLD is unlikely to diverge significantly from the approaches that have been adopted by the previous administration. While he was unable to completely step out of the military's shadow, President Thein Sein has made efforts to pursue the reforms and policies that Myanmar needs. If the transition to the NLD administration proceeds smoothly, this can also be credited to him.

That being said, there are a number of issues that need to be addressed, and the new government will surely set about developing solutions. The NLD's policy emphasizing human rights and Aung San Suu Kyi's advice may result in more consideration towards citizens and residents in addressing the strains on society that have arisen due to the rapid democratization and particularly the introduction of foreign capital, such as forced resettlement due to excessive real-estate speculation and development. This will probably be seen as an obstacle by those companies that seek business opportunities in Myanmar.

Japan has built up strong connections with Myanmar's military government over the years, and there are those who are concerned how it will fare in establishing relations with Aung San Suu Kyi. I do not see any grounds for concern, but I do believe that it is important for Japan to invest even greater care in developing its relationship with the new government, given the significant trust that it has gained among the people of Myanmar.

I chose to focus on researching Myanmar because I quickly fell in love with the country when I spent time there. This is also partly because I lived in Yangon (Rangoon) for two and a half years as a child in the early 1960s due to my parents' work. When I returned to Myanmar in April 1977 at the end of my first year of university, on arriving in the then-capital Yangon, I was immediately shocked by the state of the airport, which was nothing like you would expect from an international airport. This gave me a certain sense of relief, and while there were many aspects of life that I found unfamiliar and disorienting, I was fascinated by all of them.

However, despite my great love of Myanmar, I have not set foot there since I visited in 2006 Somehow my name ended up on the blacklist of the military administration at that time, and even since the establishment of the civilian government I have not been able to acquire a visa. I am therefore stuck in the somewhat strange position of only being able to research the country from the outside, but I like to take the optimistic view that when I receive a visa again, it will be a sign that true democracy has been established in Myanmar [laughs ]! I hope that the problem will be resolved with this change of government.

In a world where all kinds of information and commodities fly back and forth across national borders, and major cities are turning into forests of high-rise buildings, it seems that there are increasingly fewer differences between countries and regions on the surface. However, there are clear national borders, boundaries that are sometimes hard to cross, housing cultures and societies in which we can find hidden differences that set them apart. It goes without saying that true coexistence is impossible unless we understand and respect these differences.

If we want to research the world as a global entity it is therefore essential that we adopt two perspectives: one that gives us a broad, bird's eye view from which to look at the theory behind topics such as the links within international relations and civil society, and another that allows us to look closely into the individual countries and regions that make up the world and immerse ourselves in the field to conduct empirical research.

The Faculty of Global Studies was launched at Sophia University two years ago with the aim of providing an internationally unprecedented program of study to encourage students to adopt both of these perspectives. The faculty's unique curriculum offers students courses in area studies focused on Asia, the Middle East, and Africa as well as courses in theory of international relations and theory of civil society. This ensures that students study both fields while also developing a focus in one of the two.

Students at the Faculty of Global Studies have the opportunity to identify questions that they wish to investigate, whether they start––as I did––with a specific region of interest and expand their horizons from there, or whether they first explore areas such as conflict resolution or peacebuilding and then narrow down their interests. I look forward to seeing more students who will seek to answer their own unique questions at our faculty.