I just recently dissertation field work which I think took four or more years. And we are starting writing up some time. This is actually a bit of a different topic for me that I usually present on normally in Myanmar or outside of the country. I present more on empirical data on conflicts and ethnic politics and agri-business which has been the focus of my work since 2008 or 2009 or so. But today I’m building off of these years of field work on these topics to actually step back. And from what I have researched on China-Myanmar border since the early 2000. First was my cross-border timber train research and now with industrial agriculture. I want to think about how does that empirical research mean for China in Myanmar rather than China-Myanmar relations. As I work through my presentation, hopefully you will understand that I think this is really different China in Myanmar versus China-Myanmar relations during the current reform period. I am coming from a rather different disciplinary background from most people in this room, which I think is a good thing in terms of having more diversity of theories and ideas that we are building off of. I’m a critical human geographer and a political ecologist which I think most people don’t know much. That’s fine. But we have a rather critical approach to political economy and you will see that in my presentation.

I’m really a big believer in field research. I think field research allows us to understand what’s actually happening on the ground and what is confronting people’s lives and livelihood every day. And I would argue that this matters greatly from understanding the dynamics in the country especially during the current reform period of Myanmar where things are really intense. Most people are spending all their time in Yangon and Naypyidaw. That is not what I’ve been doing. I’ve been spending most of my time on the China-Myanmar border since way before the reforms. What I’m trying to bring to the table is what I have seen or not seen on the border during the current reform period. I actually have to say I have seen no changes on the border. From my research which started during the military control period to now, I see almost no changes at all when I left Yangon and Naypyidaw. And I think that significant and needs to be stressed.

I’m gonna touch a bit on some sensitive issues of what’s going on ChinaMyanmar border lines. And what’s happening on the border lines is connected to Mandalay andYangon and Naypyidaw. But what I want to do on my presentation is beyond the redirect(22:46) of the so-called shifting diplomatic relations and talk more about what I have witnessed in the border areas of northern Shan state and Kachin state where I spent most of my time. And how the dark economies or illicit economies, black market in the northern peripheries actually very well connected to national affairs.

Admittedly, my talk is quite theoretical and abstract and is quite unusual for me. I’m sorry for that. But my goal is to try to persuade you to rethink the framing of China Myanmar relations and rather China in Myanmar.

In my opinion there are dominant discords happening based on some narratives which actually I don’t think have some empirical evidence to support. But this is what’s written about in the media and what most people think Yangon.Of course this is all debatable. But there’s a shift politically, economically and geopolitically towards the west of the globe north and also these are very complicated are loose terms that themselves need to be ump at for example where is Japan fit in that. And that’s Myanmar’s national government is perhaps trying to cut economic and political overreliance on China. And that’s perhaps what the reforms are about. And the westerners’ sanctions made the country more destitute and there’s no foreign capital or FDI in the country. I would contest a lot of those discommend narrative that is circulating the country. And I think one way to do that will beyond this obsession with bilateral diplomacy, the government, geopolitics and discipline of international relations and formal economy and instead focus more on informal and black economies which I think is probably the vast or main economy happening and operating in Myanmar. Social relations which are talked a lot in my presentation. Political histories, lift politics, grounded research and short people their everyday lives, what is going on.

I think the way that we think of the states needs to be a bit more nuanced in terms of what is comprised of the state or the government. It’s not an object that you can point out right? I think of more as a process that is composed of people and actions. And we have to be careful of having them overly statist analysis or focusing too much on the economy, dictating national decisions and the development introductory of a country. So instead of putting too much emphasis on state institutions, laws and policies especially in the context of Myanmar, where after you left Yangon and Naypyidaw, sometimes it feels like in a different country. I would argue to put more emphasis on structural influences and actions of powerful social forces on people and privilege positions, especially what is happening behind the curtain, particularly outside Yangon and Naypyidaw. For me I’ve been really informed by not only the social relations but also how the tie to specific historical patterns in the country. In the northern Myanmar has an amazing vibrant history with China, which I’m currently obsessed with. And I think we should take this really seriously especially since WWII but most of my work is focusing on the cold war, and what they have meant in terms of the current unfolding development in northern Myanmar and how that is connected to the center of the country. So when I say social relations I am talking more of… this is not a picture… I’m not choosing this image because of the people that are in it. I just couldn’t find any image on my computer to stress how this like people politics and relationships are shaping the way that development decisions are being made.

My last kind of abstracts. It’s not social relations but how they are tied to the specific regions of the country, which I call it social special relations. And how that is tied to the political histories of different parts of the country. For example in southeastern Myanmar you have a very different political history with the Koran, then what you have in northern Shan state, which is very different to the political histories that tie China to Kachin state. These histories really matter in terms of the development that were seen or not seen as the case maybe. I want to play with this center-periphery idea, the center being rooted in Rangoon napped in Mandalay, and the periphery where I spent most on Yunnan borders areas. And how there’s differences in these historical patterns and social relations are also blurred. So let’s not get too caught up in center versus periphery but there are kind of informing each other anyways. So my main argument is that political economies are more as operating in Myanmar are more based on social special relations that themselves are grounded in political histories in different parts of the country. And because of that, it’s not easily uprooted by the current political economies or institutional reform at the national level. This is an argument especially compared with presentations we’ve seen so far.

What I’m calling ethnic strong man and strong man economies are good examples in northern Shan state, whose company Asia world is quite dominant, not just in the periphery but also now in the center. These colorful characters are largely coming out of post cold war counter and surgeonfish by the Myanmar military. So just two companies are now the border guard forces during the reform period. This transforms these local elite players from doing typical behaviors to kind of being strong man economies. And because of the particular economies that are in these places on China Myanmar border, we are mostly talking about illicit economies, drugs such as opium or heroin and methamphetamine. And these ethnic Chinese as well as non-Chinese strong men, lot of them have ties to mainland Chinese business network because of the geography and finance capital that’s available in those areas. And I also want to say there is a slippage that unfortunately happens. The local perception of people in these areas is that ethnic Chinese equals mainland China Chinese, which is incorrect in many ways. Nonetheless, this is often the perception which as the researches will get really complicated. I’m just highlighting the slippage of identity and nationality. So these ethnic strong men are engaging in specific capital accumulation strategies in their territories of influence, that are secure from the position of power and authority that comes from their position as Malaysia leader that’s granted to them from the Tak Madar. In terms of the peace process which wasn’t brought up and actually is never brought up is that these characters are completely left out of the peace process which I think is really a serious problem, a serious omission. The amount of arms Malaysia groups operating in Shan state is bewildering and is completely left of any talks about peace. I am still waiting for this to enter into talks with Naypyidaw. A lot of finance capitals largely coming from mainland China businessmen, illicit in terms of non-opium-agri-business such as what most of my researches have focused on for recent several years, which is a new capital accumulation strategy through Chinese opiumcrops institution program, which is one of my case studies, as well as from the black market, both drugs and because of the questionable timber in that.So here’s a good visual to illustrate the Malaysia groups that are involved in the illicit agriculture economy as supposed the illicit opium over rubber plantation with its green government sign. It also illustrates the linkages between the periphery and the center where you have armed ethnic Chinese, Malaysia group that some people claim are involved in illicit activities. And here are part of a rubber plantation scheme which itself is coming subsidized indirectly or directly from the China’s opium crops institution program. Wow that’s a lot of things coming in at the same time. And in the other part of this puzzle, what I call the crony capitalism in the center emanating out. I like this kind of funny term indigenous capitals are referred to this crony capitalism that emerged in the 1990s which itself has fascinating history that somewhat tie to western sanctions I would argue. But over the past five years or so, they’ve been bleeding out or going out from this economic center more into the research rich ethnic periphery, which I would argue is from foreign estate formation building off state formation that already happened, and also further contributing to foreign estate formation, now competing in some ways with these ethnic strong men and cross border Chinese business opportunities, which is an interesting coming together. This is a bit difficult in terms of evident and generalization but it’s for some of these companies, especially once you are SinoMyanmar. Their funds are potentially coming from mainland.

I think Chinese is much more difficult to prove. It also depends on business opportunities they are involved in. I’m certainly for oil pump, I would assume that most of the funds are actually from ethnic Chinese and Malaysia who are very involved in the oil pumps there etc. etc.. So you will see this military private capital alliance. And you have military agents, cronies and Chinese finance capital coming together and unfortunate, some are unlikely way that’s now being reconfigured of a lot tension during the current reform period with this sort of alliance. This is what’s quite exciting about the current period in Myanmar. And my last slide is why I’m giving you this kind of typology of center versus periphery. I now want to pull that apart and say that there’s a massing middle emerging of these different scales in political economies. When you have crony capitalism, strong men and China, are merging together at different times in geography, especially during the current reform period which is so exciting to a researcher trying to figure this out. And increasingly we will see the center and periphery can dissolve into each other.And when you have ethnic strong men being brought more into Burma’s urban centers you can see this with hotel and tourism industry. And you also see more crony companies who are ex-time strong men and many of them are now in peace along with the ethnic strong men more doing business opportunities on the China border. And again I will say going off north presentation that this is type of rethink the efforts of and further cementing state firmation on the border. Thank you.