Expansion and contraction of foreign aid during military rule

Since Asian donor agencies tend to provide economic and infrastructural assistance, which is mostly bilateral, Myanmar civil society organizations (CSOs) often have to rely on Western donors for support.⁴ As mentioned, the earliest ties between ‘Western-style’ CSOs and foreign supporters were with Christian missionaries who entered the country in the colonial era. Although foreign missionaries were technically no longer allowed residency after 1962, strong ties between missionaries and the Christian churches in Myanmar remained, and Christian donor organizations still play a significant role in Western donor policies in Myanmar (Sakhong, 2007; Rieffel and Fox, 2013). After independence in 1948, when the global aid chain was developing on a large scale, the country’s bilateral relations were characterized by Cold War and post-colonial connections. In the 1950s, Burma received technical support from the British and post-war reparations as compensation for the Japanese occupation (Steinberg, 2010: 36; 45; 124). The post-1962 Burma Socialist Programme Party government tried to remain neutral amid Cold War rivalries but eventually had to seek out foreign assistance due to economic decline (Steinberg, 2010: 67). Bilateral and multilateral development assistance did not really take off until the end of the 1970s and was distributed exclusively through government channels (Perry, 2007: 39; Banki, 2009: 54). Japan remained the primary donor for decades, accounting for over 70 per cent of the official development assistance (ODA) in 1987 (Banki, 2009: 53).

The punitive approach that many Western countries have taken towards the Myanmar government was initiated after the 1988 crackdown and the denial of power to the National League for Democracy (NLD) after the 1990 elections. These events instilled on Western donors the idea that bilateral assistance to Myanmar contributed to repression, and that the military government should be coerced into democratization. As previously mentioned, this view was actively promoted by Aung San Suu Kyi and various exile organizations that gained a strong voice in determining foreign (and especially Western) policies on Myanmar after 1990. They nearly unanimously called for divestment, including withholding development assistance, which they argued primarily benefitted the military government. Democracy activists urged Western supporters to direct their support to the population in exile (both refugees and political activists, including the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma [NCGUB]), whom they argued were in the best position to represent the Myanmar people. The Western sanction policies were subject to severe criticism, including by a number of scholars who argued that they ignored the needs of the majority of the Myanmar population (Taylor, 2009; Pedersen, 2012).

The Free Burma Coalition in the United States was particularly successful in getting a number of ‘Free Burma Acts’ passed that limited the possibility of investment in the country (Zaw Oo, 2006; Dale, 2011). The European Union adopted a Common Position in 1996, which contained an arms embargo and diplomatic sanctions, and suspended all non-humanitarian aid beyond immediate poverty alleviation (Steinberg, 2010: 177). This position was revised in 2004 to allow not only humanitarian assistance, but also projects on human rights, democracy and capacity building for civil society, as long as it was not distributed to or through the government (International Crisis Group, 2006: 3). Occasionally attempts were made to engage the Myanmar government, such as the Australian government’s human rights training project for civil servants that was initiated in 1999 despite objections by the NLD (Kinley and Wilson, 2007). The Depayin incident in 2003 and the removal from office of General Khin Nyunt in 2004 put a premature end to this project. In general, though, the NLD and other opposition groups were effective in fostering the view that Western assistance was better distributed outside than inside the country. This politicization of the aid debate had a profound impact on the activities of civil society actors working inside the country under military rule.

In contrast to these Western responses, Asian countries did not impose political or economic sanctions on Myanmar, nor were they particularly supportive of non-governmental activities. Japan temporarily halted assistance after 1988 but soon resumed ties with Myanmar, although it was surpassed by China which became the largest provider of ODA to Myanmar (Bjarnegård, 2020; Décobert and Wells, 2020). However, both Japanese and Chinese aid has been distributed primarily through (inter)governmental agencies, and China in particular employed a broad definition of development assistance by contributing to infrastructure projects such as building the new capital Naypyidaw (Rieffel and Fox, 2013). Japanese governmental and non-governmental donors have long been active in Myanmar, particularly in agricultural training and other activities that fall within the Japanese aid philosophy of ‘making persons’ (Watanabe, 2014), but were less likely to contribute to politically contentious activities.

After 1988, most Asian countries pursued a policy of ‘constructive engagement’ with Myanmar, including successful attempts to include the country in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) from 1997 onwards (Buszynski, 1998). ASEAN’s engagement policy gained more international recognition when it was able to play a vital brokering role in post-Nargis humanitarian assistance efforts (International Crisis Group, 2008; Human Rights Watch, 2010). Among the Asian countries, India was most openly critical after the 1988 uprising and provided assistance to democracy activists and refugees based within its borders. This policy was reversed in the course of the 1990s, when India’s ‘Look East’ policy called for closer political and economic ties with its eastern neighbours (Egreteau, 2011). Thailand has long hosted a significant section of the Myanmar population in exile, both activists and migrant workers, but has at the same time pursued hostile laws and extortive practices towards them (Hargrave, 2014; Simpson, 2014). Although ties with Thai activists have increased, especially since the rise of social media, the Thai government refuses to take a public position on the role of the military in Myanmar, presumably since Thailand has itself been ruled by the military since it staged a coup in 2014. Respondents confirmed that, despite their attempts at global advocacy, they mostly found political and financial support for their activities among Western donors. Contrary to Asian governmental policies, some non-state initiatives explicitly aim to support Myanmar civil society, for example the Thai-based Spirit in Education Movement, which contributes to capacity building through a Buddhist framework that differs from ‘mainstream’ Western development. However, this organization too receives funding from Western donors.

Despite general Western reluctance to become involved in any activities taking place inside Myanmar, a number of developments from the 1990s onwards increased opportunities for local actors to obtain foreign financial support. As mentioned, the ceasefires reached in several ethnic areas in the 1990s expanded the opportunities for local organizations to set up activities in these regions. The post-1988 military government also showed interest in receiving international development assistance, as long as it was limited to central Myanmar and the ceasefire areas that were under its control. Moreover, it preferred multi- or bilateral assistance such as from UN agencies that could be spent on technical reconstruction, rather than help from international non-governmental organizations (INGOs) that brought their own agendas and were considered difficult to oversee (International Crisis Group, 2002). Some of the ethnic armed organizations (EAOs) that had entered into ceasefires also sought out international assistance in order to develop the infrastructure and economy in their region, and INGOs were able to enter Kachin, Mon and Kayah States after signing Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) with the government (Purcell, 1999). In addition, the government sought out assistance to target the gravest humanitarian needs such as poverty and HIV/AIDS, which it increasingly acknowledged as serious. In 1994, the State Law and Order Restoration Council officially announced that it would accept international development assistance to some of its border areas, as long as it did not pose a threat to national security. Opportunities thus increased for local humanitarian and peacebuilding organizations active in the accessible areas of the country.

Various Western organizations experienced an increase in humanitarian access in the early 2000s as a result of personal relationships with General Khin Nyunt. Humanitarian aid in Myanmar reportedly doubled between 2001 and 2005, while also reaching more remote areas (International Crisis Group, 2006). As the head of Military Intelligence and later briefly Prime Minister, Khin Nyunt had facilitated the ceasefires with various ethnic groups as well as informal talks with Aung San Suu Kyi. He was also responsible for foreign affairs, and actively sought out international involvement in the country. International organizations such as the International Labour Organization (ILO), the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) worked with Khin Nyunt to establish projects to reduce forced labour, facilitate prison visits and increase protection for civilians in conflict areas (International Crisis Group, 2006). General Khin Nyunt’s sudden removal from power in 2004 directly affected the ability of intergovernmental organizations and INGOs to work inside the country. International organizations experienced decreased access to high-level government officials, increased surveillance, difficulty in obtaining permission for field trips and more pressure to work with government-organized NGOs (GONGOs). The ICRC had previously withdrawn operations due to the obstruction of its prison visits by the military government in 1995 and only resumed operations in 1999. It was forced to close all field offices inside Myanmar in 2006 after tensions arose when the Union Solidarity and Development Association (the main GONGO under the State Peace and Development Council) attempted to first join, and then compete with the ICRC prison visits programme (International Crisis Group, 2006: 8). The ICRC was only able to expand its operations again during the political transition.

The increased pressure culminated in the release of ‘Guidelines for UN agencies, international organizations and INGOs/NGOs’ by the Myanmar government in February 2006, which imposed strict rules on registration, oversight and funding of activities, and limited freedom to travel (International Crisis Group, 2006: 9). As a result, local CSOs could only legally obtain foreign support from donors who had established an MOU with the government, which in turn came with its own restrictions and oversight mechanisms. Some donors chose to channel funding through large partner organizations that did have an official presence in the country, such as Save the Children, which oversaw several multi-donor funds, but this increased local activists’ dependency on large INGOs, as discussed subsequently.

Outside the government’s framework, much more was possible. North American and European donor organizations were able to support the more politically oriented organizations that operated without official registration. However, since aid distributed outside Myanmar faced less obstruction from both the Myanmar government and Western sanctions, many donors found it easier and more efficient to support organizations in exile than those based inside the country. The American National Endowment for Democracy, for example, in 1999 reportedly spent $1.6 million on Burmese media, research and labour organizations in exile, including those of ethnic nationalities. It also supported the Norwegian-based media organization Democratic Voice of Burma, the NCGUB, and the US-based Burma Fund (Steinberg, 2001: 277; see Duell, 2014 for an overview of the main donors to the democracy movement in exile). In short, under military rule, a large proportion of the Western funding allocated for civil society support was spent on organizations outside the country, while humanitarian organizations active inside the country were subjected to strong scrutiny from both the government and the democracy movement.

Politicization of the aid debate

Distributors of development assistance, and especially humanitarian aid, often have an interest in presenting their activities as politically neutral. Organizations such as the ICRC and Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) are only able to operate in conflict areas under the condition that they remain impartial in the conflict and assist all sides equally. In reality, though, development assistance can become highly politicized. Humanitarian agencies can rightly or wrongly be accused of unequal distribution of aid, and assistance in the fields of development and democratization is even more likely to be politically charged. Research on African case studies in particular has shown how development aid has a strong political impact on the receiving countries and often comes with political intentions from the senders (De Waal, 1997; Sogge, 2002). The aid debate in Myanmar has at times been simplified to the question of whether to deliver aid through the military government, with the risk of displaced funding and continuation of conflict and oppression, or withhold aid from the government, and totally neglect the population inside the country (Décobert, 2016). Both local and Western organizations with an interest in Myanmar have actively tried to bring forth their own viewpoints on this issue, while discrediting the views of those taking a different approach. Their analyses of the situation often resulted in public policy advice about the desired distribution (or non-distribution) of assistance to Myanmar organizations.

As early as 1993, the International Council of Voluntary Agencies called for active INGO involvement inside the country, a suggestion that was rejected by the exile community. A variety of solidarity and exile organizations, including the NCGUB and some of the ethnic nationality organizations, argued that aid should be directed towards the Thai–Burma border instead (Purcell, 1999: 77). While some community leaders reportedly thought that the presence of international organizations could prevent human rights abuses from taking place, INGO representatives remained relatively secretive about their operations inside the country, in order to prevent problems both with the Myanmar government and with democracy activists who might criticize their work (Pedersen, 2012). Aid organizations wishing to be involved in military-ruled Myanmar were therefore presented with a policy dilemma: they wanted to attend to the needs of the people while at the same time promoting democratization and respecting calls from democracy activists in exile to withdraw support and assistance from the country (International Crisis Group, 2002, 2006). International Crisis Group (2006: 11) criticized ‘the use of foreign aid by political actors whose first priority is regime change’ and argued that organizations working on the ground faced serious limitations as a result of the principled stance taken by the United States and other Western states in terms of preventing money from flowing to the government, even indirectly. Some similarly argued that donors should give local organizations more room to design their own strategies, including inviting local authorities to their meetings if this was deemed beneficial (Ware, 2012).

As the climate for international organizations worsened over the course of 2004, two large INGOs decided to withdraw from the country. The French section of MSF argued that the new regulations limited their ability to travel and work, especially in minority areas. The withdrawal decision of the UN Global Fund for AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, however, was attributed both to deteriorating implementation circumstances and to severe pressure from US-based activists who urged Congress to demand additional safeguards as a condition for American contributions to the fund (International Crisis Group, 2006; Currie, 2012). The EU and Australia reacted to the Fund’s withdrawal by setting up the alternative Three Diseases Fund in 2006, which was less dependent on US funding. However, the total budget for combating these diseases was significantly reduced, resulting in adverse effects on the Myanmar population, as well as damaged relationships with government officials and GONGOs such as the Myanmar Red Cross, who had tried their best to cooperate with the Fund (International Crisis Group, 2006, 2008). Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Myanmar at the time, warned that “it would be a terrible mistake to wait for political normalisation of Myanmar to help the population and to reinforce the strengths of the community” (in International Crisis Group, 2006: 16).

Democracy organizations were much more sceptical about the benefits of aid to Myanmar. The Alternative ASEAN Network (Burma) (ALTSEAN-Burma [2002]) was one of the most vocal proponents of divestment. It argued that those in favour of humanitarian assistance were being naive and depoliticizing aid by using terminology such as ‘crisis’, which absolved the Myanmar government from direct responsibility. It argued that the military benefitted financially from foreign assistance, that it withheld aid from ethnic nationalities in areas of ongoing conflict and that it inhibited transparency, accountability and adequate monitoring of humanitarian work. By not bearing witness, ALTSEAN-Burma (2002: 48) argued, ‘international agencies are responsible for the suffering of the people through their complicity’. Aid agencies based in Yangon, moreover, were accused of deliberately avoiding contact with organizations providing aid in the border areas. This view was also shared by researchers who argued that INGOs ceased to be impartial and were making a political choice by signing MOUs with the government (Purcell, 1999; Malseed, 2009). Such views, which were publicly aired by democracy organizations in exile, made many Western donors reluctant to offer support to local civil society initiatives (Décobert, 2016).

The limited availability of first-hand information from the ground made donors highly dependent on the information provided by advocacy organizations such as ALTSEAN-Burma on the one hand and think tanks such as International Crisis Group on the other. Humanitarian actors based inside the country had to both guard their fragile access on the ground and defend themselves against being labelled as ‘regime apologists’, as the previously discussed example of the ‘After the storm’ report illustrated. They also faced actual restrictions, for example on extending their services to known NLD supporters, and reported adjusting their language and the content of the reports they submitted to authorities (Purcell, 1999; Ware, 2012). Those humanitarian actors who were too critical of human rights violations, such as the United Nations Development Programme representative Charles Petrie, were denied access to the country (Currie, 2012: 26).⁵ A few international organizations were uniquely well placed to combine engagement with and public condemnation of the military government, such as the ILO. In 1997, it ordered a public investigation into accusations of forced labour in Myanmar, while it later managed to cooperate with the government to reduce the use of forced labour and child soldiers (Horsey, 2011). This process was far from seamless, however. In 2003, two people were sentenced to death for treason after contacting the ILO representative.⁶ The removal of General Khin Nyunt and his team in 2004 deprived the ILO of its primary contact points within the government, but it was able to re-engage with the government in the course of the political transition period.

As described earlier, the debate on the desirability of donor assistance to Myanmar intensified after cyclone Nargis in May 2008. The cyclone caused unprecedented damage, exposing the military government’s inability to respond effectively to a large-scale crisis and provide effective delivery of aid. Meanwhile, Western aid suppliers tried to keep their support out of the hands of the authorities (Human Rights Watch, 2010; Larkin, 2010). International critics capitalized on the chaotic aftermath of the cyclone to highlight the military’s continuing failure and lack of care for the population, and to renew their calls for democratization. Yet the personal involvement of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and the coordinating role taken up by ASEAN also offered new prospects for effective foreign intervention in what regional countries had thus far considered largely internal affairs (International Crisis Group, 2008; Rieffel and Fox, 2013).

Despite the initial restrictions on foreign aid entering the country, cyclone Nargis and its aftermath placed Myanmar more saliently on the international aid map. ODA to Myanmar increased from less than $3 per person in 2006 to a still modest $11 per person in 2008, then fell to $7 in 2010.⁷ The number of INGOs active inside the country and their level of local staff rose significantly, particularly in the delta area. Some of this humanitarian assistance later transformed into regular development assistance, leading to long-term relationships between Western donors and local activists. Metta Development Foundation, which had been active since 1998, saw its budget expanding from $2 million to $12 million as a result of cyclone Nargis. Other organizations also continued to benefit from renewed contact and a growing reputation with international donors. The occurrence of cyclone Nargis thus shifted the balance, with CSOs inside the country seeing the opportunities for foreign assistance increase, sometimes at the expense of border-based groups, as described subsequently.

Both overly positive and overly negative depictions of INGO activities in Myanmar under military rule should be viewed in light of this politicized aid debate. The debate around humanitarian and development assistance to Myanmar prompted those involved to present two competing frames of the aid situation: one in which the international community was, intentionally or unintentionally, complicit in the regime’s strategy to commit human rights abuses and enrich itself at the expense of the Myanmar people, and another in which the international community had been misled by democracy activists into believing that humanitarian assistance in Myanmar was largely ill-spent. The lack of information coming from inside the country made it difficult for any party to assess these claims, let alone obtain the views of the intended beneficiaries. These positions therefore had a significant impact on the ability of local activists to establish contact with Western donors. These donors, in turn, also used their financial and political leverage to foster democratization from below.

Western democracy promotion

In the 1990s and early 2000s, a significant proportion of Western donor assistance to civil society in Myanmar could be labelled as ‘democracy promotion’, which was distributed to non-state actors (Bjarnegård, 2020). While exiled activists and students abroad were explicitly exposed to human rights training and civic education, the support for activists inside the country initially took a more covert form, such as English language training. Among Western donors, the US government was most explicit in its emphasis on democratization. Although diplomatic relations between the US and Myanmar had been limited, with no US ambassador in Myanmar between 1990 and 2012, the American Embassy maintained a presence in Yangon, and its American Center provided local activists the space to discuss politically sensitive issues. The United States also provided local CSOs with small grants of around $10,000, with the goal of fostering an active civil society as a key component of democratization. Australia and the EU channelled most of their donor funding through INGOs and UN organizations. Australia’s minimum grant amount at the time was $100,000, which ruled out funding to small organizations. Individual European countries such as Denmark, Norway and Switzerland spent some of their funding for human rights and democracy directly on local organizations, while a significant proportion of their budgets were distributed among activists and media organizations in exile. Eastern European donor organizations were also particularly active supporters of Burmese democracy activists, for example through the Czech Republic’s ‘Transition Promotion Program’, as they hoped to transfer their past revolutionary experiences to other contexts.

The UK, traditionally one of the most engaged countries in Myanmar due to its colonial ties, spent its budget for strengthening civil society mainly through trainings at the British Council in Yangon, and through its various ‘Millennium Centres’ around the country. The British Council also hosted Pyoe Pin, a multi-donor support programme for civil society in Myanmar. The UK’s decision in 2011 to substantially increase assistance made it the largest bilateral donor in Myanmar. In most UK projects, strengthening civil society was presented as a first step towards ultimate democratization on the central political level. The military government attempted to stop or delegitimize such attempts at democratization and frequently accused foreign donors of false motives.⁸ Where it could not exert much direct influence, such as at the American Center, it reportedly sent informers. The dual funding of organizations inside the country and those in exile was particularly sensitive, as it could have negative repercussions for local activists and often had to be publicly concealed. Consequently, some donors decided to fund only registered organizations, while others disguised their funding relations, leading to a certain level of overlap between donors (Décobert and Wells, 2020). Donor representatives were not always internally in sync either. Those close to the field were often more flexible towards organizations than their colleagues in headquarters, and individual preferences for supporting more radical or more moderate civil society initiatives also differed among diplomats and donor staff.

Changing donor priorities during the political transition

The political transition process had a profound impact on donor policies and practices, particularly after Aung San Suu Kyi gained a seat in parliament in 2012. Donor funding for Myanmar rose sharply after 2011, coinciding with a ‘gold rush’ for foreign business opportunities (Bächtold, 2015).⁹ Over $9 billion was committed in ODA between 2012 and 2015 (Campbell, 2023: 15). However, Western donor funding was increasingly spent through the Myanmar government, which was seen as essential for the building of a strong democratic state (Bjarnegård, 2020; Décobert and Wells, 2020; McConnachie, 2022). The United States withdrew its veto for international financial institutions to operate in Myanmar, and both the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank re-started operations in Myanmar after having been absent for several decades (Décobert and Wells, 2020).¹⁰ New bilateral donors such as United States Agency for International Development (USAID) entered the country, while Western governments re-assessed their sanctions policies. This created significant opportunities for civil society actors. While previously they competed for a limited amount of donor funding, a new situation emerged in which the demand for local partners almost outgrew the supply. Respondents reported an increased demand for information as a result of the many scoping missions of new donors seeking to enter Myanmar. Some observers even questioned whether the amount of foreign aid entering Myanmar in the early years of the transition might be ‘too much too soon’ (Rieffel and Fox, 2013).

While political activities that had previously been considered sensitive could be conducted more openly, Western donor assistance itself became increasingly depoliticized. This was particularly visible in the area of peacebuilding. Donors allocated large amounts of money to peace initiatives that were decidedly unequal in set-up, put EAOs in a disadvantageous position, and ignored diversity within civil society (Bächtold, 2015; Wells, 2020; Loong, 2021), despite warnings from other conflict environments that supporting an imbalanced peace process may actually do more harm than good (Anderson, 1999; Stokke et al, 2022). The Thein Sein government initiated the Myanmar Peace Center in November 2012, which received substantial support from the European Union and other international actors (Su Mon Thazin Aung, 2016). This initiative was led by former leaders of the Third Force who had recently returned from exile. Although it was meant to be a neutral institute, it was strongly criticized for being untransparent and too close to the government (Saw Yan Naing, 2016; Su Mon Thazin Aung, 2016). The Myanmar Peace Support Initiative, another project intended to facilitate dialogue between EAOs, political parties and civil society, ran from 2012 to 2014 with Norwegian donor support but did not achieve much result (Hindstrom, 2012; Roy et al, 2021). A number of CSOs, including two women’s groups and two Karen organizations, publicly expressed disappointment about the Norwegian government’s ‘flawed, rushed, and untransparent peace fund consultations’ in relation to this initiative.¹¹ Norway was particularly criticized, because its peacebuilding involvement coincided with significant business investment in the country by Norwegian companies Telenor and Statoil in the telecom and oil and gas sector (Mon Mon Myat, 2014).

The International Crisis Group, a long-term proponent of foreign engagement with the Myanmar government, became subject to public criticism in November 2012 when it announced that it would honour President Thein Sein with an award for his peace efforts in the country (Horton, 2013). The national census in 2014 was conducted in collaboration with the UN Population Fund, which could not prevent the removal of Rohingya as ethnic category and other contentious provisions (TNI, 2014; Ferguson, 2015; Min Zin, 2015). The European Union was criticized for its crowd management training offered to the Myanmar Police Force in 2014, as the police subsequently inflicted violence on peaceful protesters in Letpadan. From 2016 onwards, a group of Western donors pooled over $100 million into a Joint Peace Fund, which distributes funding to CSOs that could demonstrate a contribution to the peace process (Wells, 2020).¹² As a result, many respondents had to rephrase their rights-based projects in the more ‘neutral’ language of peacebuilding.

The situation of Myanmar activist and refugee organizations abroad and their ability to secure funding also changed dramatically because of these donor shifts. Political and advocacy organizations who had managed to create a role for themselves inside the country were able to benefit from the increase in donor support, while those that remained outside the country saw their funding options reduced (Duell, 2014; Décobert, 2016; Olivius, 2019). Several of the Western (particularly Scandinavian) donors began to shift funding from exile organizations to organizations working from inside Myanmar, whose position around the 2010 elections they found more constructive. Refugees in Bangladesh, Thailand and Malaysia experienced significant pressure to return to Myanmar, regardless of whether their area of origin was in fact accessible and free of conflict (Hargrave, 2014; McConnachie, 2022).¹³ This also jeopardized civil society activities that could not be done safely inside the country, such as the documentation of human rights violations in the ethnic areas, and some inter-ethnic women’s rights initiatives conducted from the Thai–Myanmar border (Olivius, 2019; Matelski et al, 2022).

Foreign aid reinforcing societal divisions

Especially in situations of conflict, foreign aid may create or reinforce divisions in society (Anderson, 1999; Banki, 2009). The distribution of resources such as foreign aid can make ethnic, religious and geographical divisions more prominent, as it becomes rewarding to distinguish between one’s own group members and outsiders. As previously discussed, ethnicity is one of the main identity markers in Myanmar. Within ethnic groups, divisions also exist between persons of various religious backgrounds, class and urban or rural origin. A further division exists between groups that have reached ceasefires with the military and those that have not (South, 2008b; Banki, 2009). People in remote and/or conflict areas often complain that they are less well served by aid agencies that tend to operate from central locations. Within aid organizations and their implementing partners, ethnic and religious divisions can also play a role. The divisions within Myanmar society complicated the hiring practices of donor and intermediary organizations. For example, people often accused Christian organizations of hiring mostly Christian staff (CDA, 2009). Some argue that (I)NGOs should hire staff from within communities who understand the local culture and needs, while others argue that they should refrain from hiring local staff members because they would favour their own (sub)group (CDA, 2009: 37).

In Rakhine State, existing distrust between ethnic and religious minority groups was exacerbated by the presence of Western aid agencies. Already in 2009, it was noted that the Rohingya in northern Rakhine State were far more likely to receive assistance from the international community, while the (Buddhist) ethnic Rakhine people were more likely to receive assistance from the Myanmar government (CDA, 2009: 10). Rakhine people in turn felt disadvantaged by INGOs operating in the area, because they were hiring Bengali-speaking staff in order to be able to communicate with the Rohingya population (CDA, 2009: 29).

The question of aid delivery in Rakhine State became even more relevant after violence between Buddhists and Muslims erupted in 2012. As aid levels finally started to rise during the political transition, people in Myanmar, and in Rakhine State in particular, were frustrated that the majority seemed to go to the Rohingya (Walton and Hayward, 2014). Significant street protests took place in opposition to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), which wanted to open offices in Rakhine State, after which the Myanmar government blocked the organization’s access to the country; the president argued that the OIC’s presence was “not in accordance with the desire of people” (BBC, 2012). The Rakhine people’s suspicion that aid agencies were favouring Rohingya resulted in direct accusations and even violence against Western aid workers, after which the Myanmar government forced MSF Holland to withdraw from Rakhine State; they were allowed to re-enter in the course of 2014. Other aid agencies temporarily withdrew their Western staff members from the area for security reasons.¹⁴

The sudden international attention on Myanmar during the transition, on the political and economic level but also in terms of aid, contributed to the ‘competitive victimhood’ that had emerged from decades of violent repression of various ethnic nationalities, including the Rakhine (MacLean, 2022). The calls for justice and secession of violence against Rohingya from 2012 onwards were often perceived in that same light, and particularly opposed by Buddhist nationalists. When UN Special Envoy Yanghee Lee spoke out in support of Rohingya citizenship, Wirathu publicly called her a ‘bitch’ and a ‘whore’, and the NLD government banned her from the country in 2017 (Min Zin, 2015; Brooten, 2020).

International justice initiatives

After the mass violence against and expulsion of Rohingya in 2017, the international call for justice initiatives grew. In 2018, the UN Human Rights Council established the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for Myanmar (IIFFMM) consisting of a body of experts tasked with the investigation of crimes committed in Myanmar since 2011 in order to support future domestic or international prosecutions. In August 2018, it called for the International Criminal Court (ICC) to prosecute five military leaders, including commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing, who would later stage the 2021 military coup. While a UN referral was unlikely given the composition of the Security Council, the ICC Prosecutor decided to open its own investigation into crimes committed against Rohingya who had since entered the territory of Bangladesh which, contrary to Myanmar, is a state party to the ICC. Proceedings began in late 2019 and are ongoing at the time of writing. The NLD government initially refused entry to the country for IIFFMM members but later decided to cooperate with the UN to a certain extent. The IIFFMM’s mandate ended in September 2019, after which it transferred its documentation to the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar. A third international justice attempt was initiated in 2019 by the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK, which successfully appealed to Argentina to use the principle of universal jurisdiction against the Myanmar military. On 20 January 2023, the NGO Fortify Rights filed a criminal complaint against the Myanmar military in Germany under the same principle. While the activists involved claim that the various international justice initiatives are mutually exclusive because they each have a different mandate, some experts have warned against the risk of over-documentation, and call for better coordination (see Matelski et al, 2022). ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan suggested that the international justice sector might be in need of a coordinating body similar to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.¹⁵

The NLD government became stuck between international pressure to be more cooperative and domestic pressure from the military and Buddhist nationalists who were against any acknowledgement of the rights of Rohingya (Pedersen, 2019).¹⁶ It eventually decided to challenge the ICC's jurisdiction over the events in Rakhine State. Meanwhile, the Gambia brought a case before the International Court of Justice, accusing the Myanmar state of breaching the genocide convention. In December 2019, Aung San Suu Kyi came to The Hague to defend her government against these accusations, after which she lost what little remained of her international reputation as a human rights defender. Amnesty International, the European Union, the UK city of Oxford and the US Holocaust Museum all withdrew awards they had granted to Aung San Suu Kyi; her Nobel Peace Prize was not withdrawn because the organization stated it has no such provision. While the internal reasoning for Aung San Suu Kyi’s appearance in The Hague (and thus, her defence of military crimes) remains unclear, the military was able to use her reputation to its advantage, as international indignation focused almost exclusively on Aung San Suu Kyi’s role. Despite his close involvement in the violence against the Rohingya, it would take until the 2021 coup before the leading role of Min Aung Hlaing in mass human rights violations started to receive international attention.

Inequalities in donor relationships

The preceding discussion demonstrates that Western donors have had a variety of influences on civil society in Myanmar. They have provided important facilitation and support but have also influenced local activities with strong financial encouragement first towards democratization, and later towards depoliticized and largely technical peacebuilding activities. As a result of shifting donor priorities and increasingly technical reporting requirements, moreover, CSOs that rely on foreign funding have to spend a lot of their time meeting donor needs, often at the expense of their effectiveness in the field (see Hulme and Edwards, 1997; Parks, 2008; Ear, 2012). In the context of peacebuilding, it has been argued that accountability has shifted almost exclusively towards tax payers in donor countries, rather than to the communities that the aid is intended to help (Bächtold, 2021).

A further aspect of donor dependency pertains to the role of partnerships. Formal donor organizations such as UN agencies prefer to work with larger NGOs, as opposed to smaller community-based organizations with informal structures that might have a stronger link to local communities. Research on countries such as Cambodia and Vietnam has shown that Western donors tend to prioritize recipient organizations that resemble their own (Carothers and Ottaway, 2000; Salemink, 2006). Members of such organizations speak the same language (both literally speaking English, and knowing the right terminology), make use of familiar administrative processes, and report in a way that donors understand and approve of, in contrast to ‘informal associations, social movements, and other kinds of networks, [that] are not set up to be administratively responsive to donor needs’ (Carothers and Ottaway, 2000: 13).

The ‘governmentality’ of professionalized donors and (I)NGOs is often apparent in subtle indicators such as language use and project design (Li, 2007). Englund (2006: 33) noted how in Malawi, highly educated human rights activists uncritically accepted English as the lingua franca and showed contempt for others with different or lower literacy skills, despite their stated intentions to empower poor communities. Similar tendencies can be seen in Myanmar with many international staff’s inability to speak Burmese, or local staff’s insistence on using Burmese among ethnic nationalities who do not speak Burmese (either as their first language, or not at all). Even among civil society actors who do speak English, the use of technical terminology can create a subtle distance between local and ‘professionalized’ actors. Such practices contribute to the impression noted by some anthropologists that development projects are hardly assessed based on their results on the ground but rather on their adherence to ‘frameworks, tools and formulae’ in order to ensure that the project is assessed as successful (Mosse, 2005; Crewe and Axelby, 2013). As a result, community development trainings such as the one I observed in Thailand focus a lot of their content on teaching the use and understanding of professional development terminology and technicalities in order to write successful funding proposals and project reports. Respondents conveyed how they sometimes lost funding because donors were unsatisfied with the professional level of their reporting or refused funding to organizations that did not have their own bank account. Such preconditions ruled out many experienced organizations that were successful in reaching local communities but did not meet the formal donor requirements due to government repression and/or lack of time and resources to live up to these demands.

In other cases, donor representatives, especially those close to the field, reportedly showed understanding of local conditions. These donors did not request receipts for small local expenses such as public transportation (which are obviously cheaper than flying or hiring a driver, but less easy to account for on paper), or even understood that a certain amount of bribery could be unavoidable to ensure effective implementation without obstruction by local officials. One respondent explained how they circumvented the requirement of registration with the government: “Some donors request registration. So most of the organizations in Burma, we have no registration. We explain that issue to them. My current donor partner, they never requested me to register … Most of the organizations they understand the situation in Burma.”¹⁷ Likewise, politically ‘sensitive’ organizations such as those working with political prisoners reported good and flexible working relationships with their donors, who understood that they often had to improvise or work secretly for security reasons.

A local NGO director quoted in a Paung Ku report made a similar comment regarding the unrealistic requirements the European Commission put on beneficiaries of its ‘good governance programme’ which aimed to reach grassroots organizations but realistically required at least $10,000 to prepare a funding proposal: “The EC think they are watering the plants, but the plants are somewhere else” (Paung Ku, 2011: 7). In response to these practices, some of the largest organizations tried to reduce their dependency on international NGOs by forming a bloc against them, but many of the smaller organizations were not in a strong enough position to bargain about the share taken by intermediary organizations.

UN agencies and large international NGOs have a financial monopoly position in Myanmar, as donors often choose to channel funding through these agencies, rather than directly to local actors. In one example, local non-state education providers were invited to a meeting in Yangon, where the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) announced that it had $60 million to spend on education and wanted to extend its partnership with non-state actors. The non-state education providers (both Myanmar and foreigners), who were used to working with small budgets for many years, were initially very pleased and eager to share their thoughts on how the budget could be spent to make education accessible to more children throughout the country. However, they were disappointed and even became somewhat emotional when UNICEF mentioned that it could only work with one or two centralized INGOs as local partners, in order to shorten communication channels and minimize overhead costs. The atmosphere of working towards a shared communal goal was quickly lost when participants in the meeting realized that precisely their ability to make the most out of small budgets made them ineligible for donor support.¹⁹

The high overhead costs of UN agencies were particularly painful for local civil society actors. In May 2014, UNICEF in Myanmar became subject of a public scandal, when it transpired that the organization rented office space from a former military general for $87,000 per month. After this first news story, media reported that the World Health Organization, another UN agency, spent $79,000 per month on office space, which amounts to 10 per cent of its total annual budget for Myanmar (Kyaw Hsu Mon and Lewis, 2004). A contributor to an online platform on civil society in Myanmar commented in 2013 that the director of USAID spent $17,000 per month on rent alone, almost double the amount of the United States’ full ‘small grants’ budget available to local organizations.²⁰ These scandals continued to emerge in the aftermath of the 2021 coup, as described in the next chapter.