Religion, Mass Violence, and Illiberal Regimes: Recent Research on the Rohingya in Myanmar

Abstract

The plight of the Rohingya in Myanmar has drawn considerable international attention in recent years but a solution to the crisis remains elusive. This article gathers pertinent research from key books on Myanmar's politics and society published during the last five years and synthesizes their contributions to our understanding of the issue. It argues that the picture emerging from these works highlights how legal infrastructure for dealing with mass violence fails to deal adequately with the realities of an illiberal state. It further shows how the conflict's religious dimension - amplified through public discourse - obscures a competition between historically oppressed peoples to be heard. Rather than a conflict between Buddhists and Muslims, the nested dynamics of Rakhine State's regional politics shaped a situation where minorities turn on other minorities. This critical reading of the issue thus implies that international intervention in the form of labeling victims to save and perpetrators to sanction would likely be unproductive.