Building Back Better in Burma

Hello friends. I’m back again, at least for now.

My birthday treat (self-indulgence).

Four and a half years since the coup, the challenges of recovery in Myanmar are immense, amid the devastation of communities and infrastructure, including widespread personal and community trauma. But there is extraordinary resilience amid the violence, with unprecedented experiments in local democracy and ‘Bottom up Federalism’ underway in several areas, despite very limited outside support.

A generation of young people from heartland areas of Burma have been forcibly displaced following the 1 February 2021 coup, and are struggling to survive and resist the junta, while contributing to communities under the most difficult circumstances. In the meantime, large numbers of people from ethnic nationality populated areas have been displaced on and off over decades, with at least three million newly displaced since the coup. Civilian protection needs include establishing early warning systems and building bomb-shelters. As well as protection from death, injury and other abuses, humanitarian needs are acute in the fields of food and nutrition, health and education, plus the need for psycho-social support to help maintain and restore hope and confidence in devastated communities.

Massive humanitarian needs exist in a context of collapsing international donor – and normative pro-democracy – support, especially since the destruction of USAID. Therefore, the focus will be increasingly on ‘localisation’ of aid. This is important, as local communities, CSOs, Ethnic Armed Organisations (and their service delivery wings) have significant capacity. There are also CSOs and some international organisations inside the country which can make a difference and should be supported to do so. However, this is a case of making the best of a bad situation. In the medium-term, foreign aid to Myanmar will likely further decrease, with growing domestic crises in donor countries.

Despite its illegitimacy, and that the State Security and Peace Commission (SSPC) junta only controls about half the country, it seems that - after strong intervention by China - elements of the international community are swinging behind the SSPC elections. Thailand and Cambodia will likely manoeuvre the ASEAN regional grouping into endorsing these fake polls, which will also take the pressure off Min Aung Hlang. Yet to be seen is how opposition forces respond. Armed groups will have to be careful that anti–election activities do not get framed as ‘terrorism’ by the junta and its supporters.

In themselves, the elections will have limited impact on the conflict. However, The Myanmar Army, reinforced by China and Russia, again has momentum on the battlefield - for the first time in at least a couple of years. This is very worrying, and risks reinforcing a narrative among some embassies and analysts that victory for junta is inevitable, so we might as well start working with them now. For many stakeholders, this is an impossible, detestable suggestion.

It is impossible, after the collapse of a ten-year peace process (2011-20), and over four years of brutal war directed at civilians, for conflict-affected communities (victims of atrocities) or self-determination movements to trust the militarized and centralised state again. That was tried in good faith during the period 2011-20, as epotomised by the 2015 Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement. The previous peace process proved that the Myanmar government and military were committed centralists, unable and/or unwilling to address the grievances and aspirations of ethnic nationality stakeholders. A post-election scenario in which a military–backed ruling party proposes some kind of transition would risk repeating the mistakes of the past.

It is possible that some battle–wearied Ethnic Armed Organisations make ceasefires with the junta, in order to consolidate extraordinary battlefield victories over the past three years. But a lasting political or peace settlement with the military seems highly unlikely; it is more likely that fragmentation of the centralised state will continue.

It is difficult to conceive of realistic scenarios in which the diverse and divided state of Myanmar recovers as a coherent or functional polity - despite the junta’s fake elections. The collapse of Myanmar as an effective state will be exacerbated by the massive impacts of climate change. Shifting patterns in rainfall (shorter rainy season, more intense precipitation) leading to more frequent and widespread flooding. Increasing temperatures will have a devastating impact on harvests, particularly in lowland areas (e.g. the Dry Zone). Myanmar is entering the period of extended climate crisis, with tipping points beyond which communities will experience profound livelihood and basic survival challenges beyond those caused by armed conflict.

In this context, some stakeholders are developing climate change mitigation and adaptation plans. For example the Karen National Union (KNU)’s Kawthoolei Climate Action Plan is a 10-year mitigation and adaptation strategy, based around the UNFCC Nationally Determined Contributions framework. Local climate action contributes towards the global public good of climate change mitigation, through carbon draw-down (via photosynthesis), while supporting communities to adapt to the coming climate crisis. The KNU and Kawthoolei Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation Committee have attended two UN Climate Change COP conferences, representing Karen indigenous sovereignty, and local control over Kawthoolei natural resources.

In the meantime, the SSPC junta continues - like its predecessor, the SAC - attacking civilians, including air-strikes and the destruction of churches and monasteries, towns and villages, markets, schools and clinics. Meanwhile, the international community largely turns a blind eye, and previous supporters evaporate. The prospects for recovery are therefore bleak - but local stakeholders have already proved effective. They need political, technical and financial support.

There have been some inspiring and creative post-coup developments in the political domain. The emergence of new, state–based governance bodies, as part of the bottom-up federalism movement, is unprecedented. The Karenni State Consultative Council, Ta’angland Council and proposed Kawthoolei Governing Council for example are emerging as inclusive forms of local governance, with a structural focus on inclusion (including of ‘minorities within minorities’).

As Thramu Ardeth Thawnghmung and I argued in our working paper earlier this year (Trends in Southeast Asia 2025/4, March 2025):

“These developments have significant implications for democratic practices, national reconciliation and intercommunal relationships in Myanmar, serving as ‘bottom-up building blocks’ for a new federalism aspired to by many ethnic minority (ethnic nationality) groups.”

Again, these innovative bodies urgently require political, technical and financial support. However, the collapse of western funding and political backing (particularly with the destruction of USAID) has led to a huge reduction in material support for anti-junta forces, and a perception that previous international backers are no longer interested in democracy or human rights. This is a major set-back for the revolution, at a time when Russia and China are increasing their support for the junta, including direct military support.

It seems unlikely that widespread armed and state-society conflicts in Myanmar will be resolved anytime soon; more probable is that collapse of the state will accelerate, amid the growing impacts of climate change. In this context, what’s left of international support should focus on inclusive and effective local governing bodies and service providers.

In respect of bottom–up federalism, Burma has seen significant progress over the last few years. Prior to the coup, the main challenge for ethnic self–determination movements in Burma was to ‘federalise’ a highly centralised state, through a deeply contested and political reform and peace process. Following the coup, the challenge is to build new Union-level structures, growing out of and based on the realities of ‘state units’ administered by EAOs and state–based bodies. In many EAO–administered areas, basic health and education services and access to justice, have been provided to highly marginalised communities for decades, often in partnership with CSOs.

State-based bodies and EAOs are the building blocks of a new federalism, emerging from the bottom up. In late 2024 the Multi-Ethnic Council (MEC) - an informal nine-member coalition of EAOs and state-based bodies - issued a first statement on bottom-up federalism. A follow-up statement on 12 February 2025 (Union Day, commemorating the 1947 Panglong Agreement) announced the development of Articles of Federal Transitional Arrangement (AFTA), in member groups’ respective areas. It insisted that they “will not accept a holding together model of federalism that will renew centralization” - calling instead to “rebuild our country as a strong nation through bottom-up federalism by strengthening the states.” Having originated out of frustration with the slow-moving NUCC process, in early 2025 the MEC re-engaged with the peak opposition policy-making body, through the latter’s Transitional Constitution Working Group, in order to draft a governance framework, formalising EAOs and state–based bodies’ transitional governance arrangements.

This was a demonstration of ‘effective occupation’ and ‘performance legitimacy’, on the part of EAOs and state-based bodies, in the face of vicious onslaughts by the SSPC. The diverse but tightly coordinated set of groups working on the AFTA made significant progress through August 2025, devising guidelines for recognizing accommodating bottom-up federalism at the union level (most groups having already established their own state–level transitional arrangements). This development reflected the increased political (and military) weight of EAOs in the post-coup context. The convergence of negotiations on federal–constitutional arrangements around a bottom-up approach is a highly significant development. The AFTA process brings together much of the resurgent pro–democracy movement, with longstanding EAOs and newly emergent state–based bodies - to the advantage of the latter. However, the involvement of some groups in the AFTA process remains low–profile (mostly for fear of offending China), leaving the Ta’angland Council as the main northern partner in this grouping, which was mostly focused on the southeast.

Meanwhile, in the Anyar (central Dry Zone), newly emergent local governance bodies (e.g. the Sagaing Forum) are being recognized by the NUG, in a process of mutual validation between bottom–up and top–down political bodies actors. These developments show the struggle for bottom-up federalism (and even sovereignty) gaining traction in 2025. As a Karen friend put it - “Myanmar is dead, Long live Kawthoolei!”

The challenge is to support progressive, local rights–based initiatives and actors amid and despite protracted conflicts, and a growing climate crisis. Unfortunately the junta elections may become a smokescreen, under which donors and diplomats are failing to support radical efforts in democracy and self-determination. It would be a tragedy for Myanmar and the world if these innovative for]rms of people-led local democracy are not supported to succeed.

Any comments very welcome!

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Anyone wanting to support solidarity and relief in Burma, please help the Free Burma Rangers.

BTW: You can still watch ‘Myanmar Army on the Ropes’, produced by me, Yan Naing and Tom Sheahan on the Al Jazeera YouTube channel – winner of New York Film Festival - Golden Tower award for best politics documentary !

These episodes and reflections will remain free to all Substack subscribers. I’m eventually going to start serializing Nancy and the Count, book one – the novel which predicted 1027! - and will ask for paid subscriptions.

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