“Crisis in Myanmar: Understanding Buddhist Nationalism, Decentralized Resistance, and Polycentric Federal Democracy,” with David Moe (Weds. Feb. 15, 2023)

The BU Center for the Study of Asia and the and the Institute on Culture, Religion, and World Affairs (CURA)
are pleased to present the next BUCSA Asia Forum event

Crisis in Myanmar: Understanding Buddhist Nationalism,
Decentralized Resistance, and Polycentric Federal Democracy

David Moe

(Henry H. Rice Postdoctoral Associate in Southeast Asian Studies, Yale University)

Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2023 from 5:00 to 6:30 pm

Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, Boston University

121 Bay State Road, Boston, MA 02215

Abstract:

Myanmar is religiously and ethnically the second most diverse nation in Southeast Asia after Indonesia. Yet Myanmar exists as an “unfinished nation” that holds the politics of Buddhist nationalism, militarism, and the longest civil war in a post-colonial Southeast Asia. Why did Buddhist nationalism emerge? How does old Buddhist nationalism relate to the new 2021 coup? Since the coup on February 1, 2021, citizens from different religions and ethnicities have continued to launch the courageous and creative forms of decentralized resistance against military power. What has motivated this uprising, particularly among Generation Z? How has this resistance addressed Buddhist nationalism and bridged the religious and ethnic divides in Burmese politics? Is there a unifying vision of democracy amidst the religious and ethnic diversity? What would the future of Myanmar’s polycentric federal democracy look like? In this event, the speaker will explore the current state of decentralized resistance movement two years after the coup, based on his firsthand experience of Buddhist nationalism, his intellectual expertise in theory of Buddhist nationalism, and the vision of polycentric federal democracy.

About the Speaker:

David Thang Moe (Ph.D) is Henry H. Rice Postdoctoral Associate in Southeast Asian Studies at Yale University. At Yale, he is a lead person in Myanmar Studies for Southeast Asian Movement (SEAM), and teaches courses on religion, conflict, and reconciliation in Southeast Asia, and on colonialism, nationalism, and identity in Myanmar. He has published over 70 scholarly articles, and currently is working on a book project about the politics of Buddhist nationalism, ethnic conflict, and reconciliation in Myanmar. His research interests include Asian public theology of religions, colonialism, Buddhist nationalism, ethnic conflict, subaltern politics of resistance, ethnic reconciliation, and Christian-Buddhist engagement in Southeast Asia. He has been a featured speaker about Myanmar at Yale, Harvard, Columbia, Brown, Princeton, Boston College, New York University, George Washington University, Eastern Kentucky University, University of Kentucky, Toronto, Australian National University, University of Sydney, Oxford, Cambridge, Hamburg, National University of Singapore, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Yonsei, Ewha, and other universities. In addition to being a speaker, he also met with US senators to advocate for Myanmar’s democracy movement. He is on the editorial team of five journals, including The International Journal of Public Theology; The Journal of Southeast Asian Movement at Yale; Interreligious Studies and Intercultural Theology; Missiology: An International Review; and Asian American Theological Forum. He is a member of American Academy of Religion; Society of Biblical Literature; Association for Asian Studies; New York Southeast Asia Network; and Global Network for Public Theology.