Rights refused : grassroots activism and state violence in Myanmar / Elliott Prasse-Freeman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Prasse-Freeman, Elliott, author.

Series:

Stanford Studies in Human Rights Series

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Human rights--Burma.

Human rights.

Political participation--Burma.

Political participation.

Government, Resistance to--Burma.

Government, Resistance to.

Burma--Politics and government--21st century.

Burma.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (368 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Stanford, California : Stanford University Press, [2023]

Summary:

"For decades, the outside world mostly knew Myanmar as the site of a valiant human rights struggle against an oppressive military regime, predominantly through the figure of Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi. And yet, a closer look at Burmese activism and grassroots sentiments reveals a significant schism between elite human rights cosmopolitans and subaltern Burmese subjects maneuvering under brutal and negligent governance. These divergences became starkly apparent during Burma's much-lauded, decade-long "transition" from military rule that began in 2011, a period of massive and rapid political and economic change that saw an explosion of activism around social causes like education reform, environmental protection, and land reclamation. As one Burmese activist remarked: "We are in the time of protests." How do people conduct politics when they lack the legally and symbolically stabilizing force of "rights" to guarantee their incursions against injustice? In this book, Elliott Prasse-Freeman documents grassroots political activists who advocate for workers and peasants across Burma, covering not only the so-called "democratic transition" from 2011-2021, but also the February 2021 military coup that ended that experiment and the ongoing mass uprising against the coup. Taking the reader from protest camps, to flop houses, to prisons, and presenting practices as varied as courtroom immolation, occult cursing ceremonies, and land reoccupations, Rights Refused shows how Burmese subaltern politics compel us to reconsider how rights frameworks operate everywhere"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Contents

List of Illustrations

Foreword

Preface

Note on Language

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part I: Blunt Biopolitics

1. Variegated Violence

Part II: Lives of Refusal

2. Living Refusal

3. Plow Protests

4. Cartoons, Curses, and the Corpus

Part III: Rights as Opportunities

5. Taking Rights, Seriously

6. Rights in Desperation

Conclusion: Rights Erosion and Refusal beyond Burma

Notes

References

Index

Back Cover.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

Other Format:

Print version: Prasse-Freeman, Elliott Rights Refused

ISBN:

9781503636729

1503636720

OCLC:

1352990375