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Myanmar's connectivity revolution, democratization
Rudyard Kipling described Myanmar as âquite unlike any place you knowâ
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udyard Kipling described Myanmar as 'quite unlike any place you know'. Kipling's observation, made about a century ago, perhaps still holds true to some extent.
But it wasn't the magical Shwedagon Pagoda, the 4,000 stupendous sacred stupas scattered across the plains of Bagan, the iconic Lake Inle or the gravity-defying Kyaiktiyo Pagoda atop the Golden Rock that made me super-excited when I had a chance to visit the country in late February.
For me, Myanmar is the land of The Lady ' the title of the Luc Besson film about the extraordinary Aung San Suu Kyi, the democracy icon who is sometimes referred to as Myanmar's Nelson Mandela.
I envy the Myanmarese for having Suu Kyi. Indonesia has never had a figure like her, male or female. Suu Kyi's 15-year house arrest symbolized the oppression the people of her country suffered.
At the same time, her tenacity, commitment, sacrifice, vision and devotion also symbolized the people's hope for freedom and democracy after 49 years of military dictatorship (1962-2011).
And I thought 32 years (1965-1998) of military rule in Indonesia ' propped up by Western powers, mind you ' was long!
My visit almost coincided with a historic moment: the handover of power from the military to Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) party in early March. The NLD won a landslide victory in the general election last November.
On March 15, Suu Kyi's confidant Htin Kyaw was elected Myanmar's new president.
It was understood from the start that he was going to be a proxy president, as Suu Kyi is constitutionally barred from running for the country's highest office.
Credit for opening up the democratic space, however, has to be given to Thein Sein, a former army general who was Myanmar's president since 2011.
It was he who led the process of reform in Myanmar, enabling the transition to civilian rule. Don't get too starry-eyed though! The military still holds 25 percent of seats in parliament. And as history attests, one can never totally trust the military.
Look at Thailand, Egypt, Argentina, Nigeria, Algeria, Haiti and several states in Africa. Oops!
But let's not start out with pessimism. Let's instead ask, how does a formerly Starbucks-free nation (until 2013), living in 'darkness' for almost half a century, deal with seeing the light again? It's like Sharonda Phenix of St. Louis, a woman who was blind for 30 years and was able to see after receiving a cornea transplant.
The connectivity revolution that started around 2010 is like Sharonda's cornea transplant and runs parallel with the political revolution underway in Myanmar.
There are thousands of studies in various countries about the effects of the internet and social media on offline behavior, including political participation.
And it's not just limited to the electorate, but also presidential candidates and leaders. Look at Obama. Look at Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo. Suu Kyi also used social media in her election campaign.
What is interesting about Myanmar is the speed at which this has happened. Off the grid for decades, the country is now catching up fast. According to David Madden, founder and director of Phandeeyar: Myanmar Innovation Lab, 20 years of consumer internet is being built at the same time.
'There are startups building, ride-sharing apps and anonymous social messaging apps. Then there's everything in between: education apps, online bookstores, ticketing and more.'
So how did the connectivity revolution come about? As recently as 2009, less than 1 percent of Myanmar's population of 55 million had either a smartphone or home internet access.
Then things went viral: Between 2011 and 2012, the percentage of people with cellular subscriptions nearly tripled, and since 2012, it has gone up almost nine-fold.
In an article for Tech In Asia, Eric Crouch asserted that 'It's hard to overstate the scope of the changes ['¦] in Myanmar over the last five years ' everything from politics to culture to social life [is] now in a radically different place than in the first half of the 2010's'.
Eric continues, 'All this in a country that, just a few years ago, had internet penetration rates lower than North Korea's and a censorship regime that rivaled mainland China.
Pre-publication censorship officially ended in 2012, and a vibrant network of hard news, tabloids and lifestyle publications has erupted in the years since ' and many rely exclusively on Facebook for
distribution.'
Part of the reason for the boom in Myanmar is the fact that they opened up when smartphones had been around for a while and therefore were affordable enough for many to purchase.
In fact, the explosion has revolved almost entirely around mobile phones; and we're not talking just about the urban areas, but also the countryside.
The tech explosion is like what we in Indonesia call kuda lepas dari kandang (like a horse suddenly released from its stable).
As Eric Crouch pointed out, it erupted with such wild, uncontrollable energy that it hasn't had the time to make sense of itself.
Institutions like startup accelerators, venture capital firms and even basic internet-centric laws for journalism and expression are still in their early stages.
According to an American academic specializing in the region, he noticed another phenomenon at universities: Professors are having a hard time keeping up with demand from internet-savvy students, who unlike their teachers, grew up with the internet and voraciously consume the endless information it provides. This obviously will have implications on Myanmar's democratization.
Analysts are studying the Myanmar case because it's so unusual and hard to explain. No one has a good explanation for the military's retreat from power, except that they could do it on their own terms, control the transition and avoid things like human rights charges.
Legend has it, what makes it possible for the Golden Rock seemingly to defy gravity and not topple over and fall down the mountain, is because it's held up by a stand of the Buddha's hair. Riiiight!
Let's hope that Myanmar's democratic process also defies gravity and doesn't roll back into a military abyss like so many others have.
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The writer is the author of Julia's Jihad.
