Paper short abstract:

This paper argues that Buddhist religious understandings of the world are used as a medium to express environmental concerns against legislative and bureaucratic regimes in Myanmar. It explores how recent protests in Myanmar's Mon State uses Buddhist ideas to critique the state.

Paper long abstract:

In light of Myanmar's de-facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi's focus on economic growth, there has been large investment in coal and hydro power plants to meet the country's energy needs. Since the quasi-military government handed over power, coal and hydro power plant projects have stalled throughout the country due to wide scale protests. These projects have come under widespread criticism from Burmese communities where Buddhism is an integral component of society for many in shaping understandings of the environment.

This paper will look at the environmental resistance of these protests in response to legislative and bureaucratic regimes in Myanmar. There is evidence that Buddhist doctrines and understandings of the world are used by communities as modes to contest the construction of power plants and the environmental consequences that it holds. By placing conceptions of morality and creating immoral actions of development by bureaucratic regimes, these protests gain effective traction as well as significant critiques of the decision-making processes of bureaucratic and legislative regimes.

This paper argues that the moral code of Buddhism is used as a form of leverage in driving environmental action against bureaucratic and legislative regimes in Myanmar. The important moral conception of 'Sasana decline', the decline of Buddhist tradition can be seen as manifestations of damage to the environment (Harris, 1997). This paper uses the case study of recent protests in Mon State against the construction of a coal fired plant to explore how these moral concerns are formulated by the community protesting against its construction.