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March 29, 2012 17:57
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Myanmar: What's in a name?

GlobalPost used to say Burma. Here's why we don't anymore.
Myanmar name change 2012 03 29Enlarge
Burmese feed the seagulls at a jetty along the Yangon river ahead of the parliamentary elections on March 29, 2012, in Myanmar. (Paula Bronstein/Getty Images)

Whether you say "Myanmar" or "Burma" is a highly charged issue among many people — particularly Asia editors.

It's a question that has become code for: Whose side are you on? "Myanmar," for so long, suggested junta. And "Burma" meant you were against the repressive regime.

The reason for this line of thinking can be traced back to 1989, when the military junta officially changed the name from "Burma" to "Myanmar," which happened to be a year after it killed thousands who participated in a popular uprising. The miltary regime changed the name without consulting the people, and it became a symbol of oppression. Many rejected the shift on those grounds.

But as the Southeast Asian country continues to roll out reforms — giving amnesty to at least 200 political prisoners, agreeing to allow democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party to run in this weekend's by-elections — it's also a debate that is fading fast.

The two words do, after all, mean the same thing. They refer to an oblong country in Southeast Asia that is home to around 50 million people of various ethnic groups, the largest one of which is Burman. "Myanmar" is arguably more inclusive of the entire population, roughly one-third of which is an ethnicity other than Burman.

In the Burmese language, "Myanmar" is actually just a more formal, ceremonial version of the word "Burma."

More from GlobalPost: "Burma" or "Myanmar"? Does it Matter?

Now that the regime is — outwardly at least — reforming, its official name is becoming more internationally used and accepted. The US and the UK still use "Burma," but France and Japan have used "Myanmar" for some time. The BBC and the Washington Post are holdouts, but the NY Times and WSJ have switched. Here's the Financial Times' well-reasoned justification for making the change.

When you choose to call a country something other than its official name, you're making a statement.

So, somewhat counter-intuitively, it is GlobalPost's desire to not make a statement that has led us to change our style to "Myanmar."

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Myanmar: Suu Kyi fever in pre-election Yangon

Sebastian StrangioMarch 28, 2012 06:00
YANGON — Standing outside his wooden home in central Yangon, Aung Kyaw Moe proudly shows off his latest piece of ink-work: a portrait of Gen. Aung San that wraps around his muscly upper arm. Like many Burmese, the 29-year-old rower, a member of Myanmar’s national team, idolizes his country’s national hero, who fought for independence from British colonialism. But with by-elections approaching, Aung Kyaw says his tattoo is also a sign of his support for the general’s daughter, the country’s iconic opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Burma: Peace talks with Kachin rebels

March 8, 2012 12:52
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The government in Burma has signed ceasefire agreements with many ethnic rebel groups, in an effort to end armed conflict.

Aung San Suu Kyi: Reforms not irreversible

February 29, 2012 17:40
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Aung San Suu Kyi's party won the elections in 1990 by a landslide but the military junta dismissed the results and prolonged her house arrest for 22 years.

Burma: How real are new press freedoms?

Megha RajagopalanFebruary 19, 2012 09:57
RANGOON — “In the past, they would scrutinize every sentence in every piece,” U Ko Ko, publisher of the Yangon Times, said of Burma's censors. “Now they change less than 10 percent.”

Burmese monk Ashin Gambira, one month out of jail, is arrested again

February 10, 2012 12:04
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Despite new reforms introduced by the Burmese president, activists say there are over 400 political prisoners in detention.  

Burma: An aging Aung San Suu Kyi appeals to young voters

February 9, 2012 22:26
PATHEIN — "Yes, she is cool. She makes jokes. She can talk with anyone," said Lin Lin, a 31-year-old with a Nirvana Nevermind tattoo.

Burma: Aung San Suu Kyi campaigns as US eases one sanction

February 7, 2012 14:49
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Thousands came to see Aung San Suu Kyi speak in the Irrawady delta, her first visit after nearly two decades.
January 25, 2012 02:39
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Investing in Burma? Brace for pain.

Will Southeast Asia's last frontier economy implode before it ever takes off?
Investing in burma 01 25 2012Enlarge
A Myanmar laborer undertakes renovation work at a building in downtown Yangon on January 21, 2012. (SEO THAN WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
this story is part of globalpost's continuing coverage of world business. for more visit our new business page.

As Western governments ramp up to the inevitable — removing heavy sanctions against Burma, officially known as Myanmar — investing in Burma may seem attractive to those who bet on emerging markets.

An authoritarian army-run regime, the world's longest running dictatorship, kept Burma closed off for six decades. Western sanctions have forbidden most business dealings with the Burmese, even with citizens that have no direct links to the men in charge.

The country now appears poised to open up, exposing an untapped market to the world. 

Still, this Reuters report offers an equally compelling list of reasons to avoid Burma. 

Ready?

1. Burma's current currency regime "deters investment and abets kleptocracy."

2. An unimaginative populaton cowed by fear: "People have had beaten into them not to take the initiative," an aid worker told Reuters, "not to be creative, not to be innovative."

3. Mysterious state revenue figures: "State revenue is grossly underestimated and some critics say it is likely vast sums of that money was kept off the books and quietly smuggled out of the country into offshore banks held by cronies of the former junta."

And, according to a Harvard development guru writing in the Democratic Voice of Burma, the coming wave of "development" could very well fail to trickle down to the massive numbers of Burmese scraping by on less than $1 a day.

Here's Harvard's Elliott Prasse-Freeman on Burma's challenges: 

Development is here the sacred object, led by ‘experts’ from outside who could (perhaps unwittingly) usher in a quasi-authoritarian neoliberalism where key social and political decisions over the future of the economy and its development would be quarantined in the hands of a narrow elite.

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