Myanmar’s Contested Borderlands: Uneven Development and Ongoing Armed Conflict

Attempts to assert control over the country’s borderlands have been a central dynamic of the state-building agendas of successive governments in Myanmar, albeit a deeply conflictual one in light of the fact that the power and legitimacy of the state has been historically weak and contested throughout much of the country. This chapter explores the unresolved issues surrounding the distribution of power between centre and borderlands that have shaped the mentalities of both the central government and border-based opposition groups since Myanmar’s independence, and the diverse patterns of cross-border interactions that connect Myanmar’s borderlands to the wider region.