Liberty, justice, and equality of opportunities for each and every citizen are essential components of any liberal democratic system.  In Burmese society today, the arbitrary rules of successive military regimes since the 1960s have sapped the sense of justice, and the love and respect for the rule of law.

A military coup has to begin with disregard for the constitution or ‘the basic law’ of the country and the removal of a legitimate government from power.  Thus military coups in any country usually set the precedence for disrespect for the rule of law and justice in the wider society.  Since the military leaders do not respect ‘basic law’ and rule the country at whim, other ranks in the hierarchy of the military institution follow suit.  Provided this it is not surprising that military-ruled countries usually become lawless countries.

The citizens of a military-ruled country, on the other hand, will not initially respect the laws imposed by soldiers since they do not consider the military legislature of the country.  Since laws cannot be imposed on the basis of legitimacy by peaceful means, by social contract or by consent of the individuals, they are usually imposed and enforced by persuasion and coercion.

The hard method or coercion involves lawless killing and kidnapping of citizens.  Endless intimidation and persecution under authoritarian regimes are well-known.  Soft method or persuasion involves bribing or buying off of the citizenry to abide by the system.

The soft method and the hard method complements one another.  While coercion demonstrates what can happen to non-conformists, persuasion privileges conformists.  The culture of conformism is contagious.  The authoritarian system is effectively maintained when the sense of justice of the citizenry is weakened in the society.  The collective perception of justice in a society may be considered weakened when the citizenry, as a collection of individuals, do not react to injustice done to them.

In this framework, the hope for justice and rule of law in military-ruled Burma may appear fairly dim.  Most of the Burmese people have been tolerating countless incidents of injustice done to them by the military regime over the past years.  Have we become so much accustomed to injustice?

It should be noted that the immediate cause, as opposed to underlying causes, of most of the antigovernment uprisings in Burma have been Burmese people’s intolerance to injustice.  This means that there must be a limit to what injustice can do to a society.  Individual’s tolerance to injustice may vary.  Repeated acts of injustice done to a people, however, may stretch their collective sense of justice to the limit one day.

On the other hand, Burma can boast countless individuals who have demonstrated and been demonstrating their strong sense of justice.  These non-conformist individuals inspire the rest of the society.  Just like conformism promoted by the authorities, their non-conformism is also contagious.

Dictatorial regimes know that it is the collective conscience of the people which matters most.  Only a collective will can shake a political system.  The Burmese military regime, therefore, will spare no effort in their attempts to prevent non-conformist will to become a collective conscience of us Burmese people.

Ko Ko Thett