IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/65546.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Ashes of co-optation: from armed group fragmentation to the rebuilding of popular insurgency in Myanmar

Author

Listed:
  • Brenner, David

Abstract

This article argues that attempts to buy insurgency out of violence can achieve temporary stability but risk producing new conflict. While co-optation with economic incentives might work in parts of a movement, it can spark ripple effects in others. These unanticipated developments result from the interactions of differently situated elite and non-elite actors, which can create a momentum of their own in driving collective behaviour. This article develops this argument by analysing the re-escalation of armed conflict between the Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO) and Myanmar's armed forces after a 17-year-long ceasefire broke down in 2011. After years of mutual enrichment and collaboration between rebel and state elites and near organisational collapse, the insurgency's new-found resolve and capacity is particularly puzzling. Based on extensive field research, this article explains why and how the state's attempt to co-opt rebel leaders with economic incentives resulted in group fragmentation, loss of leadership legitimacy, increased factional contestation, growing resentment among local communities and the movement's rank and file and ultimately the rebuilding of popular resistance from within.

Suggested Citation

  • Brenner, David, 2015. "Ashes of co-optation: from armed group fragmentation to the rebuilding of popular insurgency in Myanmar," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 65546, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
  • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:65546
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/65546/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Collier, Paul & Hoeffler, Anke, 1998. "On Economic Causes of Civil War," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 50(4), pages 563-573, October.
    2. Achim Wennmann, 2009. "Getting Armed Groups to the Table: peace processes, the political economy of conflict and the mediated state," Third World Quarterly, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 30(6), pages 1123-1138.
    3. Cramer, C., 2002. "Homo Economicus Goes to War: Methodological Individualism, Rational Choice and the Political Economy of War," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 30(11), pages 1845-1864, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Anouk S. Rigterink, 2020. "Diamonds, Rebel’s and Farmer’s Best Friend: Impact of Variation in the Price of a Lootable, Labor-intensive Natural Resource on the Intensity of Violent Conflict," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 64(1), pages 90-126, January.
    2. Stefan Bächtold & Joan Bastide & Lara Lundsgaard-Hansen, 2020. "Assembling Drones, Activists and Oil Palms: Implications of a Multi-stakeholder Land Platform for State Formation in Myanmar," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 32(2), pages 359-378, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Andal, Emmanuel Genesis T., 2016. "The Economic Incentives of International Conflicts: A Theoretical Exposition," Journal of Economics, Management & Agricultural Development, Journal of Economics, Management & Agricultural Development (JEMAD), vol. 2(1), June.
    2. Christopher Blattman & Edward Miguel, 2010. "Civil War," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-57, March.
    3. Mehrdad Vahabi, 2017. "A critical survey of the resource curse literature through the appropriability lens," CEPN Working Papers hal-01583559, HAL.
    4. Vahabi,Mehrdad, 2019. "The Political Economy of Predation," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107591370, September.
    5. Christopher Blattman, 2009. "Civil War: A Review of Fifty Years of Research," Working Papers id:2231, eSocialSciences.
    6. Moshik Lavie & Christophe Muller, 2011. "Incentives and Survival in Violent Conflicts," Research Working Papers 47, MICROCON - A Micro Level Analysis of Violent Conflict.
    7. Horatiu Rus, 2014. "Corruption, conflict and the management of natural resources," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 15(4), pages 355-386, November.
    8. Mehrdad Vahabi, 2018. "The resource curse literature as seen through the appropriability lens: a critical survey," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 175(3), pages 393-428, June.
    9. Mehrdad Vahabi, 2017. "A critical survey of the resource curse literature through the appropriability lens," CEPN Working Papers 2017-14, Centre d'Economie de l'Université de Paris Nord.
    10. Benedikt Korf, 2006. "Functions of violence revisited: greed, pride and grievance in Sri Lanka’s civil war," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 6(2), pages 109-122, April.
    11. Christopher Cramer, 2003. "Does inequality cause conflict?," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(4), pages 397-412.
    12. Yu, Jiangli & Wang, Shuo & Yang, Wantong, 2023. "Natural resources governance and geopolitical risks: A literature review and bibliometric analysis," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 86(PA).
    13. Coyne,Christopher J., 2020. "Defense, Peace, and War Economics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781108724036, October.
    14. Mihalache-O'Keef, Andreea S., 2018. "Whose greed, whose grievance, and whose opportunity? Effects of foreign direct investments (FDI) on internal conflict," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 187-206.
    15. Robert MacCulloch & Silvia Pezzini, 2010. "The Roles of Freedom, Growth, and Religion in the Taste for Revolution," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 53(2), pages 329-358, May.
    16. Ola Olsson, 2005. "Geography and institutions: Plausible and implausible linkages," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 10(1), pages 167-194, December.
    17. Ravallion, Martin, 2019. "Global inequality when unequal countries create unequal people," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 85-97.
    18. Paul Collier & Anke Hoeffler, 2002. "AID, Policy and Peace: Reducing the risks of civil conflict," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(6), pages 435-450.
    19. Francesco Amodio & Leonardo Baccini & Michele Di Maio, 2021. "Security, Trade, and Political Violence," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(1), pages 1-37.
    20. Elisabeth Gilmore & Nils Petter Gleditsch & Päivi Lujala & Jan Ketil Rod, 2005. "Conflict Diamonds: A New Dataset," Conflict Management and Peace Science, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 22(3), pages 257-272, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    non-state armed groups; insurgency; counterinsurgency; conflict resolution; Myanmar (Burma); Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO);
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • N0 - Economic History - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:65546. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.