Indian Historical Review, volume 51, issue 2, pages 222-237

Political Dynamics of Pre-colonial Myanmar/ Burma: The Context for Colonisation

Publication typeJournal Article
Publication date2024-11-29
scimago Q3
wos Q3
SJR0.107
CiteScore0.2
Impact factor0.1
ISSN03769836, 09755977
Abstract

In Burmese historiography, the issue of periodisation has not been given much attention. Burma’s pre-colonial history of dynastic and ruler changes occurred within a static framework with little to no institutional or social change. Before the British conquest, the political history of Burma can be summed up as an endless struggle between the Burmese people and their neighbours, as well as between at least four different indigenous groups: Shans, Arakanese, Mons or Talaings. Numerous political organisations and migrations occurred during the pre-colonial era. The Pyu city-states, the Pagan Empire, the Toungoo Dynasty and the Konbaung Dynasty were the four pre-colonial systems covered in this article. Mercantilism, Buddhism, commerce with Asian countries, and cultural and political concepts had a significant impact on Pyu culture, which may have long shaped later Burmese governmental structures and society. In the Pagan Kingdom, farming, irrigation, culture and design attained a high degree of development and were formed by the ancestors of the trendy Burmese. The Kanbwang Dynasty came to power in the eighteenth century and established central authority nearby. Early in the nineteenth century, colonial powers seized control of Burma. The main objectives of this article are the political and social landscape of pre-colonial Burma and how it impacted colonialism. The article also makes connections between periods of Burma’s colonial history and early modern history.

2016-03-10 citations by CoLab: 54
Walton M.J.
Asian Survey scimago Q2 wos Q1
2008-12-01 citations by CoLab: 66 Abstract  
Abstract The effects of the 1947 Panglong Agreement on Burma's ethnic minority groups can still be seen today in calls for a return to the spirit of Panglong, but there are conflicting versions of this event and its legacy. In order to grasp the prospects for ethnic unity in Burma, it is necessary to deconstruct the various “myths” of Panglong.
Charney M.
2006-01-01 citations by CoLab: 38
Lieberman V.
2003-05-26 citations by CoLab: 345 Abstract  
This ambitious work has two novel goals: to overcome the extreme fragmentation of early Southeast Asian historiography, and to connect Southeast Asian to world history. Combining careful local research with wide-ranging theory Lieberman argues that over a thousand years, each of mainland Southeast Asia's great lowland corridors experienced a pattern of accelerating integration punctuated by recurrent collapse. These trajectories were synchronized not only between corridors, but most curiously, between the mainland as a whole, much of Europe, and other sectors of Eurasia. He describes in detail the nature of mainland consolidation - which was simultaneously territorial, religious, ethnic, and commercial - and dissects the mix of endogenous and external factors responsible. Here, then, is a fundamentally original analysis not only of Southeast Asia, but of the pre-modern world.
Myint-U T.
2001-03-26 citations by CoLab: 78 Abstract  
Burma has often been portrayed as a timeless place, a country of egalitarian Buddhist villages, ruled successively by autocratic kings, British colonialists and, most recently, a military dictatorship. The Making of Modern Burma argues instead that many aspects of Burmese society today, from the borders of the state to the social structure of the countryside to the very notion of a Burmese identity, are largely the creations of the nineteenth century - a period of great change - away from the Ava-based polity of early modern times, and towards the 'British Burma' of the 1900s. The book provides a sophisticated and much-needed account of the period, and as such will be an important resource for policy makers and students as a basis for understanding contemporary politics and the challenges of the modern state. It will also be read by historians interested in the British colonial expansion of the nineteenth century.
Leach E.R.
1960-10-01 citations by CoLab: 99 Abstract  
The thesis underlying this essay may be summarized as follows: The modern European concepts frontier, state and nation are interdependent but they are not necessarily applicable to all state-like political organisations everywhere. In default of adequate documentary materials most historians of South-East Asia have tended to assume that the states with which they have to deal were Nation-States occupied by named “Peoples” and separated from each other by precise political frontiers. The inferences that have been made on the basis of these initial assumptions sometimes conflict with sociological common sense. It is not the anthropologist's task to write history, but if history is to be elaborated with the aid of inspired guesses then the special knowledge of the anthropologist becomes relevant so as to point up the probabilities.

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