| Popis: |
This chapter discusses historical and contemporary insurgency and opium cultivation in Myanmar, I first analyse the factors that lend to the durability of a given insurgency in Myanmar over time: geography, resources, and people. I apply the analysis of this interplay of drugs and insurgency across decades in Myanmar, before turning to Chin state, Tonzang township in particular, to examine how that area fits into the triage of crime and insurgency described previously. I then describe opium-growing areas of Tonzang I worked in from 2018 to 2020, and how they differ from the stereotypes we often hold about such places. This is followed by the conclusion, which considers opium as a proxy indicator for the coerced integration of non-market-reliant peoples into markets, from resource security to cash insecurity, and the limits that the historical and contemporary illicit political economy imposes on the potential for social transformation in the post-junta era. |
