Earlier in the year New Mandala collaborated with the ANU Media Office and the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific to bring you a 6-part vodcast and podcast series called “Thailand in crisis”.
Today we launch a new series called “Burma votes 2010”. Over coming weeks we plan to provide commentary and analysis on Burma’s prospects at this crucial electoral moment. In the first episode I interview Dr Morten Pedersen and Professor Des Ball who offer their takes on how the election on 7 November 2010 fits into wider political and social dynamics. Morten introduces a number of key themes in recent Burmese political history while Des focuses on conditions for ethnic minorities along the Burma-Thailand border. The podcast of this episode is available here.
Thanks for this Nich. It’s really great to see New Mandala put together a pod/vodcast series on the election. I do hope that you get the opportunity to interview some Burmese academics in the coming episodes.
I have one comment regarding Morten Pederson’s statement about a “generational change” coming out of the elections. This has been a pretty common prediction since early 2010. However, with Thein Sein appointed as USPD chairperson, it seems quite likely that he will serve as president following the elections with perhaps Shwe Mann as vice-president and Than Shwe continuing to hold all the strings in some (possibly unofficial) capacity. There are also plenty of other relatively senior figures who will presumably take on new ‘civilian’ positions post-elections. So, where’s the generational change? If it happens at all, I can’t see it as an immediate outcome of the elections, but rather a result of ill-health and/or death further down the line.
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Very interesting and highly informative discussion. Thanks!
I have heard it said that whether or not you like their politics, from a foreign affairs point of view the generals are good to deal with, and usually are able to (at least privately) achieve what they say they will. Much more so than say dealing with the Thai leadership. Although this was from a source many years ago – so the situation may have changed a lot now, as highlighted by the lack of functionality during the Nargis aid trickle.
Just one small technical issue: the synch is out from about the 2 minute mark.
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When I download the podcast to my computer, I get a very small mp3 file and a mere 6 second audio clip. This actually happens with several other recent podcasts on the College of Asia and Pacific podcast list, such as Haberkorn’s and Chakrabarty’s talks, but not others, such as the On the Brink Human Rights talks. Same method for downloading, but very different results. Any idea of what is going on?
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