State Formation in the Shadow of the Raj: Violence, Warfare and Politics in Colonial Burma(<Special Issue>State Formation in Comparative Perspectives)

Abstract

This article examines the construction of the colonial security apparatus in Burma, within the broader British colonial project in eastern Asia. During the colonial period, the state in Burma was built by default, as no one in London or India ever mapped out a strategy for establishing governance in this outpost. Instead of sending in legal, commercial or police experts to establish law and order--the preconditions of the all-important commerce--Britain sent the Indian Army, which faced an intensity and landscape of guerilla resistance never anticipated. Early forays into the establishment of law and order increasingly became based on conceptions of the population as enemies to be pacified, rather than subjects to be incorporated into or even ignored by the newly defined political entity. The character of armed administration in colonial Burma had a disproportionate impact on how that population came to be regarded, treated, legalized and made into subjects of the Raj. Administrative simplifications along territorial and racial lines resulted in political, economic, and social boundaries that continue to divide the country today. Bureaucratic and security mechanisms politicized violence along territorial and racial lines, creating "two Burmas" in the administrative and security arms of the state. Despite the "laissez-faire" proclamations of colonial state officials in Burma, this geographically and functionally limited state nonetheless established durable administrative structures that precluded any significant integration throughout the territory for a century to come.