“Variously wide-ranging and penetrating, the essays assembled in this volume examine Myanmar's short decade of dramatic political and social change in all its complexity. . . . Dense with original research and fresh interpretations of what is happening in Myanmar and why, they bode well for the future of scholarship on this no-longer overlooked country at the nexus of South and Southeast Asia.”

Nick Cheesman, Australian National University

“This collection of essays (completed in 2018) addresses some of the possibilities and the primary challenges to life and governance in an era of ambiguity. Among the most informative chapters are the final one about the Rohingya crisis, a chapter on the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative and environmental governance, and the opening chapter on the country’s political options going forward.”

Choice

“Nuanced critical insights into Myanmar’s democratic transition while charting potentially fruitful research directions for the future.”

Felix Tan Thiam Kim | Contemporary Southeast Asia

“Of course, no one could have predicted the coup, not even during the transition's tumultuous later years. Nonetheless, it is to the credit of the contributors to Unraveling Myanmar's Transition that they were able to point, with a critical urgency, to some of the knots and contradictions that wrought the transition-era, informed the coup itself and continue to haunt the post-coup moment. Of these contributors, Aung Tun (2020, p. 28) offers what is perhaps the book's most prescient statement: 'instability is expected.'"

SOJOURN