The Truth Behind the Rohingya’s Lost Identity: The modern humanitarian crisis, shaped by the power dynamics of its acting forces in the past.

Abstract

The Rohingya, an ethno-religious minority community, have been subjected to systematic state persecution in Myanmar. The paper provides a critical review of the current attitude of Myanmar within its historical roots and focuses on the geopolitical shifts, colonial oppression, and religious views of those in power. The first section summarizes the religious climate in pre-colonial Arakan inhabited by Muslims and Hindus, to acknowledge that Arakan was geopolitically and religiously separate from Burma until its 1785 integration. The second section contextualizes the Buddhist religious climate in Burma, which laid the grounds for religion to be intertwined with politics. The third section introduces the sectarian conflict between Arakanese Muslims and Burmese Buddhists induced by Burma’s derogatory view of Muslims. The fourth section traces the influence of British colonial rule in bringing Muslim immigrants to Arakan, which was met with dissatisfaction among the Buddhist majority. I analyze how the British census of the Burmese population based on religion for coolie labor was leverage for the Burmese to justify their exclusion of Rohingya and solidify their anti-Muslim ideologies. The fifth section analyzes why the non-interference colonial policy broke the tie between religion and state, instilling Buddhists’ animosity towards the British. The sixth section explores how the 1930 Global Economic Crisis and British colonial policies relegated Buddhists to second-class status and furthered the tension between British officers and Buddhists. The seventh section traces the rise of Burmese Nationalism through the rise of Buddhist movements and nationalist organizations and the association of Buddhists with the Burmese identity. The eighth section pinpoints WWII as a significant event that instilled ethnic hatred between the Buddhists, backed by the Japanese, and the Muslims, backed by the British. The ninth section addresses the repercussions of colonialism for Buddhists, as seen by the country’s foreign policy and its treatment of the Rohingya Muslims today. My survey of the events that contributed to the power imbalance between the Burmese Buddhists and the Arakan Muslims concludes that the persecution of the Rohingya in Myanmar is not just political propaganda; it is a result of British colonial strategies that disrupted the relationship between religion and state and led to retaliatory actions against Muslims to reverse this power dynamic.

Keywords: Myanmar, colonial Burma, ethno-religious conflict, Rohingya refugee crisis, Buddhism, Muslim, British colonial policy