17.12.2006
Ethics of Ethical Tourism in Burma
_ By Hnin Maung
The concept - “ethical tourism” is alike ethical investment, ethical living and ethical consumerism etc; a new phenomena allegedly developed by the prodigies of neo-liberals and the environmentalists in the West. In nutshell, it means deploying the concept such as right, wrong, good and evil and responsibility.
The ethical tourism fascinates me because it is about good and bad and responsibility of one’s own action. It can be translated as a form of consumerism without guilt. It is like eating expensive organic food from a health food shop and having the thrill of feel good factor.
It can be beneficial for the local people. There are a handful of talented Western NGO workers in the Thai-Burma border area who accidentally went to the border areas as tourists and they ended up spending their life in helping in refugees and become part Burmese community.
Enough is being said and written about the Thai-Burma border but ethical tourism in Burma is an agenda believed to be set by Dr Zar Ni and whole loads of other people “who want to help the people inside Burma” and local economy and rest of the countless reasons.
The proponents of ethical tourism in Burma accuse the democracy movement and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the Burma Campaign in UK of creating unemployment within the tourism sector with their campaign on tourism boycott. People who travel to Burma is argued to get more involved in the country’s issue.
But in my blunt opinion, ethical tourism is unachievable in Burma. I am bound to be accused by many for politicizing tourism or an evil exile Burmese who does not care about livelihood of thousands of people employed in tourism sector (off course excluding sex industry).
In economic terms ethical tourism would still benefit the regime which is not just undemocratic and oppressive but economically incompetent. It is paramount for a government to earn hard currency in order to survive but the military junta is continuing to fail in translating it’s income into worthwhile nation building work, investment in health and education and other developmental work. It is not a responsibility of ethical tourists or NGOs per se to build hospital, provide clean water and welfare but the government.
The guardians of ethical tourism in Burma can argue a case for tourists to stay in smaller family own hotels or guest houses the country and avoid using tour operators etc. They can even drum up the whole experience of visiting Burma as a channel of communication between Burmese people and the rest of the world.
In fact, I am a frequent traveller to Burma too! Most of the readers may find it paradoxical for a heart throbbing supporter of anti tourism in Burma to be going inside the country as tourist. I suppose my answer to their charges would be that in life we all do things with a set goal or achievement. I travel to uncover the hidden side of Burma and I exactly know how to do it and I try to achieve it to my best of ability and return to free land.
In Burma, I once encountered this panicking shop owner because one of his staff (a young boy) went to do a delivery to a tourist in a hotel never returned for a while. The boss thought he did a run with money from delivery. The boy returned after a good few hours and he looked traumatic. The boy was held up by a secret police questing for an alleged unofficial dollar trading. The independent tourist guides are forced to work as informants for the junta.
But for a pleasure seeking tourist, the outcome of the trip would be lots of patronizing pictures of locals with lots of smiley faces as if everything is hunky-dory in their life.
The cultural tourists’ excursions don’t go beyond drinking Myanmar beer, watching puppet dance shows and viewing selected Burmese art galleries etc. The most ethnocentric tourist may choose to wear Burmese clothes for a few days.
During my cultural excursions in the country I manage to extend my cultural study beyond paintings and wearing clothes etc because I can do so by being an insider and outsider at the same time. I tend to explore norms and behaviour of people under military culture. The governments like the parents influence their citizen’s behaviour and norms.
An oppressive or autocratic government generates oppressed culture which is in not apparent in most cases. Unfortunately, the ethical tourists with the aim of having pleasure and explore culture within a narrow definition cannot experience or see these hidden cultures. Ironically, in Rangoon I came across this culture and Burmese language learning-tourist who worked as an English teacher for wealthy kids.
The small scale family owned hoteliers in the country are closing down their businesses because it is simply not a profitable business to be in. A huge chunk of their foreign income earnings are taken away by the government in the form of tax and saving in the state owned Myanmar Foreign Trade Bank and various other forms. The family owned hotel are obviously forced to pay the junta.
The hoteliers in Burma cannot compete with their counterparts in other South East Asian countries like Thailand in attracting tourists. A pure and simple economic reason of value for money overrides the arguments for and against the ethical tourism. For a pleasure hunting tourist on budget, value for money comes before ethics.
The ethical tourism based on rights and wrong becomes murky when it is hard to classify rights and wrong. In Burma, people are forced to obey the junta in every respect and nepotism is institutionalized and rooted in the society. I will continue to travel into Burma because I can hack it and I go with a clear mission of uncovering the mask. It may be a posh thing to be ethical in the Western world and I would like be a part of ethical organic food eating group but nothing is ethical in Burma.
It’s citizens like children raised by an evil parents continue to survive with difficulties. The ethical tourists in Burma can do nothing to help the Burmese but the danger is that they will be easily deceived by the junta. It’s citizens/residence can only bring about change. One may like it or not but as result of successive bad governments the country has produced a decadent society. A far fetched idea of revolution cannot be implanted from abroad but it is like a beauty which goes beyond good and evil.
A Burmese culture is alike any cultures around the world, it is hospitable culture. Those culture seeking ethical tourists are bound to be welcomed by the future democratic government of Burma if they wish to be hosted by an ethical government of Burma. In may or may not happened in our life time but I am sure any dedicated lovers of ethics would not mind waiting for the moment.
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Comments:
U Myo Nyunt, Perth, Western Australia, said _
Tourism is tourism. Traveling to places by people to meet other people in their
place, environment. What has ethics to do with tourism. Being lonely in
some places we go to other places, to see and perhaps revel in the mystery,
grandeur and the wonder places are and were formed and existed. Planet Earth
has no vice nor virtue.
Your
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