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Aung San Suu Kyi: The Philosopher

By Raluca Enescu

            At this very moment, basically everyone in the world is aware of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s achievements as the political leader of Burma’s democracy movement. Less well-known is her contribution to political theory and philosophy.

            Although less widespread known than it deserves, her book “Freedom from fear”, or at least part of it (and here I am referring, especially, to the essays “In quest of democracy” and “Freedom from fear”) represents an extremely valuable contribution to modern political philosophy. The reason why it has not been too much taken into account yet is not clear to me; perhaps it is because it has been regarded more like a book of cultural and historical references than, actually, as “political philosophy”.

            The greatest value of the two essays I have already mentioned comes from the fact that they are one of the few theories that have been yet conceived which fundament liberal democracy on Buddhist values.

            “The Buddhist view of world history tells that, when society fell from its original state of purity into moral and social chaos, a king was elected to restore peace and justice […] The agreement by which their first monarch undertakes to the rule righteously, in return for a portion of the rice crop, represents the Buddhist version of government by social contract […] The Buddhist view of kingship does not invest the ruler with the divine right to govern the realm as he pleases. He is expected to observe the Ten Duties of the Kings, the Seven Safeguards against Decline, the Four Assistances to the People and to be guided by numerous other codes of conduct […]. The Ten Duties of Kings are widely known and generally accepted as a yardstick which could be applied just as well to modern governments as to the first monarch of the world. The duties are: liberality, morality, self-sacrifice, integrity, kindness, austerity, non-anger, non-violence, forbearance and non-opposition to the will of the people […] The tenth duty of kings, non-opposition to the will of the people (avirodha) tends to be singled out as Buddhist endorsement of democracy […] The royal duty of non-opposition is a reminder that the legitimacy of government is founded on the consent of the people, who may withdraw their mandate at any time if they lose confidence in the ability of the ruler to serve their best interests. By invoking the Ten Duties of Kings, the Burmese are not so much indulging in wishful thinking as drawing on time-honored values to reinforce the validity of the political reforms they consider necessary. It is a strong argument for democracy that governments regulated by principles of accountability, respect for public opinion and the supremacy of just laws are more likely than an all-powerful ruler or ruling class, uninhibited by the need to honor  the will of the people, to observe the traditional duties of Buddhist kingship. Traditional values serve both to justify and to decipher popular expectations of democratic government”(Aung San Suu Kyi-“In quest for democracy”, essay included in “Freedom from fear”)

            This very good-sensed perspective is highly likely to offer meaningful answer in the political debate concerning the propagation of liberal democracy in the world.

            There have been a lot of theories and hypothesis, by various sociologists and political philosophers, concerning the idea that, one day, all countries will achieve democracy. But all of this theories received criticisms from other authors of political theories, and some of the objections were based on a quite inconsistent ground: Professor Samuel P. Huntington, for example, claims, in his book “Clash of civilizations”, that liberal democracy is a product, at such point determined by its European and Christian origins, that it cannot be “transplanted” into other cultures.

            “If ideas and beliefs are to be denied validity outside the geographical and cultural bounds of their origin, Buddhism would be confined to north India, Christianity to a narrow tract in the Middle East and Islam to Arabia.” Says Aung San Suu Kyi in her essay, “In quest of democracy”

            Besides, democracy is the only political system that is likely to guaranty people’s natural rights and liberties; if we agree that, by definition, the right to freedom, for example, is a natural-one, then, it results that it is a right that ALL the people of the world are entitled to have, and a goal that all the people of the world are willing to obtain.

            And if a people’s culture is its product, then, it becomes clear that a culture that would deny the right to freedom is a contradiction; because no group would build a system of concepts that would deny one of his major goals. So, it cannot be the culture, in any case, that would stop a people from achieving democracy, but only the ill will of some people, who are putting their own personal interest before the community’s .

            From those people, who have a specific interest in denying people’s most basic rights, we can expect to claim that democracy is not achievable, and justifying this by pretending it is not compatible with the country’s tradition seems the easiest way.

            But we definitely cannot apply the same logic to sociologists, scientists and philosophers. The distrust towards the idea of newly-born liberal democracy in Asian countries might come from the fact that political theories concerning democracy, based on other cultural context than that of Europe and of Christianity have not been enough developed and promoted, although the factual support is existing.

Regarding the philosophy as a constructive debating process, I would say that, in this context, Aung San Suu Kyi’s political theory would be able to provide a lot of valuable answers, opening new perspectives on understanding the evolution of human rights and democracy in the world.           

Raluca Enescu

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Comments

Sara said _

This is very good Reluca. Nice work, keep it up.

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