Why Theravāda Buddhist Nations Struggle with Democracy

Ten years back, I worked on an article (as yet unpublished) with the late Columbia University professor Alfred C. Stepan. Al was troubled by the political developments in Myanmar and Thailand — not to mention Sri Lanka, Laos, and Cambodia. At the time, Myanmar had yet to allow civilians to head the government, Thailand had experienced two recent military coups, and Sri Lanka had undergone a bloody civil war. The key driving research question was, “Why had none of these Theravāda Buddhist-majority nations been successful at institutionalising democracy?”

In the final phase of his career, Al turned to religion as a potential explanation, becoming increasingly intrigued by how religion impacted politics. At Columbia, he directed the Center for Democracy, Toleration and Religion and grew fascinated by Islam, especially in the context of countries such as Indonesia, which was transitioning from authoritarianism to democracy. In addition, Al had a long-standing interest in Sri Lanka and was involved in research on Myanmar, where he hoped to support the peace process. Another research question of his was, “Why is there no Theravāda Buddhist counterpart to Indonesia’s democratic transformation?”

In early 2014, Al visited Myanmar. We then met in Thailand, travelling down to the insurgency-affected Muslim-majority southern border provinces of Pattani and Yala, where we interviewed some leading figures in the region. Inspired by a conversation with the prominent Thai monk and intellectual Phra Paisal Visalo, the abbot of Wat Pasukato in Chaiyaphum, who said, “When Buddhism gets married (to) nationalism, bad things start to happen.” This inspired our paper arguing that Theravāda Buddhism had a “nationalism problem” that was a major obstacle to toleration and democracy.

In the past, the main nations where Theravāda Buddhism constituted the majority religion, such as Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Burma (Myanmar), and Siam (Thailand), had enjoyed extended and relatively “democratic” rule (that is, Ceylon from 1948 to 1980, Myanmar in the 1950s, and Thailand around the turn to this millennium). However, over time, these nation-states reverted to less democratic regimes. We identified some common themes connected with religious ideas and identity, and argued that like other major religions, Theravāda Buddhism is multivocal. That is, it combines ideas of tolerance and pluralism with some notions that are exclusivist and majoritarian.

In all three nation-states, nationalism grew in salience in the wake of 19th-century colonialism and 20th-century state-building. While Siam was never directly colonised, Thai kings emulated many of the policies of European colonial rulers. The loose network of mandalas (competing and overlapping areas of power), which previously characterised mainland Southeast Asia, gradually firmed up into a more centralised and exclusionary structure within each nation-state that privileged the majority Theravāda Buddhist community. In short, Al saw the historical or colonial Burma and Siam as examples of the heterogeneous and diverse entities he termed diverse “plurinational polities”. These gradually morphed into the modern nation-states of Myanmar and Thailand we know today.

In the past, the main nations where Theravāda Buddhism constituted the majority religion, such as Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Burma (Myanmar) and Siam (Thailand), had enjoyed extended and relatively ‘democratic’ rule…However, over time, these nation-states reverted to less democratic regimes.

Fascinated by India, Al was enthusiastic for what he and his co-authors termed “state-nations” which permitted a range of languages, did not adopt a state religion, and used decentralised, often federal forms of political power. Theravāda Buddhist nations, by contrast, appeared singularly averse to such pluralisms: they typically had a single national language, a de facto national religion, and a highly centralised mode of governance. Theravāda Buddhism was closely associated first with kingship and later with post-colonial regimes, many of them authoritarian. Except in Myanmar’s case, where monks had sometimes mobilised against autocracy — for example, during the 2007 Saffron Revolution — those in power had generally co-opted and enlisted the Buddhist order (sangha).

As part of the equation, full citizenship in these polities — whether de jure or de facto — was often accessible only to the Buddhist majority. Prior to the late 1950s, for instance, the Thai regime denied Thais of Chinese descent voting rights and they were not eligible for conscription. While Sino-Thais have since been incorporated into Thai society, Theravāda Buddhist nations often appear to struggle with territorially concentrated ethnic and religious minorities. More recently, Malay/Muslims in Thailand’s southern border region have struggled to maintain their identity in the face of demands that they become more Thai, speak Thai, and perform their loyalty to the Thai monarchy.

In Myanmar, almost a million Rohingya were driven out to refugee camps in neighbouring Bangladesh in the latter half of 2017. This was one of the largest population displacements in modern history, an extreme example of Buddhist intolerance. Narratives of disenfranchisement, marginalisation, and even deportation are depressing testimony to the limited pluralism in these Buddhist-majority states. They are often matched by a lack of recognition for minority languages and a persistent refusal to decentralise power, which includes the Thai central government’s failure to grant all 76 provinces the right to elect their governors.

Alas, Alfred Stepan died in September 2017 before the paper could be published. After that, the troubling developments across the region, notably the 2021 coup in Myanmar and the subversion of the 2023 Thai general election results, have further illustrated the salience of the issues we started discussing over a decade ago. Clearly, Theravāda Buddhist nations still have some problems in the context of democracy, but the eternally optimistic Al would remain adamant that given sufficient political will and public debate, these troubling issues can be resolved.

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