Under Ne Win’s regime, the peripheral satellite towns established under the Caretaker Government grew significantly. Residents in these municipalities had little contact with government officials of any kind and were too preoccupied with survival to have any time or inclination to become politically active or engage in any anti-State activities (Seekins, 2011). By keeping citizens isolated from the rest of Rangoon’s population, a lack of social solidarity developed, making it even less likely that the population would organize a coherent resistance to Ne Win’s government. As Seekins (2011) explains: Rangoon during the Ne Win era was hemmed in by thinly populated green spaces to the west, north and east, both inside and outside the formal city limits. The Caretaker Government had used the “new towns” ... as dumping grounds for squatters in 1959... Strategic “reshaping” of the city and its population was less ambitious during the intervening Ne Win years... But this did not mean that the army-state ignored the “peri-urban” region. Its limited development of these areas was focused primarily on meeting its own needs, narrowly defined, and those of its constituencies . . . rather than the general public. (p. 110) These new towns were used to physically control the movement of those parts of the population the state deemed a nuisance or those who lived on land required for infrastructure and development projects beneficial only to upper-level members of the military-state. Furthermore, the towns were established in an attempt to paint Rangoon in a facade of modernity and economic and social advancement. Social mobilization schemes became a staple in Tatmadaw domination strategies. A major influential aspect of Ne Win-era control mechanisms was the network of patron-client relations. This system was hierarchical and implied reciprocity, where both inferiors and superiors relied on each other for long-term survival and prosperity, as Seekins (2011) explains: 30