Article Myanmar: Surveillance and the Turn from Authoritarianism? Karin Dean School of Humanities, Tallinn University, Estonia. karin.dean@tlu.ee Abstract In Myanmar, one of the longest ruling military regimes in the world (1962-2011), exerting unrestrained coercion and relying on a pervasive security apparatus, has accepted a constitution and competitive elections. The military directed concatenation of developments but especially the Constitution that legalizes a unique power-sharing arrangement between the military and the elected government, contribute to the exceptionalism but also continuing coercion of Myanmar’s military, even under the democratically elected popular government of former democracy icons Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy. Holding that a key step in a democratic transition must involve the scaling down of state coercive apparatus, the article demonstrates how this has not been the case in Myanmar. The size, expenditure and revenues of the armed forces have been maintained, the surveillance for political and social control continues, while the spread of mobile communication devices, and particularly social media, has opened up more extensive and easier opportunities for monitoring. Subjugating the practices of surveillance to laws is not prioritized in the complex political context of multiple pressing issues. Introduction The current focus of Surveillance Studies is set by concerns over the clash between fast developing technologies, new governmental and commercial strategies and citizens’ strive for privacy. While surveillance is seen as inseparable from information society and modern governmentality, paradoxically, its increase during recent decades has led to a degree of apprehension over its authoritarianist capability. The article will study the prospects for surveillance in the context of a regime change from extreme authoritarianism to one where the state is expected to become less of a perpetrator while gradually embarking on information society. Myanmar exhibits a case of one the longest ruling military regimes in the world that during 1962-2011 exerted unrestrained coercion and relied on a pervasive security apparatus.1 In 2010, the incumbent military government, after completing a new constitution, held elections that were won by a handpicked party that established a civilian government staffed predominantly by retired military officers. This new military backed civilian government implemented a number of reforms welcomed worldwide, including the release of thousands of political prisoners, legalization of opposition parties and entry into parliament of the longtime democracy icon and former prisoner of conscience, Aung San Suu Kyi, and her National League for 1 The country’s name was changed from Burma to Myanmar in 1989; the name Burma will be used in references to periods before 1989. Dean, Karin. 2017. Myanmar: Surveillance and the Turn from Authoritarianism? Surveillance & Society 15(3/4): 496-505. http://library.queensu.ca/ojs/index.php/surveillance-and-society/index| ISSN: 1477-7487 © The author(s), 2017 | Licensed to the Surveillance Studies Network under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives license.