(Estimated Pub Date) the Challenge of Ethnic Conflict to National and International Order in the 1990S: Geographic Perspectives- October 1995

Approved for Release: 2018/06/01 C00123268
Geographic and Ethnographic
Perspectives on Ethnic Conflict in
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Southeast Asia
Eric Crystal
Coordinator
Center for Southeast
Asia Studies
University of California at Berkeley’
Geographic/Ethnographic Overview
»
Few regions of the world present so wide a range of
natural environments and sociocultural adaptations as
does Southeast Asia. The enduring geographic and
ethnographic diversity of the region has been com-
pounded in recent decades by the forces of national-
ism, impact of ideology, intervention of extemal
powers, and differential pace of development in the
10 nations of the region. In brief, Southeast Asia today
provides an extraordinary range of economies, societ-
ies, cultures, and geographical regimes. Per capita
income ranges from $17,000 per year in Brunei to
$120 per year in Laos. The stability and technological
sophistication of Singapore, the newly industrialized
status of Thailand, and the burgeoning agroindustrial
base of Malaysia contrast strongly with the stark real-
ity of brutal military rule in Burma, the current
attempt at national reconciliation in Cambodia, and
the efforts to emerge from a subsistence economy in
Laos. '_
In the brief time allotted to me here, I wish to discuss
the past, present, and prospective dangers posed by
ethnic tensions in a region that, in the past decade, has
evidenced an average rate of economic growth (7 per-
cent) higher than any other on the globe. Although
poverty and lack of human and natural resources may
contribute to ethnic tensions, so also may the rise of a
middle class and the perception of the monopolization
of power by discrete minorities in the most economi-
cally successful of Southeast Asian states.
7 The views expressed in this paper are solely those of the author.
Identifying Key Issues in Ethnic Relations
For purposes ofthis discussion, I will focus on four
key aspects of ethnic tension in the Southeast Asian
region. The first factor relates to environmental issues
and the competition for agricultural land in highland
regions. The second factor is centered on religious
affiliation, identification, and proselytization. The
third factor focuses on tensions in the border regions
of Southeast Asia. The fourth aspect relates to vesti-
gial ideological conflicts in this region often articu-
lated in terms of ethnic interest.
Highland-Lowland Ecological Distinctions and
Ethnic Tensions
From the perspective of precolonial India and early
China, Southeast Asia was a frontier region, inhabited
by exotic races and peoples. Relatively low in popula-
tion in comparison to India and China in prehistoric as
well as more recent times, Southeast Asia yielded
valuable tribute and trade products such as aromatic
sandalwood, exotic bird of paradise feathers, and
much coveted rhinoceros hom (Hickey, 1982; 33-34).
From late neolithic times to the present, the geograph-
ical distinction between the alluvial plains and moun-
tain hinterlands tended to define interethnic relations
in the area and from the earliest articulation of state
society-perhaps in the second century AD-—to the
present a sharp division between lowland and high-
land populations has obtained in Southeast Asia.
Plains dwellers adapted and refined wet-rice cultiva-
tion, producing surpluses and articulating stratified
societies well over 2,500 years ago. Early kingdoms in
Southeast Asia such as Oc-eo in Vietnam and Funan
in Cambodia further articulated the development of
culture to the level of the state. Kingdoms in the
region from Myanmar (Burma) to Cambodia soon
adopted the religion and the buttressing ideology of
Hinduism, which was brought in the wake of Hindu
trade missions to the wealthy frontier states in “the
lands below the wind" in Southeast Asia (Reid; 1988).
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Approved for Release: 2018/06/01 C00123268