SYNOPSIS

The presentation will discuss recent research undertaken with local Kachin colleagues in Myanmar as part of the project 'Drugs and (Dis)order: Building Sustainable Peacetime Economies in the Aftermath of War', in which we explored the origins and rationale of a popular social movement called Pat Jasan. The movement aims to take into its own hands the resolution of the local crisis of illicit drug supply and consumption in Kachin-identifying communities in Myanmar. Pat Jasan is sometimes referred to as a 'drugs vigilante' movement, and has attracted considerable criticism for the violence of its actions. Our research, which is soon to be published in the International Journal of Drugs Policy, seeks to understand the social and cultural origins of the movement. We consider how contestations of what 'harm reduction' means between Pat Jasan volunteers and biomedical harm reduction agencies can be handled more constructively by all parties to achieve better outcomes for local people.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Dr Mandy Sadan is Associate Professor in Global Sustainable Development at the University of Warwick, as well as Senior Research Fellow at the Oxford School of Global & Area Studies at the University of Oxford. She previously worked at SOAS University of London, where she was Reader in the History of South East Asia. She has been researching and teaching about the minority ethnic areas of Myanmar for nearly 25 years, with a particular focus on the Kachin region in the north.

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