Is Burma Liberalizing?

Jay Ulfelder tries to explain recent concessions by the highly authoritarian government:

Dictators are most likely to undertake political liberalization either when citizens already pose a credible and formidable threat (liberalization by concession), or when citizens appear to pose only a weak threat (liberalization by imposition). Viewed through this wider lens, recent events in Burma make a little more sense. Like Gorbachev’s initially timid steps toward openness (glasnost) in support of economic restructuring (perestroika), the Burmese government’s recent reforms seem to identify that country as a budding case of liberalization by imposition. After the collapse of the USSR, dictators may have become more inclined to err on the side of caution and forego the potential gains from reduced economic friction. More recently, though, the Chinese government’s success (so far) in managing these trade-offs in its favor seems to have re-opened the door to liberalization from above.