About

WHO WE ARE & WHAT WE DO

Pyinnya is an educational clearinghouse designed to both assist Burmese people in their quest for knowledge and foster an on-line community of learners amongst the Burmese.

By making accessible via the Net important contempory debates on crucial topics such as food and human security, good governance, gender and trade, agricultural and rural development, demilitarization, democratic transition, and so on, Pyinnya intends to contribute to the intellectual advancement of Burmese learners, regardless of sex, ethnicity, profession, creed, and party affiliation.

Specifically, Pyinnya’s aim is to apply information technology in helping facilitate their “acquisition” of cutting edge knowledge in various Burma-relevant fields.

Ultimately, we at Pyinnya wishes to encourage our compatriots and friends to lead “an examined life” in accord with a deeply intellectual Buddhist tradition of ‘free inquiry’  as espoused some 2,500 years ago in the Kalama Sutta http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/soma/wheel008.html .

Pyinnya is not the first or only educational effort towards this end, however.

A SELECT HISTORY OF KNOWLEDGE PROMOTION FOR THE BURMESE

Throughout Burma’s post-independence history since 1948, there have been genuine concerns about the education of the Burmese and the process of their intellectual advancement - in short, the quality of human resource development - on the part of Burmese educators and intellectuals and our international friends, institutions and individuals.   Among them are His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Nobel Prize winning economist Amartya Sen, former Philippines President Fidel V. Ramos and the late Louis Walinsky who served the Union of Burma Government as resident economic advisor from 1953-58, to name a few. 

Pyinnya acknowledges these individuals and institutions for their concerns and support by making public some documents which attest to their concerns, support and efforts.  (See “Public Records” below.)

INTELLECTUAL POVERTY: THE TROUBLED CIVILIZATION IN BURMA/MYANMAR

Finally, a word about the larger context against which Pyinnya has been created.

The deepening nation-wide crisis of Burma/Myanmar today is not simply political or economic in nature; but it has an unmistakably intellectual dimension.   The country and her people are impoverished not just in the material/economic sense, but intellectually and spiritually as well.   In short, Burma/Myanmar is a troubled civilization, despite its oft-cited bedrock Buddhist philosophy of loving kindness, compassion and ‘free inquiry’.  

This “civilizational impoverishment” is the direct and cumulative result of the deeply ideological policies and behaviours on the part of civilian nationalist leadership (1948-58 and 1960-62) and the half-century rule of the categorically anti-intellectual military leaders (1962 to present).

Against this tragic backdrop, we in Pyinnya would like to invite all able visitors of our site to contribute in any way they could to this generational process of revitalizing intellectually the Burmese society at large. 

PUBLIC RECORDS

A Personal Letter from the pioneering Burmese development economist Dr Hla Myint of Oxford University to the late Louis Walinsky in Rangoon, dated 26 Feb, 1956.

Source: Lou Walinsky Files, Wason Collection, South East Asia Archival Materials, Cornell University, USA.

hla-myint-to-lou-walinsky-1956-page-1-of-2.pdf; hla-myint-to-lou-walinsky-1956-page-2-of-2.pdf

A Letter by His Holiness the Dalai Lama in support of the Institute for Community and Institutional Development (2002-04) , dated 9 December 1999. 

Source: ICID Files.

moral-support-from-holiness-the-dalai-lama-for-education-of-the-burmese-008.pdf

A Letter from former Philippines President Fidel V. Ramos to Chris Patter, the then EU External Relations Commissioner, dated 26 March 2004. 

Source: Fidel V. Ramos Peace and Development Foundation, Manila, the Philippines.

fidel-ramos-to-chris-patten-2004-page-1-of-2.pdf; fidel-ramos-to-chris-patten-2004-page-2-of-2.pdf

The Institute of Education, University of London 

Source: ICID Files.

support-from-london-university-institute-of-education-2002010.pdf

The School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London  

Source: ICID Files.

support-from-soas-2002009.pdf

What’s After SLORC?: The First Five Years of Post-Military Rule in Burma - Louis Walinsky for the Committee for the Restoration of Democracy in Burma (circa. 1992)

the-first-five-year-of-post-military-rule-by-lou-walinsky-page-1-of-2.pdf ; the-first-five-year-of-post-military-rule-by-lou-walinsky-page-2-of-2.pdf