Bardonomics

This is adapted from a paper I wrote for my Comparative Politics class at Harvard . A Friendless People Thousands have been killed. Hundreds of thousands have fled. They are a people without a home, much less a state. Such is the plight of the Rohingya, whom a UN spokesperson once called the most friendless people in the world. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has called the situation a “textbook example of ethnic cleansing” (“UN”). This latest wave of state-sponsored violence follows a series of attacks by militants—a small insurgent group, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA)—in August on Myanmarese military outposts. The brutal military crackdown is ostensibly targeted at insurgents. Yet, it is unmistakably civilians who are bearing the brunt of the violence, with the UN High Commissioner calling the response “clearly disproportionate” and “without regard for basic principles of international law” (“UN”). The approach of ethnic institutionalism...