This book explores how children have been affected by armed conflict in the borderlands of Thailand, particularly in the region abutting the Thailand-Myanmar border, and in the most southern part of Thailand. The author argues that the Thai government has made great efforts to protect children from armed conflict in these borderlands. The author analyzes the obstacles facing the Thai government in protecting children from armed conflict in the borderlands, and advances alternative solutions for how the Thai government might better protect children from armed conflict in the foreseeable future. This book not only opens a window for future research on children affected by armed conflict in the borderlands of Thailand and beyond, but also contributes to the breadth of perspective and depth of expertise in related fields, such as studies of human insecurity. It is relevant to scholars, graduate students, and policymakers interested in the impact of armed conflict on children.

Millions of children around the world are affected by conflict, and the enduring aftermath of war in post-conflict societies. This book reflects on the implications of children’s insecurity for governments and the international humanitarian community by drawing on original field research in post-conflict Cambodia and in Burma’s eastern conflict zones. The book examines the way that politics and discourses of security and child protection have further marginalised rather than enhanced the protection of children. In Cambodia, threats from trafficking, exploitative labour, and high levels of domestic and social violence challenge the government and the international humanitarian community to respond to the new human security terrain that is the legacy of three decades of political violence. Burma has endured over 60 years of insurgency and civil conflict in ethnic minority states, significantly affecting children who are recruited into armies, killed, maimed or tortured, and displaced. Analysing the theoretical and practical challenges faced in addressing children’s security in global politics, the book offers a novel framework for responding to the politics of protection that is at the heart of this crucial issue. It is a useful contribution to studies on Asian Politics and International Relations and Security.

The civil war in Burma has been dubbed as the longest running internal conflict in the world, and hundreds of thousands have fled desperation and abuse across the border to Thailand. Today, countless of exiles live on the Thailand-Burma border as undocumented migrants, whilst thousands of others have lived confined to the refugee camps for years, even decades, with no way out. And all the while, hundreds of thousands are still displaced in the jungles of eastern Burma. Although there have recently been changes in Burma's political landscape, the underlying causes of the conflict remain unaddressed. Recent changes on the border have adversely affected the refugee population and severely hampered not only aid efforts but also the work of the pro-democracy and capacity building movement that has thrived on the Thailand-Burma border for decades. This book provides an insight into the situation on the border and the lives of those who remain trapped in a limbo.

This major Handbook is a collection of work from leading scholars in the Conflict Analysis and Resolution (CAR) field. The central theme is the value of interdisciplinary approaches to the analysis and resolution of conflicts.

Rebel Politics analyzes the changing dynamics of the civil war in Myanmar, one of the most entrenched armed conflicts in the world. Since 2011, a national peace process has gone hand-in-hand with escalating ethnic conflict. The Karen National Union (KNU), previously known for its uncompromising stance against the central government of Myanmar, became a leader in the peace process after it signed a ceasefire in 2012. Meanwhile, the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) returned to the trenches in 2011 after its own seventeen-year-long ceasefire broke down. To understand these puzzling changes, Brenner conducted ethnographic fieldwork among the KNU and KIO, analyzing the relations between rebel leaders, their rank-and-file, and local communities in the context of wider political and geopolitical transformations. Drawing on Political Sociology, Rebel Politics explains how revolutionary elites capture and lose legitimacy within their own movements and how these internal contestations drive the strategies of rebellion in unforeseen ways. Brenner presents a novel perspective that contributes to our understanding of contemporary politics in Southeast Asia, and to the study of conflict, peace and security, by highlighting the hidden social dynamics and everyday practices of political violence, ethnic conflict, rebel governance and borderland politics.