Hybrid Lecture (online and in-site) by Iselin Frydenlund: "Buddhist Responses to the 2021 Military Coup in Myanmar"

We kindly invite you to this hybrid (online and in-site) lecture in English language.

Topic:
    "Buddhist Responses to the 2021 Military Coup in Myanmar"

Speaker:
    Professor Iselin Frydenlund (PhD)

Affiliation:
    Professor of the Study of Religions at
    MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society

Date/Time:
    December 3rd, 2025 (Wednesday), 16:15 – 17:45 (CET/MEZ)

Language:
    English

Place:
   University of Hamburg
   Asia-Africa-Institute (AAI)
   Edmund-Siemers-Allee 1, Ostflügel ("East Wing"), room O-120
   20146 Hamburg

For online participation, please register via:
    https://www.eventbrite.de/e/buddhist-responses-to-the-2021-military-coup-in-myanmar-tickets-1964377096776?aff=oddtdtcreator

About this lecture:

The military coup in Myanmar on 1 February 2021 ended a period of semi-civilian rule (2011–2021), bringing the country once again under direct military rule. Recent research into the religious responses to the coup in its early phases indicates that the mass protests were characterised by global internet culture, inter-religious solidarity, and new visions for a plural and democratic Myanmar. The Buddhist Sangha, it is often claimed, remained silent and was mainly supportive of the military.

In this talk I argue that this narrative is too simplistic, ignoring both changes in attitudes over time, as well as internal divisions within the Sangha. Rather, what we see is both monastic justification of the military's action and resistance to it.

Moreover, I will also make the case that Buddhist support for the coup must be understood not only within an instrumentalist framework or within what we can refer to as the "Military-monastic complex", but also through a specific "Buddhist Ideology of Order". In opposition to this, a Buddhist revolutionary movement is identified. It envisions radical societal transformations, including of institutional Buddhism itself.

Finally, I will discuss the ways in which pro-revolutionary activities go well beyond established monastic revolutionary networks, indicating broader Sangha engagement in the Myanmar Spring Revolution than has often been assumed.

Brief profile:

Dr. Iselin Frydenlund is professor of the Study of Religions at MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society and a Fellow of the MF Centre for the Advanced Study of Religion (MF CASR). She specializes in questions relating to Buddhism and its societal impact, focusing on Buddhism, politics, nationalism and violence in Sri Lanka and Myanmar. She also works on Buddhist-Muslim relations in Buddhist majority states in Asia and was the PI of the Research Council of Norway-funded research project INTERSECT ("Intersecting Flows of Islamophobia"). Since 2016 she has also been heading an academic exchange program between MF and Myanmar Institute of Theology.

Frydenlund regularly appears in national and international media on questions related to Buddhism and politics, and she frequently provides analysis for policy-makers home and abroad. Her latest book is "Buddhist-Muslim Relations in a Theravada World" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020), co-edited with Michael Jerryson. Her monograph on Buddhism as a political force in Asia will soon appear for the Scandinavian University Press.

We would like to thank the Hamburg Society for Thai Studies for the cooperation. 

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