Along the Burma-Thailand border, through official channels or via countless informal paths, efforts to escape from the difficulties of life in Burma are ongoing.¹ In many individual stories, obvious push factors such as war and poverty are combined with the groaning boredom, educational void and incessant petty hassles that dictate life for Burma’s non-elite citizens. Those who flee these familiar hardships are confronted by a new language, culture and economy. Few receive a warm welcome on the Thai side of the border and most find they are forced to survive at the bottom of a stark social and political hierarchy, often under conditions far from the comfortable life that they may have originally imagined. As bama (Thai for Burmese) they are generally regarded as a dispensable and temporary imposition.²

Item Type:	Research Book Chapter
Keywords:	Thailand, Burma
Research Division:	Human Society
Research Group:	Political science
Research Field:	Government and politics of Asia and the Pacific
Objective Division:	Law, Politics and Community Services
Objective Group:	International relations
Objective Field:	International political economy (excl. international trade)
UTAS Author:	Farrelly, N (Professor Nicholas Farrelly)
ID Code:	145395
Year Published:	2012
Deposited By:	Office of the School of Social Sciences
Deposited On:	2021-07-20
Last Modified:	2021-07-20
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