Winning the PR War in Burma - It’s All about Atari
The battle for momentum in Burma has long seemed to be a case of simply applying military repression. But the actions of the spritual leaders of the country challenging the mandate of the military leaders makes this a much more complex fight for what in go is called atari.
My programmer friend Stuart taught me go years ago. It’s all about learning how to maintain momentum, while relentlessly trapping the other player’s pieces until you can capture them.
It’s not like chess, where you can pull out your heavy ammunition and threaten pieces with the queen. Each tile in go is identical to the next. You place your pieces to gain territorial advantage, to threaten your opponent’s tiles, and to maintain atari (often all three in one move).
In politics, as in military battles and public relations wars, momentum is frequently the deciding factor when two sides otherwise seem evenly matched.
The democracy movement in Burma gained atari when democracy advocate Aung San Suu Kyi ’s party won the 1990 election, and it has maintained the momentum ever since, despite the leader being hemmed in by 11 years of house arrest, and severe limits on public political action.
In go, there is often a point when a player makes an apparently small move that suddenly shifts the balance of power. The slowly growing protests this month have been such a move.
In the end, this is not a dispute that will be decided by the number of weapons one side has. It will be decided when the sheer momentum of popular support for the protests convinces middle-level military commanders to disobey their generals’ orders.
The public relations war was won years ago outside Burma. But in the cloistered country, the military leaders are still able to assert control over the political process.
When the democracy movement’s actions win over the soldiers, they will have won the war. Until then, all their actions are about maintaining momentum.
Even a massive crackdown on protesters may not help the military at this point. Killing monks in the overwhelmingly Buddhist country could have the opposite effect of adding momentum to the protesters’ cause
Any credibility the army maintains could evaporate if they make the wrong moves against the popular monks.
There comes a point in go when an opponent’s atari makes them unstoppable. I’m hoping we’re at that point now in the streets of Rangoon and the rest of the country.
Related Stories
POSTED IN: Audiences, Communication Tactics, Crisis Communications, Ethics, Persuasion, Politics
0 opinions for Winning the PR War in Burma - It’s All about Atari
No one has left a comment yet. You know what this means, right? You could be first!
Have an opinion? Leave a comment: