My DPhil research explores alternative visions of non-state education and particularly the modes of collective action structuring and sustaining these as they seek to further Burma’s democratic transition.

Through a case study of recent initiatives in a Pwo Karen community on the country’s southeastern border with Thailand, I explore the role knowledge networks, mediated by a range of interests and identities, are currently playing in shaping civic representations and responses amongst ethnic nationality communities at the margins of the state.

I employ a combination of ethnographic and participatory research methods to expose the evolving nature of social and material relations supporting these visions, their enactments and effects within a community experiencing new freedoms and entitlements at this decisive point in Burma’s social and political development.