The EconomistNovember 7th 2020 Asia 352
1sagging foreign investment. Many Bur-
mese have yet to see the prosperity that Ms
Suu Kyi promised. One in four remained
poor in 2017, according to the World Bank.
The precariat is growing. Nearly half of
those polled by the abslast year were wor-
ried about losing their livelihood, more
than twice as many as in 2015. Some 54%
said they were unable to access basic ser-
vices, such as water, public transport and
health care, up from 48% five years ago.
“Gains from the economic reforms and
growth under the nldgovernment have yet
to be widely perceived by ordinary citi-
zens,” the authors of the survey wrote.
Part of the problem is the government’s
lack of capacity. When the nldtook up res-
idence in Naypyidaw, the army-built capi-
tal, Ms Suu Kyi stuffed the cabinet full of
the party faithful—men (and they are all
men) whose only qualification was their
loyalty to her. Their ineptitude, combined
with an inert bureaucracy staffed by ex-sol-
diers, left the government floundering and
unable to achieve anything much.
Matters have improved somewhat as in-
competent ministers have been replaced
with technocrats. Yet the government still
has few tools to help the poor, according to
Gerard McCarthy of the National Universi-
ty of Singapore. It “inherited a really skele-
tal social safety net”, he says, and its capaci-
ty to improve matters is limited. Tax
revenue has hovered at around 7% of gdp
since 2016, less than half the average in
South-East Asia. Myanmar’s covid-19 stim-
ulus amounted to a miserly 3.4% of gdp,
also far below the regional average.
The nlddiscourages the poor from rely-
ing on the state, argues Mr McCarthy. For
decades it has cleaved to the idea that peo-
ple are morally obliged to help themselves
and others through acts of charity, an ethicborn of both Buddhism and necessity. Dur-
ing the austere years of army rule, political
organisations were outlawed and there
was no public safety net. People in need
could turn only to charities. But this ideol-
ogy is in growing conflict with the expecta-
tions of the public, a majority of whom be-
lieve that democracy should lead to better
public services, according to the abs.
Just five years after civilians took pow-
er, Burmese have muddled and ambivalent
views about their hard-won political free-
doms. Although 87% of those surveyed by
abssay that they support democracy, two-
thirds believe it does not effectively pro-
mote economic growth or maintain order.
People also harbour wistful thoughts about
military rule. Nearly half support a role for
the Tatmadaw in politics—up from 39% in- Confusingly, 56% also back military
rule, compared with 48% five years ago.
Younger, rural Bamars who care about
the economy and security are more likely
to admire the men in uniform. They are
less likely “to remember the really bad
times,” notes Bridget Welsh, one of the au-
thors of the absreport. What they do re-
member is that Thein Sein, an ex-general
who began the process of opening up the
country, was a better steward of the econ-
omy than Ms Suu Kyi. These Burmese be-
lieve that Muslims pose an existential
threat to the country’s survival, and that
the army is necessary to repel them and
keep order in a fractious nation, says Mr
Holliday. The surveys he conducted with
Roman David, of Lingnan University in
Hong Kong, suggest that a growing minor-
ity of the Burmese population do not see
democracy and army rule as antithetical to
each other, but as systems of governance
that can co-exist. Ms Suu Kyi, in other
words, is undermining her own legacy. 7
Keeping ethnic minorities in lineA
t a cinemain Seoul eight middle-aged
women in matching sky-blue hoodies,
hair bands and face masks are sharing
dried figs and persimmons as they chat and
snap selfies. They have travelled from all
over the country for the opening weekend
of “Mr Trot”, a film based on a South Korean
television show that aired earlier this year.
In the show, a mix of washed-up and aspir-
ing male crooners chosen from 15,000 ap-
plicants dress up in pastel suits and semi-
unbuttoned silk shirts and sing old South
Korean ballads to compete for the title of
“Mr Trot”. The women, whose hoodies read
“Lim Young-woong, you are my hero”, are
members of an online fan club for the win-
ner. They are not alone in their obsession:
more than 30% of South Korean television-
viewers tuned into the show’s final episode
in March.
Trot, which emerged in the early 20th
century when the Korean peninsula was a
Japanese colony, blends traditional Korean
music with elements of the Japanese and
Western popular songs of the era. It has
long been ubiquitous in South Korea, but it
has been a long time since it was consid-
ered cool—if it ever was. The ballads, with
their cheesy melodies, melodramatic lyrics
and repetitive beats are perennial favour-
ites with drunken revellers in noraebang,
or “singing rooms”, the South Korean
equivalent of karaoke parlours. Songs
about doomed romance, lost hometowns
and the general tragedy of life blare from
speakers at motorway service stations and
from the radios of buses and taxis driven by
older men. The more up-tempo numbers
are beloved of political parties at election
time, when candidates and activists regale
voters with clunky dancing set to trot blast-
ing from campaign lorries.
But partly thanks to the popularity of
“Mr Trot” and its predecessor “Miss Trot”, a
similarly popular programme with female
contestants that aired last year, the genre
has gone from a sentimental throwback to
a potent cultural force. The shows’ stars
have become celebrities. In 2019 two of the
three most popular music acts in South Ko-
rea were trot singers, eclipsed only by bts,
the world’s biggest boy band. Trot singers
top the charts for streaming and record
sales. Several new trot-themed television
shows are trying to emulate the success of
their famous predecessors. Companies
selling everything from coffee to gas boil-
ers have recruited trot stars to front adver-SEOUL
At home, K-pop plays second fiddle to a
fustier, more sentimental genreMusic in South KoreaHot for trot