The earnest desire as humankind in this world is to have a peaceful life, a life free of pain and suffering. Leading a dignified life in a democratic society where our rights to life, culture, and territory are recognized, protected, and guaranteed is fundamental to our struggle for socio-political aspirations. However, living under the repressive military regime in present-day Burma, that firmly upholds the ideological doctrine of Burman supremacy “we are the master mindset”, our Indigenous Karen peoples from Kawthoolei of Burma have never experienced peace in our lives. Instead, we’ve endured intergenerational atrocities at the hands of fascist Burman military dictators for almost eight decades. Our ancestral territory, which plays a vital role in sustaining our traditional livelihoods, preserving cultural heritages, and safeguarding customary institutions and bio-cultural knowledge systems, has faced multiple risks. These sacred lands are under tremendous pressure due to the dominant Burman regime’s political agenda of colonialism through territorialization, combined with militarization and top-down destructive ‘developments’ , such as industrial mining, agribusiness, highway construction, hydroelectric dams, and green grabbing for nature conservation without our consent.

Despite the government of Burma voting in favor of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), our self-determination rights to territories, lands, natural resources, and culture continue to be violated relentlessly. Since overthrowing the democratically elected civilian government in 2021, the self-proclaimed State Administration Council (SAC) of the military junta continues to perpetrate gross human rights violations nationwide, including extrajudicial killings, torture, forced disappearance and imprisonment. Furthermore, the military junta’s continued threats of indiscriminate artillery shelling, airstrikes, and aerial surveillances put significant challenges on our daily livelihood activities, administrative activities of education and health, cultural activities, and environmental stewardship.

Besides the state violence that Indigenous Karen peoples have faced under the authoritarian regime of Burma, we are also vulnerable to climate-induced disasters, such as floods, erratic rainfall, droughts, landslides, and agricultural pest infestations. The capitalist-driven, large-scale land rush for industrial agriculture and extractivism is a global phenomenon directly linked to the climate crisis due to its destruction of forests and biodiversity, species extinction, and emission of poisonous greenhouse gases (GHGs). With wealth accumulation, these greedy corporate actors and entities have an influential role over political power, entrenching their imperialist control over economic systems, and will unquestionably continue to plunder natural resources limitlessly.

In response to these challenges, two Indigenous-conserved territories (ICTs), the Salween Peace Park and Thawthi Taw-Oo Indigenous Park were established in 2018 and 2024, and officially declared with the goal of reclaiming our territorial rights and self-determination. For our Indigenous Karen peoples in Kawthoolie as well as the Karen National Union (KNU) as a de facto government, the launch of these two ICTs marked the historic milestone in our revolutionary movement. These two ICTs also demonstrate radical democracy in practice because they are decentralized and bottom-up where local indigenous communities are directly involved in self-governance, collective decision making, community empowerment, and meaningful consultations for self-strengthening processes. Both governance systems of these ICTs are guided by the Charter that is based on the principles of democracy, peace and justice, environmental integrity, and cultural preservation.

To amplify our Indigenous Karen peoples struggle for self-determination rights over territorial governance and control, we believe that international solidarity is instrumental. Therefore, with the invitation of the Global Tapestry of Alternatives (GTAGlobal Tapestry of Alternatives) and its alliance organizations, I got a chance to represent my Indigenous communities from the Salween Peace Park and Thawthi Taw-Oo Indigenous Park in Kawthoolei/Burma at the global confluence on “Radical Democracy, Autonomy, and Self-Determination” held in Port Edward, the Wild Coast of South Africa from February 2-6, 2025. In our struggle for autonomous governance and self-determination, we believe in consensus, choosing our own leaders, collective decision-making relevant to our community’s affairs, reviving and/or creating our rules and laws, and a democracy that started with the people that demonstrates the radical democracy in practice.

From this gathering, I noticed that common experiences and struggles shared across different countries and/or communities included large-scale land and sea grabbing for mining, highway construction, commercial fishing, agri-business, urbanisation, fortress conservation, and natural resources extraction of oil and gas through development aggression, colonialism, and militarism. Furthermore, the escalation of armed conflict, war, and political repressions continue to exacerbate under authoritarian regimes in some countries leading to mass displacement and humanitarian crises. Despite the multiple challenges and interconnected crises of climate change, social and economic inequalities, environmental problems, and armed conflict, drawing inspiration from collective movements, resistances, and resilience has made me realise that transformative governance systems that are practically rooted in grassroots movements and people’s power for a better, just, peaceful, equitable, and sustainable world are achievable.

Even as we witness and endure oppression under authoritarian regimes and imperialist powers, alternatives to these dominant, repressive, and exploitative systems are always possible.

During the Confluence, a local visit to gain firsthand experience about the practices of radical democracy and autonomy by the Amadiba Crisis Committee (ACC) was worthwhile. I witnessed the community’s spirit of hospitality through the performance of their traditional colourful dances and songs, exchanging of traditional gifts, and tasting of their traditional meals. This was a meaningful experience for me. Most importantly, I felt uplifted when listening to and learning about their inspirational stories of resilience and resistance against multinational mining companies for their territorial rights. Nonhle Mbuthuma, a prominent leader of the ACC who arranged the visit asserted that, “Wealth is about peace in your heart, not money. Our fight to protect our ancestral lands, the lands that feed us, and provide food for us has been intergenerational…the land is our mother that feeds us, land is where we have our home, legacy and connection to our ancestors. The sea is our home too, it is a place where our ancestors in the ocean/water reside, and when you disturb the water you also disturb our connection to the ocean, and it’s a mother to us and feed us”.

This powerful speech signifies our Indigenous Karen peoples’ ontological claim of “tar mar dot mar kar”, a philosophical concept that implies the moral principle of reciprocity and interdependency between humans, the rest of nature, and spiritual entities. This concept, culturally rooted in our ancestors’ teachings of maintaining harmonious living between humans and nature, characterises the intimate web of life. Our oral traditional poem about reciprocity also embodies this concept:

“We, who drink water, must take care of the water
We, who eat from the land, must take care of the land
Only when we maintain the balance will our wellbeing be sustained”

In conclusion, realizing that the interconnected problems of global environmental crisis, climate change, armed conflict, and humanitarian crisis will continue to exacerbate under imperialist powers and authoritarian regimes, it’s critically imperative for us to build grassroots movements and mutually recognise our leadership, wisdom, traditional knowledge systems, and grounded democracy practices in defense of our ancestral territories and natural resources, which are counter-narrative to the dominant and violent systems. Therefore, mutual recognition of our collective struggle for self-determination over territorial rights and autonomy and consolidation of international solidarity can be key to system change and certainly offers a glimpse of hope for a positive future for humanity and the planetary ecosystems.