Burmese Chinese
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Chinese Burmese, also Sino-Burmese or Tayoke, are a Burmese citizens of full or partial Chinese ancestry. They are group of overseas Chinese born or raised in
Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...
(Burma). As of 2012, the Burmese Chinese population is estimated to be as high as 3 per cent of the country's population. Burmese Chinese are a well established middle class ethnic group and are well represented in all upper levels of Burmese society. Burmese Chinese also play a leading role in Burma's business sector and dominate the Burmese economy. In addition, Burmese Chinese have a strong presence in Burma's political scene with several people such as
San Yu San Yu ( my, စန်းယု, ; 3 March 1918 – 28 January 1996) was a Burmese army general and statesman who served as the fifth president of Myanmar from 9 November 1981 to 27 July 1988. Biography San Yu, an ethnic Chinese, was born i ...
,
Khin Nyunt General Khin Nyunt (; ; born 23 October 1939) is a Burmese military officer and politician. He held the office of Chief of Intelligence and was Prime Minister of Myanmar from 25 August 2003 until 18 October 2004. Early life and education Kh ...
, and Ne Win having been major political figures.


Etymology

In the
Burmese language Burmese ( my, မြန်မာဘာသာ, MLCTS: ''mranmabhasa'', IPA: ) is a Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Myanmar (also known as Burma), where it is an official language, lingua franca, and the native language of the Burmans, the coun ...
, the Chinese are called ''Tayoke'' (, ''tarut'', ) and formerly spelt (''tarup''). The earliest evidence of this term dates to the
Bagan Era The Kingdom of Pagan ( my, ပုဂံခေတ်, , ; also known as the Pagan Dynasty and the Pagan Empire; also the Bagan Dynasty or Bagan Empire) was the first Burmese kingdom to unify the regions that would later constitute modern-da ...
, in the 13th century, during which it referred to the territory and a variety of peoples to the north and northeast of Myanmar. Various scholars have proposed that it comes from the Chinese term for "Turk" (突厥, ''Tūjué'' / ''tú jué''); from the name of Dali (大理國, ''Dàlǐguó''), the capital of the
Kingdom of Nanzhao Nanzhao (, also spelled Nanchao, ) was a dynastic kingdom that flourished in what is now southern China and northern Southeast Asia during the 8th and 9th centuries. It was centered on present-day Yunnan in China. History Origins Nanzha ...
; a Chinese corruption of the term ''Dàyuèzhī'' (大月支 or 大月氏), a Chinese term referring to Mongol-speaking Kushan Huns. The adoption of ''Tayoke'' as an exonym for the
Han Chinese The Han Chinese () or Han people (), are an East Asian ethnic group native to China. They constitute the world's largest ethnic group, making up about 18% of the global population and consisting of various subgroups speaking distinctiv ...
was not an established practice until the 19th century. In the 1940s and 1950s, the term ''paukphaw'' (, ) was co-opted as an affectionate term for the Chinese, and is now typically used in the context of diplomatic ties between China and Myanmar. The term itself purportedly originates from a Burmese myth about the Chinese and Burmese peoples as being descendants of the same parents, a dragon princess and a sun god. In the Mon language, the Chinese are known as ''Krawk'' (, ); in Shan, they are called ''Khe'' (, ). In the
Wa language Wa (Va) is an Austroasiatic language spoken by the Wa people of Myanmar and China. There are three distinct varieties, sometimes considered separate languages; their names in ''Ethnologue'' are Parauk, the majority and standard form; Vo ( Zhen ...
, spoken in the borderlands between Yunnan Province and
Shan State Shan State ( my, ရှမ်းပြည်နယ်, ; shn, မိူင်းတႆး, italics=no) also known by the endonyms Shanland, Muang Tai, and Tailong, is a state of Myanmar. Shan State borders China (Yunnan) to the north, Laos ( ...
, the word for Chinese is ''Hox/Hawx'', pronounced .


Ancestral origins

The Hakkas, Hokkiens and Cantonese comprised 45 per cent of the ethnic Chinese population. The Yunnanese comprised 30 to 40 per cent of the ethnic Chinese population.


Hokkien

* Hokkiens ( Burmese: ''eingyi shay'', or ''let shay'', , ) from
Fujian Province Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its cap ...
. Most of the Hokkien were traders.


Cantonese

* Cantonese ( Burmese: ''eingyi to'', or ''let to'', , ) from Central Guangdong Province. Most migrants from Guangdong Province were artisans.


Hakkas

* Hakkas ( Burmese: ''zaka'', , ) from Fujian and Guangdong provinces. The Hakkas are further subdivided into those with ancestry from Fujian Province and Guangdong Province, called ''eingyi shay haka'' () and ''eingyi to haka'' () respectively.


Kokang

In Upper Myanmar and Shan Hills, the Kokang people predominate there.


Panthay

The
Panthay Panthays () form a group of Chinese Muslims in Burma. Some people refer to Panthays as the oldest group of Muslims in Burma. The exact proportion of the Chinese Muslim group in the local Chinese population remains unknown due to a lack of data. H ...
have long been considered distinct from the
Han Chinese The Han Chinese () or Han people (), are an East Asian ethnic group native to China. They constitute the world's largest ethnic group, making up about 18% of the global population and consisting of various subgroups speaking distinctiv ...
diaspora community. They are Chinese Muslims who are called
Hui The Hui people ( zh, c=, p=Huízú, w=Hui2-tsu2, Xiao'erjing: , dng, Хуэйзў, ) are an East Asian ethnoreligious group predominantly composed of Chinese-speaking adherents of Islam. They are distributed throughout China, mainly in the n ...
in China. Finally, there are the ''tayoke kabya'' () of mixed Chinese and indigenous Burmese parentage. The ''kabya'' (, meaning "mixed heritage") have a tendency to follow the customs of the Chinese more than of the Burmese. Indeed, ''tayoke kabya'' who follow Burmese customs are absorbed into and largely indistinguishable from mainstream Burmese society. A large portion of Burmese Chinese is thought to have some ''kabya'' blood, possibly because immigrants could acquire Burmese citizenship through intermarriage with the indigenous Burmese peoples.


Socioeconomics


Education

The Burmese Chinese place a high importance on education and represent a disproportionately high share of those with advanced (medical, engineering or doctorate) degrees in Myanmar. The figure would be higher still had it not been for the longstanding ban on those without Burmese citizenship from pursuing advanced degrees when Ne Win instigated the 1982 Citizenship Law further restricted Burmese citizenship for Burmese Chinese (as it stratified citizenship into three categories: full, associate, and naturalised) and severely limited Burmese Chinese, especially those without full citizenship and those holding FRCs, from attending professional tertiary schools, including medical, engineering, agricultural and economics institutions. Many wealthy Sino-Burmese families send their children to the city's English language schools for primary and secondary education and Chinese and Singaporean Universities for education. Presently, many wealthy Burmese Chinese send their children overseas — in particular to
Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
,
Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
and
Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...
, for advanced studies.
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
is also a major destination, as the Taiwanese government offers aid and scholarship incentives to 'returning' overseas Chinese to study and settle there. Until vast nationalisation by the Ne Win's government happened in 1963, most Burmese Chinese were enrolled in schools where Mandarin Chinese was the medium of instruction with Burmese as a second language. Notable Chinese schools at that time include: * Burma-Chinese High School (緬甸華僑中學) * Nanyang High School (緬甸南洋中學)- now Basic Education High School No. 2 Bahan * Rangoon Chinese Elementary School (仰光華僑小學) * Kee Mei Elementary School (仰光集美小學)


Employment

Historically, Burmese Chinese have made their livelihoods as merchants, traders, and shopkeepers as well as manual labourers such as
indentured labourers Indentured servitude is a form of labor in which a person is contracted to work without salary for a specific number of years. The contract, called an " indenture", may be entered "voluntarily" for purported eventual compensation or debt repayment ...
(pejoratively called "coolies"); dockers, municipal workers, rickshaw men, and pony cart drivers. They were also heavily represented in certain professions such as civil servants, university lecturers, pharmacists, opticians, lawyers, engineers, and doctors.


Trade and industry

Like much of Southeast Asia, Chinese entrepreneurs
dominate The Dominate, also known as the late Roman Empire, is the name sometimes given to the " despotic" later phase of imperial government in the ancient Roman Empire. It followed the earlier period known as the "Principate". Until the empire was reuni ...
Burmese commerce at every level of society. Entrepreneurial savvy Chinese have literally taken over Burma's entire economy. Burmese Chinese wield tremendous economic clout and influence over their indigenous Burman majority counterparts and play a critical role in maintaining the country's economic vitality and prosperity. Entire Chinese enclaves have sprung up in major cities across the country. Burmese Chinese a disproportionate wealthy, market-dominant minority not only form a distinct ethnic community, they also form, by and large, an economically advantaged social class: the commercial middle and upper class in contrast to the poorer indigenous Burmese majority working and underclass around them. Mandalay is now the economic and financial nerve center of Upper Myanmar and is considered the epicenter of Burmese Chinese business culture. An influx of poor Han Chinese immigrants, mostly from the Yunnan province have continuously increased the dynamics of the economy throughout the entire nation and transformed Mandalay into the prosperous trading center that it is today. Established Burmese businessmen of Chinese ancestry continue to remain at the helm of Myanmar's economy, where the Han Chinese minority have been transformed almost overnight into a garishly distinctive prosperous business community. Much of the influx of foreign investment capital into the Burmese economy has been backed by expatriate mainland and overseas Chinese investors and channelled through Overseas Chinese business networks for new startup companies and foreign business acquisitions. Many members of the Burmese Chinese business community act as operating agents, doing business and investment biddings for mainland and overseas Chinese investors outside of Burma. In 1988, the
State Law and Order Restoration Council State may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * '' State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State * ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States * ''Our ...
(SLORC) came to power, and gradually loosened the government's role in the economy, encouraging private sector growth and foreign investment. This liberalisation of the state's role in the economy, if slight and uneven, nonetheless gave Chinese-owned Burmese businesses extra space to expand and ultimately assert their economic clout. Today, virtually all of Burma's retail, wholesale, and shipping outlets are Chinese-owned. For example, Sein Gayha, a major Burmese retailer that began in Yangon's Chinatown in 1985, is owned by a Burmese family of Hakka ancestry. Moreover, Burmese businessmen of Chinese ancestry control the nations four of the five largest commercial banks, Myanmar Universal Bank, Yoma Bank, Myanmar Mayflower Bank, and the Asia Wealth Bank. As the indigenous Bamars were known for their graceful hospitality towards non-Burmese ethnics, newly settled Han Chinese immigrants following Burma's acceptance of free-market capitalism in the latter part of 1988 began to capitalise on new business opportunities that the Chinese were well known for specialising in. Multivarieted businesses that have sprung up include Chinese-style patisseries and bakeries, noodle shops, watch repair, cosmetic shops, and grocery stores which soon at the forefront became the nerve-centers of economic life across various small towns in Burma. As the Chinese immigrants became more ambitious with regards to their business activities, they began to seek and conduct more aggressive entrepreneurial and investment activities by venturing out into business opportunities that were thought to be more vastly profitable, such as liquour stores and pawn brokerage shops. Today, Burma's Chinese community is now at the forefront of opening up the country's economy to conduct foreign business and direct investment, especially catering it towards mainland China and other Overseas Chinese businesspeople and investors as an international Overseas Chinese economic outpost. Beijing has been very proactive in engaging with the Overseas Chinese business community and using China's soft power to help Burma's Chinese community stay close to their ancestral roots in order to foster business ties. Much of the foreign investment from mainland China now entering Myanmar is being channelled through Overseas Chinese bamboo networks. Many members of the Burmese Chinese business community often act as agents for expatriate and Overseas Chinese investors outside of Myanmar. Chinese entrepreneurs have been increasingly involved in Mandalay's economy since the imposition of sanctions by the United States and the European Union in the 1990s. During Burma's open-door immigration policy in the 1990s, Mandalay became the most attractive destination for massive Chinese migration and newly settled Han Chinese immigrants. With the onset of
economic liberalisation Economic liberalization (or economic liberalisation) is the lessening of government regulations and restrictions in an economy in exchange for greater participation by private entities. In politics, the doctrine is associated with classical liber ...
and the rise of
free market In economics, a free market is an economic system in which the prices of goods and services are determined by supply and demand expressed by sellers and buyers. Such markets, as modeled, operate without the intervention of government or any ot ...
capitalism in Burma, members of the Chinese community gravitated towards business and adhere to the Chinese paradigm of
guanxi ''Guanxi'' () is a term used in Chinese culture to describe an individual's social network of mutually beneficial personal and business relationships. The character ''guan'', 关, means “closed” while the character ''xi'' 系 means “system ...
which is based on the importance of having contacts, relationships, and connections as ingredients for entrepreneurial and investment success. Following Burma's new market transformation, Han Chinese immigrants from Yunnan were able to obtain identity papers on the black market to become naturalised Burmese citizens overnight. Identity cards were not only used for new Chinese immigrants to stay indefinitely, but to also bypass legal barriers on foreign ownership of businesses such as hotels, shops, and restaurants. A substantial increase in foreign direct investment has poured in from mainland China with much of the capital ending up in Burma's real estate sector and mainland Chinese immigrant investors have been able to circumvent the foreign ownership ban as many of them were able to obtain Myanmar identity cards via bribery or marriage to a Myanmar national through intermediaries who themselves are Burmese citizens of Chinese ancestry. Retail stores were opened by Chinese entrepreneurs, whose business interests ranged from cement mixing to financial services as ambitious Chinese entrepreneurs and investors have literally taken over the economies of Yangon and Mandalay and turned them into the prosperous business and financial centers that they are today. As Mandalay became more economically prosperous, large influxes of Han Chinese immigrants have continued to settle there as their prime choice of destination since the 19th century, resulting a sinification of the entire city. The transformation of Mandalay into a booming modern metropolis filled with foreign businesses and gem trading centers occurred under the auspices of the entrepreneurial Chinese minority. Many Chinese-owned and operated Burmese businesses such as trading cooperatives, market stalls, food joints, medicine shops, hotels, and gem shops have also flourished. Today, virtually all of Mandalay's and Yangon's retail shops, hotels, restaurants, financial services providers, and prime residential and commercial real estate are under Chinese hands. Prime real estate in key sites in Mandalay have been entirely acquired by wealthy Chinese businessmen and investors. As new Han Chinese migrant investors came into Myanmar flush with vast amounts of capital, shrewdly investing it in various businesses including wholesale marketing, gold and jewellery shops, hotels, restaurants, real estate, and jade mining. Mandalay's 100,000 strong Chinese population comprise ten per cent of the city's entire population yet own all of Mandalay's retail gold shops, gemstone mining concessions, foreign business offices, and timber trading companies surrounded by the large Chinese-owned Victorian villas scattered on the city outskirts left behind by the British colonialists. Gemstones and gold bars are among the many the goods sold on the Burmese commodities market and represent a key focus commodity of value by many Chinese expatriate entrepreneurs and investors. Foreign buyers of jade and gems have been flocking to the city of Mandalay, with clients from Hong Kong continuing to be the main customers. Mandalay has been virtually sinicised economically and culturally, to the resentment of indigenous Burmese, who have been entirely displaced into poverty-stricken shantytowns in economic submission. About 50 per cent of the land plots in Downtown Mandalay are controlled by the Chinese. Whenever a large commercial real estate project, such as a hotel or shopping center is about to be constructed, the project is typically under the hands of a Chinese real estate entrepreneur. In addition, more than 50 per cent of the economic activity generated in Downtown Mandalay is derived from the eclipsing plethora of Chinese-owned shops, hotels, restaurants, and showrooms that predominate the area. About 80 per cent of the hotels and guesthouses, more than 70 per cent of the restaurants, more than 45 per cent of gold and jewellery shops, about 30 per cent of jade and gemstone trading, and nearly 100 per cent of the sale centers for mainland Chinese-made commodities in Mandalay are owned and operated by Chinese. Henceforth, Han Chinese entrepreneurs have acquired all of the central Mandalay's economic crown jewels and have been disproportionately responsible for generating much of the city's output of business activity relative to their small population size. In Central Mandalay, about 80 per cent or four out of five gold and jewellery shops are Chinese-owned. In addition, all of Mandalay's shopping malls and hotels were entirely built and owned by Chinese construction and real estate development companies. Besides Mandalay's immense commercial business output that has been largely responsible by the Burmese Chinese business community, their activities have also been amplified with the additional investment facilitation by expatriate mainland and Overseas Chinese entrepreneurs via the bamboo network. Wherewith the augmented investment support patronised by expatriate mainland and Overseas Chinese investors have economically revitalised and continued to overshadow Mandalay's central business district. In addition, the apparent influence of mainland China is also ostensibly felt throughout the city, where the local inhabitants have alluded to Mandalay as a "
Chinese city According to the administrative divisions of the People's Republic of China there are three levels of cities, namely provincial-level (consists of municipalities ), prefecture-level cities, and county-level cities. As of June 2020 the PRC has ...
" dominated by an inflow of international expatriate mainland and Overseas Chinese capital, with much of it invested in hotels, restaurants, and bars. Mandalay's other major industries include sports where the nation's popularity of soccer has sprung across the city. The Burmese soccer club,
Yadanabon FC Yadanarbon Football Club ( my, ရတနာပုံ ဘောလုံး အသင်း ) is a Burmese professional football club based at the Bahtoo Stadium in Mandalay. The club was a founding member of the Myanmar National League in 2009. ...
represents the city in the Myanmar National League, making it the nation's first professional soccer league. The strong economic clout exerted by the Chinese in Mandalay, Yangon, and other parts of northern Burma has entirely displaced indigenous Burmans into poverty-stricken ghetto shantytowns on the outskirts of major Burmese cities. Artisan goods manufactured historically by indigenous Burmans have been entirely displaced by inexpensive Chinese consumer goods such as textiles, machinery, and electronics in terms of quality and price. Areas such as tapestry weaving, gold leaf carving, furniture crafting, and precious stone polishing which was historically a source of livelihood for indigenous Burman artisans have been entirely taken over by the Chinese. Many artisan products historically produced by the indigenous Burmans have been entirely displaced by cheaper Chinese imports and higher quality Chinese-made products. Burmese entrepreneurs of Chinese ancestry dominate every major Burmese artisan business and industry sector including silk weaving, tapestry, jade cutting and polishing, stone and wood carving, making marble and bronze Buddha images, food products, temple ornaments and paraphernalia, the working of gold leaves and of silver, garments, pharmaceuticals, match manufacturing, brewing, and distilling. Burmese entrepreneurs of Chinese ancestry have also established heavy industry joint ventures with many large mainland Chinese conglomerates. These industries include shipbuilding, copper, nickel, oil and natural gas, cement, base metals, coal, fertilizers, jet fuel, industrial minerals, kerosene, steel, tin, tungsten, agricultural processing, forestry, airlines, wood and wood products, teak logging, timber, rice, construction and building materials, machinery, transport equipment, and plastics. Chinese-made consumer electronics, beer, and fashion are also large industries. In Yangon, the Hokkien community have cornered small and medium-sized family businesses in teak logging, rice, bean and legume trading, and cooking oil production while the Cantonese community are well known for their niches in the small-scale manufacturing of handicrafts and similar artisan retail products. Between 1895 and 1930, Chinese-owned Burmese businesses were initially concentrated within three sectors: Brokerage, manufacturing, and contracting. Under British colonial rule, the Chinese share of the businesses was reduced significantly from 28.5 to 10 per cent in manufacturing, 26.6 to 1.8 per cent in brokerage, and 31 to 4.3 per cent in contracting while Burmese Indians improved their economic positions significantly and controlled a larger proportion of the businesses within the three sectors. Other major sectors between 1895 and 1930 that declined included banking and money-lending, dropping from 33.3 per cent to zero. Trading changed from 13.3 to 12.6 per cent. Similar drops in market share occurred in the import-export trade, extraction, distribution-supply, and business partnerships. However, the Chinese share in milling increased from 0 to 4.5 per cent, agents from 13.3 to 15.6 per cent, shopkeeping from 6.7 to 18.3 per cent, and merchanting from 12.3 to 13.1 per cent. Of the 47 rice mills in Burma, 13 per cent of them were Chinese controlled and were utilised for rice exportation and processing by Chinese rice merchants. During the last few decades of the 19th century, the Chinese turned to rural money-lending as an additive business and investment revenue stream. Burmese businessmen of Chinese ancestry also ran illicit opium and gambling dens, teahouses, liquor stores, and also acted as agents for the production, sale, and export of petroleum and natural gas products. As Burmese Chinese entrepreneurs became more financially prosperous, they often coalesced their financial resources and pooled large sums of seed capital together to forge joint business ventures with expatriate mainland and overseas Chinese businessmen and investors from all over the world. Like other Southeast Asian businesses owned by those of Chinese ancestry, Chinese-owned businesses in Burma often make corporate partnerships with Greater Chinese and other Overseas Chinese businesses across the globe to focus on new business opportunities to collaborate and concentrate on. However, most Burmese businessmen and investors have voluntarily chosen to stay in Burma or have concentrated their efforts on surrounding Southeast Asian markets such as
Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
,
Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...
, and
Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
as well as the Greater Chinese market including
mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...
,
Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...
,
Macau Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a p ...
, and
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
. Many Burmese entrepreneurs of Chinese ancestry also have friends and extended family members in mainland China, as China's economic reform since the late 1970s have produced auspicious conditions for them to support their goal of wealth accumulation by introducing the wholesale market of Chinese-made products into Burma and other Southeast Asian markets. Besides sharing a common ancestry, cultural, linguistic, and familial ties, many Burmese entrepreneurs and investors of Chinese ancestry are particular strong adherents of the Confucian paradigm of
interpersonal relationships The concept of interpersonal relationship involves social associations, connections, or affiliations between two or more people. Interpersonal relationships vary in their degree of intimacy or self-disclosure, but also in their duration, in t ...
when doing business with each other, as the Chinese believed that the underlying source for entrepreneurial and investment success relied on the cultivation of personal relationships. Moreover, Burmese businesses that are Chinese-owned also form a part of the larger bamboo network, a business network of Overseas Chinese firms operating in the markets of Greater China and Southeast Asia that share common family, ethnic, linguistic, and cultural ties. For the Chinese community, business success and entrepreneurial dynamism is attributed towards a confluence of being flexible and adaptable towards changing business environments and economic climates, an intense desire to acquire wealth, networking skills, calculative risk-taking, scientific and technological skills, ability to think logically, rationally, and prudentially in a business setting, an ability to sell and market, exercising impulse control to delay instant gratification, frugality, a strong work ethic, trustworthiness, creativity, making the most of the opportunities when they present themselves, looking towards the future, and upholding family honour. Legal two-way trade between Burma and mainland China reached US$1.5 billion annually by 1988 and additional Chinese trade, investment, economic, and military aid was sought to invigorate and jumpstart the re-emerging Burmese economy. In order for the Chinese community to secure and protect their economic interests, the Burmese Chinese Chamber of Commerce serves as a guild, association, business nerve center, and lobby group as a lookout for local Burmese businessmen and investors of Chinese ancestry. The Malaysian business magnate and investor
Robert Kuok Robert Kuok Hock Nien (; Hokchew: ''Guoh24 Houk5 Nieng55''; born 6 October 1923), is a Malaysian business magnate and investor. Since 1973, Kuok has lived in Hong Kong. According to ''Forbes'', his net worth is estimated at $12.6 billion as of ...
converted Mandalay and Yangon into the largest economic hubs for Burmese, mainland, and overseas Chinese business networking and large-scale corporate deal-making in Burma. For smaller businesses and newer start-ups, many self-employed Chinese street peddlers and retail hawkers make a great living selling cheap bicycle tires imported from China. The Han Chinese who dominate Burma's jade industry have been the chief driving force behind Burma's gem mining industry and jade exports. Private gem mining is a huge industry in Burma with many of the concessionaires being controlled by Burmese entrepreneurs of Chinese ancestry. At present, Burma's booming gem industry is completely under Chinese hands at every level, from the financiers, concession operators, all the way to the retail merchants that own scores of newly opened gem markets. One Chinese-owned jeweller reportedly controls 100 gem mines and produces over 2,000 kilograms of raw rubies annually. Since the privatisation of the gem industry during the 1990s, Burmese jewellers and entrepreneurs of Chinese ancestry have transformed Burma's gem industry into new retail jewellery shops, selling coveted pieces of expensive jewellery to customers mainly hailing from Hong Kong and Taiwan. One high-profile incident occurred in June 2011, where a gem market was forced to be shut down after a fight embroiled a group of Chinese and Burmese merchants over a business deal that went sour. Allegedly, the Burmese and Chinese merchants were embroiled in a fight over a deal that was worth US$5,300. Burmese entrepreneurs of Chinese ancestry are not just dominant in the
big business Big business involves large-scale corporate-controlled financial or business activities. As a term, it describes activities that run from "huge transactions" to the more general "doing big things". In corporate jargon, the concept is commonly ...
sector, but also in the small and medium-sized business sector. Small and medium-sized enterprises that the Chinese have dominated include selling bicycle tires, auto parts, electrical equipment, textiles, precious metals, machinery, ironmongery, hardware, printing and bookbinding, books and stationery, paper and printing ink, tailoring, laundromats, dry-cleaning, jewellery, language training and tutoring, and money exchanges. Beauty parlors, construction sites, mobile phone sale centers, traditional Chinese medical clinics, restaurants, pubs, dry cleaners, laundromats, cafes, teahouses, casinos, gambling dens, breweries, nightclubs, hotels, and karaoke bars were also common establishments. The Chinese dominate both the legitimate trade as well as the highly lucrative illegitimate trade in opium and other unsavory drug enterprises. High-profile cases have involved the Burmese Chinese business elite such as businessman
Lo Hsing Han Lo Hsing Han or Law Sit Han ( my, လော်စစ်ဟန်, ; ; ca. 1930s – July 6, 2013) was a Burmese businessman and drug trafficker. He later became a major business tycoon across Burma, with financial ties to Singapore. He was an eth ...
and politician Kyaw Win, who have continued to control Burma's major banks, airlines, teak logging companies, and gemstone mining concessions. Lo's son, Steven Law is also a prominent businessman well known for being at the helm of Burma's largest conglomerate company
Asia World Asia World Group ( my, အာရှဓန ကုမ္ပဏီ) is a Burmese conglomerate. It is Myanmar's largest and most diversified conglomerate, with interests in industrial development, construction, transportation, import-export, and a lo ...
, whose investments include a container shipping operator, port buildings, and toll road authorities. Law also has business interests in sports, where he is the majority owner of
Magway FC Magwe Football Club ( my, မကွေးဘောလုံးအသင်း) is a Myanmar Professional football club, based at Magwe, Myanmar. The club represents the Magway Region of Central Myanmar. At the founded time, the name of club is Ma ...
, a Burmese soccer team. Law also has holding's in Burma's gem industry where it is valued at an estimated $600 million. His other holdings include numerous valuable ruby concessions as well as a stake in a mining concession situated near the Burmese town of Phakent. Given Law's notoriety in Burmese business circles, his conglomerate is also the most popular business partner for foreign investors looking to invest in Burma's private gem industry. An influx of foreign capital investment from mainland China, Germany, and France has led to the development of new potential construction projects across Burma. Mainland China's outpouring of investment into the country has flooded the Burmese economy with plenty of cheap Chinese goods and services, in addition, to providing financial backing for new startup infrastructure projects. Many of these infrastructure projects are in the hands of Chinese construction contractors and civil engineers with large scale construction undertakings of various classifications such as irrigation dams, highways, bridges, ground satellite stations, and an international airport for Mandalay. Burmese entrepreneurs of Chinese ancestry have also established numerous joint ventures and corporate partnerships with mainland Chinese State-owned enterprises for the construction of oil pipelines that potentially could create thousands of jobs in Burma. Private Chinese companies, many of which range from small to medium-sized businesses rely on the established Overseas Chinese bamboo network as an outlet between mainland China and Burmese Chinese entrepreneurs and investors to conduct trade between the two countries. mainland China is now Burma's most important source of foreign goods and services as well as one of the most important sources of capital for foreign direct investment in the country, accounting for 61 per cent of all foreign direct investment from 2013 to 2014. Between 2007 and 2015, China's investment in Burma increased from US$775 million to US$21.867 billion accounting for 40 per cent of all foreign direct investments in the country. Between 2009 and 2012, Burma was the second-largest Southeast Asian recipient of Chinese foreign direct investment capital after Singapore with much of the capital making its way into Burma's energy and mining industries. Chinese state-owned enterprises account for 57 per cent of all foreign firms operating in Burma and are primarily involved in the oil and gas, power, and mineral sectors while private firms that engage in licit and illicit trade account for a majority of foreign investment in Burma's domestic economy. Chinese structural power over Burma's structure of finance also provides China with a dominant position within the country's natural resource sector, primarily Burma's latent oil, gas, and uranium sectors. Its position galvanises China's position as Burma's primary investor and consumer of its extractive industries, which accounts for a majority of mainland China's investment holdings. Many Chinese investors have realised that it has been more advantageous for them to invest in Burma's mining, lumber, and energy sectors as a number of them have set their sights on Burma's high-value natural resource industries such as raw jade stones, teak and timber, rice, and marine fishery industries as potential target investments of choice. As Chinese economic might grew, much of the indigenous Burmese majority have gradually been driven out into poorer land on the hills, on the outskirts of major Burmese cities or into the mountains. Disenchantment grew among the displaced indigenous Burmese hill tribes who felt they were unable compete with Chinese-owned businesses in a free market capitalist system. During the Burmese property boom in the 1990s, Chinese real estate investors began building and speculating as property values doubled and tripled, which resulted indigenous Burmese being pushed further away from their native homes and displaced into the outskirts of major Burmese cities towards impoverished shantytowns. Underlying resentment and bitterness from the impoverished Burmese majority has been accumulating as there has been no existence of indigenous Burmese having any substantial business equity in Burma. The increased economic clout held in the hands of the Chinese in Burma has triggered distrust, envy, resentment and anti-Chinese hostility among the indigenous Burmese majority. Decades of free market liberalisation brought virtually no economic benefit to the indigenous Burmese majority but rather the opposite resulting a subjugated indigenous Burmese majority underclass, many of whom still engage in menial labour, rural peasantry or illegal teak smuggling to make ends meet in a stark socioeconomic contrast to their modern, wealthier, and cosmopolitan middle and upper class Chinese counterparts. Thousands of displaced Burmese hill tribes and aborigines live in satellite shantytowns on the outskirts of Mandalay in economic destitution, with the glaring wealth disparity and abject poverty among the indigenous Burmese aborigines has resulted hostility blaming their socioeconomic ills on foreign domination, exploitation, and looting of their country by a relative handful of outsiders, namely Chinese.


Culture


Language

Most Burmese Chinese speak Burmese in their daily life. Those with higher education also speak Standard Chinese and/or
English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...
. The use of Chinese dialects still prevails.
Hokkien The Hokkien () variety of Chinese is a Southern Min language native to and originating from the Minnan region, where it is widely spoken in the south-eastern part of Fujian in southeastern mainland China. It is one of the national languages ...
(a dialect of
Min Nan Southern Min (), Minnan ( Mandarin pronunciation: ) or Banlam (), is a group of linguistically similar and historically related Sinitic languages that form a branch of Min Chinese spoken in Fujian (especially the Minnan region), most of Taiwan ...
from Quanzhou,
Zhangzhou Zhangzhou (), alternately romanized as Changchow, is a prefecture-level city in Fujian Province, China. The prefecture around the city proper comprises the southeast corner of the province, facing the Taiwan Strait and surrounding the prefect ...
and Jinjiang) and
Taishanese Taishanese (), alternatively romanized in Cantonese as Toishanese or Toisanese, in local dialect as Hoisanese or Hoisan-wa, is a dialect of Yue Chinese native to Taishan, Guangdong. Although it is related to Cantonese, Taishanese has littl ...
(a Yue dialect akin to Cantonese) from
Taishan __NOTOC__ Taishan may refer to: *Mount Tai or Taishan (), Shandong, China * Taishan District, Tai'an (), named after the Mount Tai, a district in Tai'an, Shandong, China *Taishan, Guangdong (), a county-level city of Jiangmen, Guangdong, China ** G ...
and
Xinhui Xinhui, alternately romanized as Sunwui and also known as Kuixiang, is an urban district of Jiangmen in Guangdong, China. It grew from a separate city founded at the confluence of the Tan and West Rivers. It has a population of about 735,50 ...
are mostly used in Yangon as well as in Lower Myanmar, while Yunnanese Mandarin is well preserved in Upper Myanmar. Although General Ne Win's rule (1962–1988) enacted the ban on Chinese-language schools that caused a decline of Mandarin speakers, the number of Chinese schools is growing again. (Note: Standard Chinese refers to the national language of the PRC and
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
, distinct from the Southwestern Mandarin dialect of the
Upper Myanmar Upper Myanmar ( my, အထက်မြန်မာပြည်, also called Upper Burma) is a geographic region of Myanmar, traditionally encompassing Mandalay and its periphery (modern Mandalay, Sagaing, Magway Regions), or more broadly speak ...
,
Kokang Kokang ( my, ကိုးကန့်; ) is a region in Myanmar (Burma). It is located in the northern part of Shan State, with the Salween River to its west, and sharing a border with China's Yunnan Province to the east. Its total land area i ...
and
Panthay Panthays () form a group of Chinese Muslims in Burma. Some people refer to Panthays as the oldest group of Muslims in Burma. The exact proportion of the Chinese Muslim group in the local Chinese population remains unknown due to a lack of data. H ...
). At the end of 2012,
Mizzima News Mizzima News ( my, မဇ္ဈိမသတင်း, Ma.jjhi.ma.) is a Burmese multimedia news organisation. It was established in August 1998 by a group of Burmese journalists in exile in New Delhi. The International Press Institute awarded Mi ...
reported that an increasing number of young Burmese Chinese are expressing interest in Chinese language, taking language courses even when their parents don't understand Chinese. However, this trend is not necessarily indicative of an interest in joining Chinese community or cultural organisations, as many of their parents did. Groups like the Myanmar Overseas Young Chinese League report a lack of interest from Burmese Chinese youth.


Religion

Most Burmese Chinese practice
Theravada Buddhism ''Theravāda'' () ( si, ථේරවාදය, my, ထေရဝါဒ, th, เถรวาท, km, ថេរវាទ, lo, ເຖຣະວາດ, pi, , ) is the most commonly accepted name of Buddhism's oldest existing school. The school' ...
, while incorporating some
Mahayana Buddhist ''Mahāyāna'' (; "Great Vehicle") is a term for a broad group of Buddhist traditions, texts, philosophies, and practices. Mahāyāna Buddhism developed in India (c. 1st century BCE onwards) and is considered one of the three main existing br ...
and
Taoist Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Tao ...
beliefs including
ancestral worship The veneration of the dead, including one's ancestors, is based on love and respect for the deceased. In some cultures, it is related to beliefs that the dead have a continued existence, and may possess the ability to influence the fortune of t ...
. There are also some prominent Theravadin Buddhist meditation teacher of Chinese descent like
Sayadaw U Tejaniya Sayadaw U Tejaniya ( my, ဆရာတော် ဦးတေဇနိယ) is a Theravādin Buddhist monk of Chinese descent and the meditation teacher at the Shwe Oo Min Dhamma Sukha Forest Center in Yangon, Myanmar whose teachings have attrac ...
. There are several notable Chinese temples situated in Yangon, including
Fushan Temple Fushan Temple (; my, ကုက္ကိုင်းဘုရားကျောင်း; also called Fu Shan Si or Fu Sun Si), located on Kaba Aye Pagoda Road in Bahan Township, Yangon, is a Chinese temple founded in January 1875 by overseas Chi ...
(dedicated to Qingshui Zhushi),
Kheng Hock Keong Temple The Kheng Hock Temple, also known as the Kheng Hock Keong (慶福宮), is the largest and oldest temple to the Chinese sea-goddess Mazu in Yangon, Burma. It is located on the corner of Sintodan Street and Strand Road in Latha Township. Kheng H ...
(dedicated to Mazu) and
Guanyin Gumiao Temple Guanyin Gumiao Temple (, also known as the Guangdong Guanyin Temple) is one of two major Chinese temples located within Latha Township in Yangon's Chinatown. It was founded by the Cantonese community of Yangon in 1823, but was destroyed by a fir ...
(dedicated to
Guanyin Guanyin () is a Bodhisattva associated with compassion. She is the East Asian representation of Avalokiteśvara ( sa, अवलोकितेश्वर) and has been adopted by other Eastern religions, including Chinese folk religion. She ...
). The minority
Panthay Panthays () form a group of Chinese Muslims in Burma. Some people refer to Panthays as the oldest group of Muslims in Burma. The exact proportion of the Chinese Muslim group in the local Chinese population remains unknown due to a lack of data. H ...
or
Chinese Muslims Islam has been practiced in China since the 7th century CE.. Muslims are a minority group in China, representing 1.6-2 percent of the total population (21,667,000- 28,210,795) according to various estimates. Though Hui Muslims are the most nume ...
(回教華人; , lit. "little flowers") originated from Yunnan are mainly Muslim.


Names

The Burmese Chinese have Burmese names and many also have
Chinese names Chinese names or Chinese personal names are names used by individuals from Greater China and other parts of the Chinese-speaking world throughout East and Southeast Asia (ESEA). In addition, many names used in Japan, Korea and Vietnam are often ...
. Given names in various Chinese dialects are often transliterated into the
Burmese language Burmese ( my, မြန်မာဘာသာ, MLCTS: ''mranmabhasa'', IPA: ) is a Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Myanmar (also known as Burma), where it is an official language, lingua franca, and the native language of the Burmans, the coun ...
, using phonetic transcriptions or translated. For example, a Burmese Chinese person named 'Khin Aung' may have the Chinese name of 慶豐 ( Hokkien POJ: Khèng-hong), with '慶' ( Hokkien POJ: khèng) corresponding to 'Khin', and '豐' ( Hokkien POJ: hong) corresponding to 'Aung'. However, variations of transcription do exist (between dialects), and some Burmese Chinese do not choose to adopt similar-sounding Burmese and Chinese names. Because the Burmese lack surnames, many Burmese Chinese tend to pass on portions of their
given names A given name (also known as a forename or first name) is the part of a personal name quoted in that identifies a person, potentially with a middle name as well, and differentiates that person from the other members of a group (typically a f ...
to future generations, for the purpose of denoting lineage. According to publications of Long Shan Tang, a clan association based in Yangon, the ten most common Chinese surnames in Yangon are: # Lee/Li (李) # Peng/Pang (彭) # Shi/See/Si (時) # Dong/Tung (董) # Min/Man (閔) # Niu/Ngau (牛) # Pian/Pin (邊) # Hsin (辛) # Kwan (關) # Khaw (許) In
Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...
, the majority of Chinese surnames are Lim 林, Tan 陈, Yang 杨, Lee 李, Chou 周, Wang 王, Chang 张, Su 苏, Huang 黄, Yeh 叶, Hsu 许, Fang 方 and Wu 吴


Cuisine

Burmese Chinese cuisine is based on
Chinese cuisine Chinese cuisine encompasses the numerous cuisines originating from China, as well as overseas cuisines created by the Chinese diaspora. Because of the Chinese diaspora and historical power of the country, Chinese cuisine has influenced many o ...
, particularly from
Fujian Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its cap ...
,
Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020) ...
and
Yunnan Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the C ...
provinces, with local influences. Spices such as
turmeric Turmeric () is a flowering plant, ''Curcuma longa'' (), of the ginger family, Zingiberaceae, the rhizomes of which are used in cooking. The plant is a perennial, rhizomatous, herbaceous plant native to the Indian subcontinent and Southeast ...
and chili are commonly used. Also, the use of soy sauce,
bean curd A bean is the seed of several plants in the family Fabaceae, which are used as vegetables for human or animal food. They can be cooked in many different ways, including boiling, frying, and baking, and are used in many traditional dishes thr ...
,
bean sprout Sprouting is the natural process by which seeds or spores germinate and put out shoots, and already established plants produce new leaves or buds, or other structures experience further growth. In the field of nutrition, the term signifies ...
s, Chinese pickled mustards, and dried
mushroom A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground, on soil, or on its food source. ''Toadstool'' generally denotes one poisonous to humans. The standard for the name "mushroom" is ...
s can be attributed to Chinese influence. The following is a partial list of Chinese contributions to Burmese cuisine. These are an established part of today's Burmese cuisine, and are hardly differentiated as a foreign cuisine. * Pauksi: steamed buns * Bèkin: roasted duck * Igyakway: fried Chinese doughnut * Htamin kyaw: fried rice * La mont: mooncake * Mi shay: thin rice noodle soup * Mi swan: thin wheat noodles * San byoke: rice porridge *
Panthay Panthays () form a group of Chinese Muslims in Burma. Some people refer to Panthays as the oldest group of Muslims in Burma. The exact proportion of the Chinese Muslim group in the local Chinese population remains unknown due to a lack of data. H ...
khauk swè: Panthay-style fried noodles * Sigyet khaukswè: literally "noodles laced in cooked oil," usually with chicken *
Kyay oh ''Kyay oh'' ( my, ကြေးအိုး; ) is a popular noodle soup made with pork and egg in Burmese cuisine. Fish and chicken versions are also made as well as a "dry" version without broth. ''Kyay oh'' is traditionally served in a copper po ...
: literally "beehoon soup with chicken or pork," * Kor Yay Khautswe: noodle with thick starchy gravy File:Chinatown streetside stand, Yangon.JPG, A streetside vendor in Latha Township (also known as "China Town") selling Chinese baked goods, including tikay and paste-filled buns.


History


Pre-colonial

The earliest records of Chinese migration into present-day Myanmar were in the
Song A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetit ...
and
Ming The Ming dynasty (), officially the Great Ming, was an imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1368 to 1644 following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming dynasty was the last orthodox dynasty of China ruled by the Han peop ...
dynasties. In the 18th century,
Ming Dynasty The Ming dynasty (), officially the Great Ming, was an imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1368 to 1644 following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming dynasty was the last orthodox dynasty of China ruled by the Han peo ...
princes settled in
Kokang Kokang ( my, ကိုးကန့်; ) is a region in Myanmar (Burma). It is located in the northern part of Shan State, with the Salween River to its west, and sharing a border with China's Yunnan Province to the east. Its total land area i ...
(the northern part of present-day Myanmar). Chinese traders, however, travelled as far as the capital city as well as northern towns on the Irrawaddy such as
Bhamo Bhamo ( my, ဗန်းမော်မြို့ ''ban: mau mrui.'', also spelt Banmaw; shn, မၢၼ်ႈမူဝ်ႇ; tdd, ᥛᥫᥒᥰ ᥛᥨᥝᥱ; zh, 新街, Hsinkai) is a city in Kachin State in northern Myanmar, south of the ...
. Some of them stayed and started a Chinese community at Amarapura, and when King Mindon moved his capital to Mandalay in 1859, the Chinese were the only community that decided to stay behind. Many of their descendants intermarried into the host society and remain important and respected citizens of Amarapura.


British Colonial period

Another wave of immigration occurred in the 19th century under the British colonial administration. Britain encouraged immigration of the Indians and Chinese to British Burma, and such incentives for work opportunities and enterprise and for accumulating wealth attracted many Chinese immigrants. They primarily came to Burma via British Malaya. The Chinese quickly became dominant in the highly lucrative rice and gem industries. Many Chinese merchants and traders owning both wholesale and retail businesses. Unlike in British Malaya, where most Chinese were coolie labourers, the Chinese in Burma were largely from the artisan and merchant classes. They integrated well into Burmese society not least because they, like the Bamar, were of
Sino-Tibetan Sino-Tibetan, also cited as Trans-Himalayan in a few sources, is a family of more than 400 languages, second only to Indo-European in number of native speakers. The vast majority of these are the 1.3 billion native speakers of Chinese languages. ...
stock and were Buddhists, implicit in the nickname ''pauk hpaw'' (, lit. "sibling"). During British rule, marriage between the Chinese and Burmese, particularly Chinese men and Burmese women, was the most common form of intermarriage in Burma, as evidenced by a High Court ruling on the legal status of Sino-Burmese marriages under Burmese Buddhist law. From 1935 until the end of British rule, the Chinese were represented in the colonial legislature, the House of Representatives. After
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, displaced Burmese Chinese (whose pre-war homes were in Burma), were the most numerous group of overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia to request repatriation to return to Burma, according to the
United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) was an international relief agency, largely dominated by the United States but representing 44 nations. Founded in November 1943, it was dissolved in September 1948. it became part o ...
.


Post-independence

During the 1950s, Burma was one of the first countries to recognise the
People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
as a nation. However, its own Chinese population was treated as aliens. The Burmese Chinese were issued foreign registration cards (FRC) in a tiered citizenship system adopted by the post-independence government. When the Chinese Communists expelled the
Kuomintang The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially on the Chinese mainland and in Tai ...
, many fled to
Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...
and
Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
over the borders of
Yunnan Province Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the ...
. The Burmese government fought and removed the armed KMT and forced them to
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
; those who managed to stay prospered. In the 1950s, discriminatory policies against overseas Chinese encompassed citizenship, government employment, approval for business regulations and licensing, loan extensions and permission to make remittances. In 1952,
Kheng Hock Keong Temple The Kheng Hock Temple, also known as the Kheng Hock Keong (慶福宮), is the largest and oldest temple to the Chinese sea-goddess Mazu in Yangon, Burma. It is located on the corner of Sintodan Street and Strand Road in Latha Township. Kheng H ...
publications estimated that ethnic Chinese, who lived in enclaves in the area along Sinohdan, Latha, and Maung Khaing Streets (with Cantonese typically living above Maha Bandula Road and Hokkiens living below), constituted 9.5 per cent of Rangoon's population. During this period, there was a sharp rise in the number of private Chinese language schools, primarily teaching
Mandarin Mandarin or The Mandarin may refer to: Language * Mandarin Chinese, branch of Chinese originally spoken in northern parts of the country ** Standard Chinese or Modern Standard Mandarin, the official language of China ** Taiwanese Mandarin, Stand ...
, in Burma, from 65 in 1935 to 259 in 1953 and 259 at its peak in 1962, with many such schools affiliated to the Chinese nationalist (, lit. "White Chinese") or communist (, lit. "Red Chinese") movements. However, fewer than 10 per cent of Burmese Chinese of school age attended Chinese language schools. Similarly, about 80 clan associations operated in the 1950s.


Socialist rule

In 1962, Ne Win led the Socialist coup d'état, establishing the
Revolutionary Council A workers' council or labor council is a form of political and economic organization in which a workplace or municipality is governed by a council made up of workers or their elected delegates. The workers within each council decide on what thei ...
under the
Burmese Way to Socialism The Burmese Way to Socialism ( my, မြန်မာ့နည်းမြန်မာ့ဟန် ဆိုရှယ်လစ်စနစ်), also known as the Burmese Road to Socialism, was the state ideology of the Socialist Republic of the ...
. In February 1963, the Enterprise Nationalization Law was passed, effectively nationalising all major industries and prohibiting the formation of new factories. This law adversely affected many industrialists and entrepreneurs, especially those without the full citizenship. The government's economic nationalisation program further prohibited foreigners, including the non-citizen Chinese, from owning land, sending remittances, getting business licences and practising medicine. Such policies led to the beginnings of a major exodus of Burmese Chinese to other countries—some 100,000 Chinese left Burma. Although a ''kabya'' himself, Ne Win banned Chinese-language education and created other measures to compel the Chinese to leave. Ne Win's government stoked up racial animosity and ethnic conflicts against the Indians and Chinese Burmese, who were terrorised by Burmese citizens, the most violent riots taking place in 1967. All schools were nationalised, including Chinese language schools. Beginning in 1967 and continuing throughout the 1970s, anti-Chinese riots as well as
Anti-Indian sentiment Anti-Indian sentiment, also known as Indophobia or anti-Indianism, is a modern term referring to negative feelings and hatred towards the Republic of India, Indian people, and Indian culture. Indophobia is formally defined in the context of ant ...
continued to flare up and many believed they were covertly supported by the government. Similarly, Chinese shops were looted and set on fire. Public attention was successfully diverted by Ne Win from the uncontrollable
inflation In economics, inflation is an increase in the general price level of goods and services in an economy. When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services; consequently, inflation corresponds to a reduct ...
, scarcity of consumer items and rising prices of
rice Rice is the seed of the grass species '' Oryza sativa'' (Asian rice) or less commonly ''Oryza glaberrima'' (African rice). The name wild rice is usually used for species of the genera '' Zizania'' and '' Porteresia'', both wild and domesticat ...
. The 1982 Citizenship Law further restricted Burmese citizenship for Burmese Chinese (as it stratified citizenship into three categories: full, associate, and naturalised) and severely limited Burmese Chinese, especially those without full citizenship and those holding FRCs, from attending professional tertiary schools, including medical, engineering, agricultural and economics institutions. During this period, the country's failing economy and widespread discrimination accelerated an emigration of Burmese Chinese out of Burma.


Modern era

In 1988, the
State Law and Order Restoration Council State may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * '' State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State * ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States * ''Our ...
(SLORC) came to power, and gradually loosened the government's role in the economy, encouraging private sector growth and foreign investment. This liberalisation of state's role in the economy, if slight and uneven, nonetheless gave the ethnic Chinese-led businesses extra space to expand and reassert their economic power. Today, the majority of retail, wholesale and import trade businesses are run by the Burmese Chinese today. For example, Sein Gayha (), a major retailer that began in Yangon's Chinatown in 1985, is owned by a
Hakka Chinese Hakka (, , ) forms a language group of varieties of Chinese, spoken natively by the Hakka people throughout Southern China and Taiwan and throughout the diaspora areas of East Asia, Southeast Asia and in overseas Chinese communities aroun ...
family. Moreover, four of the five largest commercial banks in Myanmar, Myanmar Universal Bank, Yoma Bank, Myanmar Mayflower Bank, and the Asia Wealth Bank, were all founded by Sino-Burmese. Today, the majority of Burmese Chinese live in the major cities of
Yangon Yangon ( my, ရန်ကုန်; ; ), formerly spelled as Rangoon, is the capital of the Yangon Region and the largest city of Myanmar (also known as Burma). Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government ...
, Mandalay,
Taunggyi Taunggyi ( ; Shan: ; Pa'O: ) is the capital and largest city of Shan State, Myanmar (Burma) and lies on the Thazi-Kyaingtong road at an elevation of , just north of Shwenyaung and Inle Lake within the Myelat region. Taunggyi is the fifth la ...
,
Bago Bago may refer to: Places Myanmar * Bago, Myanmar, a city and the capital of the Bago Region * Bago District, a district of the Bago Region * Bago Region an administrative region * Bago River, a river * Bago Yoma or Pegu Range, a mountain rang ...
, and their surrounding areas. Although there are Chinatowns (; ''tayoke tan'') in the major cities, the Chinese are widely dispersed throughout the country.
Yangon Yangon ( my, ရန်ကုန်; ; ), formerly spelled as Rangoon, is the capital of the Yangon Region and the largest city of Myanmar (also known as Burma). Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government ...
is home to nearly 100,000 Chinese. The northern region of Myanmar has seen a recent influx of
mainland Chinese Mainland Chinese or Mainlanders are Chinese people who live in or have recently emigrated from mainland China, defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (PRC) except for Hong Kong ( SAR of the PRC), Macau (SAR of the PRC), ...
migrant workers, black market traders and gamblers. In Kachin State, which borders China in three directions, Standard Chinese is the lingua franca.
Upper Myanmar Upper Myanmar ( my, အထက်မြန်မာပြည်, also called Upper Burma) is a geographic region of Myanmar, traditionally encompassing Mandalay and its periphery (modern Mandalay, Sagaing, Magway Regions), or more broadly speak ...
has seen a demographic shift resulting from the recent immigration of many Mainland Chinese to
Mandalay Region Mandalay Region ( my, မန္တလေးတိုင်းဒေသကြီး, ; formerly Mandalay Division) is an administrative division of Myanmar. It is located in the center of the country, bordering Sagaing Region and Magway Region t ...
, Shan, and Kachin States. Ethnic Chinese now constitute an estimated 30 to 40 per cent of Mandalay's population. Huge swaths of land in city centre left vacant by the fires were later illegally purchased, mostly by the
ethnic Chinese The Chinese people or simply Chinese, are people or ethnic groups identified with China, usually through ethnicity, nationality, citizenship, or other affiliation. Chinese people are known as Zhongguoren () or as Huaren () by speakers of s ...
, many of whom were recent illegal immigrants from
Yunnan Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the C ...
. The Chinese influx accelerated after the current military government came to power in 1988. With the Burmese government turning a blind eye, many Chinese immigrants in the 1990s settling in Mandalay. In the 1990s alone, about 250,000 to 300,000 Yunnanese were estimated to have migrated to Mandalay. The Mandalay's population from about 500,000 in 1980 to one million in 2008 and the percentage of local Burmese reduced to less than 50. Chinese festivals are now firmly embedded in the city's cultural calendar. The strong influx of Mainland Chinese immigrants into Mandalay coupled with the presence of strong Chinese economic clout resulted the subsequent displacement of indigenous Burmese to the outskirts of the city creating racial tensions between the two communities. There are also substantial Burmese Chinese communities outside of Myanmar, particularly in
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
,
Macau Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a p ...
,
Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...
,
Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...
,
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
(such as New York City's Henry Street) and Australia.
Zhonghe District Zhonghe District (, Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Tiong-hô Khu), also spelled Chūwa and Jhonghe, is an inner city district in New Taipei City in northern Taiwan. Geography and climate Zhonghe lies just south-west of Taipei City and shares borders with Banqia ...
, near
Taipei Taipei (), officially Taipei City, is the capital and a special municipality of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Located in Northern Taiwan, Taipei City is an enclave of the municipality of New Taipei City that sits about southwest of the ...
,
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...
is home to 40,000 Burmese Chinese (2008), one of the largest communities outside of Myanmar.


Notable Burmese Chinese

File:Gen_San_Yu.jpg, President
San Yu San Yu ( my, စန်းယု, ; 3 March 1918 – 28 January 1996) was a Burmese army general and statesman who served as the fifth president of Myanmar from 9 November 1981 to 27 July 1988. Biography San Yu, an ethnic Chinese, was born i ...
, 5th President of Burma.


See also

* China–Burma relations *
Kokang people The Kokang Chinese ( or 果敢族 (''Guǒgǎn zú''); my, ကိုးကန့်လူမျိုး) are Mandarin-speaking Han Chinese living in Kokang, Myanmar, administered as the Kokang Self-Administered Zone. Etymology The name Kokan ...
*
Thai Chinese Thai Chinese (also known as Chinese Thais, Sino-Thais), Thais of Chinese origin ( th, ชาวไทยเชื้อสายจีน; ''exonym and also domestically''), endonym Thai people ( th, ชาวไทย), are Chinese descenda ...
* Rangoon


Further reading

*


References


External links


Newidea! Myanmar information website

Burma Overseas Chinese Student Association

Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China
(Chinese-language only)
Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission, R.O.C.


of ''
The Irrawaddy ''The Irrawaddy'' () is a news website by the Irrawaddy Publishing Group (IPG), founded in 1990 by Burmese exiles living in Thailand. From its inception, ''The Irrawaddy'' has taken an independent stance on Burmese politics. As a publication pr ...
''
Home away from Home

Governing the Chinese in multi-ethnic colonial Burma between the 1890s and 1920s

Twentieth century impressions of Burma : its history, people, commerce, industries, and resources

Yeo Cheow Kaw and Rangoon Kian Teik Tong

Southeast Asian Personalities of Chinese Descent: Biographical dictionary

Chinese in Colonial Burma: A Migrant Community in A Multiethnic State
{{Overseas Chinese2
Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...