The Politics of Persistence: China’s Border Government and Aid to the Communist Party of Burma, 1969–1989

This article re-examines China’s support for the Communist Party of Burma (CPB) through the historical perspective of both Chinese governments in the centre and subnational governments in the borderlands. Departing from previous interpretations that prioritise state-to-state dynamics, this study explores why the CPB endured despite the reduction of China’s official aid from the mid-1970s onwards. It highlights a significant temporal disconnect between the Chinese central government’s policies and the actions of its border government, creating ambiguity over whether to sustain, modify, or terminate support for the CPB. Drawing on multiple sources, primarily archival materials from the Yunnan Border Foreign Affairs Office, this research identifies two distinct phases of Chinese aid. From 1969 to the mid-1970s, Yunnan border counties strongly supported the CPB. However, from the mid-1970s to the 1980s, these counties adopted a pragmatic approach, marked by depoliticisation and demilitarisation, integrating CPB issues into a broader framework of border management. In response, the CPB relied on the border economy as a survival channel and leveraged border mobility regulations to maintain access to Yunnan. By examining the nonlinear temporal relationship between the central and border governments, this study reveals how informal borderland networks have historically sustained armed ethnic groups.