Myanmar Emerges, Promise and Peril

Myanmar Emerges is a year-long GlobalPost investigation by Patrick Winn into the challenges facing Myanmar’s nascent democracy. The 10-part series, produced in 2013, was the winner of the Robert F. Kennedy Excellence in Journalism Award.

The 30-minute documentary was filmed over the course of one year, showing life across the country in reform-era Myanmar. The documentary follows 10-year-old Zaw Lin Thu as he navigates the streets of Yangon, the British colonized city known as a Rangoon, later destroyed by a brutal military regime.

However, just outside of Zaw Lin Thu’s world, Myanmar’s new democracy is being put to the test. Rebellious monks are standing up to military untouchables; an opium war rages in the jungle; and children are slaving on the streets to survive.

Meanwhile, politicians throughout the world cheer as Myanmar claims to be leaving tyranny in the past.