Thawng Za Pum

In this Enlightened Myanmar Research Foundation project, led by Thawng Za Pum, Programme Manager, the team invited representatives from civil society organisations and arts organisations from across Myanmar’s states and regions to a two-day workshop in Yangon in August 2018. The purpose of the workshop was to identify a comparative method and approach to the study of parliaments across the country. On the first day, participants shared their own research methods and experiences; from there they went on to identify a common framework, as explained in their workshop report.

Senior analysts and researchers from the Hansard Society and from SOAS University of London were invited to contribute to practical learning sessions and introduce some of the research and dissemination methods that they have used when studying parliaments in different countries. The workshop seeded plans for a comparative research project entitled ‘Audit of political engagement’ led by Myat The Thitsar, with support from a further grant from the Global Research Network on Parliaments and People.

About EMReF

Enlightened Myanmar Research Foundation (EMReF) is an independent non-profit research institution working for development of evidence-based policy making and revitalization of independent research culture in Myanmar. EMReF places a particular focus on supporting the strengthening of national and state legislatures. EMeRF conducted Performance Analysis on Local Legislatures (2010-2015), and currently distribute data on local legislatures through the MyPILAR website (www.mypilar.org) and by issuing by-weekly news bulletins on the work of state legislatures. The organisation is also working on developing the capacity to act as trainer for sub-national parliaments in various areas including parliamentary research. Currently EMReF has been working effectively parliamentary strengthening programs in partnership with Canadian Parliamentary Center under the ongoing IDRC-funded project “Building Parliamentary Research Capacity”, and SOAS (University of London) and Hansard Society (London) for a program namely Parliament for People (P4P), which promotes public engagement with parliaments and promote role of legislatures in Myanmar.