ADVANCE PUBLICATION 646 THE JOURNAL OF ASIAN STUDIES • 83:3 • August 2024 DOI: 10.1215/00219118-11163169 © 2024 Association for Asian Studies BENJAMIN SCHONTHAL and TOM GINSBURG Breaking the Saffron Wave? Sangha Capture in South and Southeast Asia ABSTRACT In recent years, thousands of Buddhist monastics have marched in antiregime protests across South and Southeast Asia. Among the largest and most in uential nonstate organizations in the region, monastic communities appear to be powerful agents for political change. Yet, like similar movements over the last half-century, recent monastic protests did not produce broader political resistance among the monkhood, nor did they lead to substantive political change. What explains this? Why has antigovernment activism among Buddhist monks been less durable or impactful than other types of monastic activism, such as the varieties of chauvinistic nationalism that have risen to prominence in recent years? This arti- cle draws on three case studies—Myanmar, Thailand, and Sri Lanka—to offer one answer: sangha capture, the strategic use of law, bureaucracy, patronage, and coer- cion by governing elites to induce compliance among monastics while also muf ing and marginalizing would-be critics. KEYWORDS Buddhism, democracy, politics, Southeast Asia, law S hortly aer Myanmar’s military coup in February , the world’s news channels broadcast images of saron-robed Buddhist monks marching in protest through the country’s cities and towns. For some observers, the images called to mind the mass monastic demonstrations on the streets of Yangon during the  Saron Revolution, in which tens of thousands of Buddhist monks marched for democratic change. For others, the actions of Myanmar’s monks evoked comparisons with antiregime protestors in Bangkok, both monastic and lay, who were launching their own mass events at roughly the same time. Similar acts of de ance would appear across the Bay of Bengal roughly eighteen months later, when members of Sri Lan- ka’s monastic community engaged in their own antigovernment protests as part of that country’s popular struggle (in Sinhala, aragalaya) against the Rajapaksa dynasty. For Myanmar, ailand, and Sri Lanka (all Buddhist-majority countries with signicant populations of monks), large demonstrations by members of the clergy would seem to be a major threat to governing regimes and a powerful instrument for political change. Yet, like other similar movements over the last half-century, these recent demonstrations by Buddhist clerics did not lead to a broader wave of politi- cal resistance among the monkhood, nor did they ultimately dislodge the dominant political order.  In each case, dramatic moments of de ance by monks were followed Downloaded from http://read.dukeupress.edu/journal-of-asian-studies/article-pdf/doi/10.1215/00219118-11163169/2108661/11163169.pdf?guestAccessKey=0e444562-14a8-4dfd-8164-3d7839cb7b9d by guest on 27 June 2024