Aung San Suu Kyi on Democracy vs. Dictatorship

“Sometimes I think that a parody of democracy could be more dangerous than a blatant dictatorship, because that gives people an opportunity to avoid doing anything about it.”

Aung San Suu Kyi has spent much of the past 26 years campaigning for democracy in her native Burma. She was placed under house arrest in 1989, a year before her National League for Democracy received nearly 60% of the vote in an election whose results would be nullified by the military junta in power. She was released from house arrest in 2010 and is rumored to be a presidential candidate in 2015.

Among Aung San Suu Kyi’s many awards and accomplishments:

-1991 Nobel Peace Prize

-1991 Rafto Prize (for Human Rights)

-1991 Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought

-1992 International Simón Bolivar Prize

-U.S. Congressional Gold Medal and Presidential Medal of Freedom

-Listed by Forbes in 2014 as the 61st most powerful woman in the world.

Photo credit: Claude TRUONG-NGOC / Wikicommons