Burmese girl in Yangon, Myanmar

Scarcely a Western Foreign Minister passing through Myanmar these days can escape an obligatory joint press conference with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi at which invariably the judgement is made that the situation in Myanmar is “fragile”. We might perhaps ask how such an assessment can be made after only 48 hours in the country. But perhaps “fragility” is the default state of many countries in the world these days? IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde was telling us only last month that “the recovery is still very fragile”. More…