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Leading scholars working on Buddhism and politics in South and Southeast Asia add to current discussions regarding ´Engaged Buddhism´ and the recent work on protests. The writers have mostly established themselves in their fields, offering a diverse approach and country-by-country coverage.

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Introduction: ´Buddhist Politics´ as Emptiness: History and the Forms of Engagement in Asia; Pattana Kitiarsa and John Whalen-Bridge PART I: DEPENDENT ORIGINATIONS AND CHANGING DESTINATIONS 1. Buddhists Confront the State; Charles F. Keyes 2. ´Foremost among Religions´: Theravada Buddhism´s Affairs with the Modern Sri Lankan State; Mahinda Deegalle 3. Schools, Ritual Economies and the Expanding State: The Changing Roles of Lao Buddhist Monks as ´Traditional Intellectuals´; Patrice Ladwig PART II: THE POLITICAL ROLE OF SACRED THINGS 4. After Pol Pot: Cambodia and the Building of a New Stupa; John Amos Marston 5. The Relic and the Rule of Righteousness: Reflections on U Nu´s Dhammavijaya; Tilman Frasch 6. Sacred Site or Public Space? The Shwedagon Pagoda in Colonial Rangoon; Donald Seekins PART III: MONKS, NUNS, AND...TREES 7. Angry Monk Syndrome on the World Stage: Tibet, Engaged Buddhism, and the Weapons of the Weak; John Whalen-Bridge 8. Rebirth Control: Contemporary Inner Mongolian Buddhism and the Religious Authority of the Chinese State; Jonathan Mair 9. Do Buddhist ´Nuns´ Need the Thai Sangha?; Monica Lindberg Falk 10. Sacred Protests and Buddhist Environmental Knowledge; Susan M. Darlington Index

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"This collection broadens our understanding of what Engaged Buddhism is and what it isn´t. The grass-roots movements for peace and justice that arose in the 1950s in India, Tibet, Vietnam, and Sri Lanka were termed ´engaged´ by monks, laypeople and scholars, who saw their nonviolent methods as expressions of spiritual practice. This volume places these movements alongside the rise of monastic corruption, state-sponsored terrorism, ethnic cleansing and guerrilla theater - all in the name of Buddhism. This book is a valuable synopsis of a new wave of cautionary scholarship." - Christopher Queen, Lecturer in Extension, Harvard University, US, and Co-editor of Engaged Buddhism: Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia, Engaged Buddhism in the Wes t, an d Action Dharma: New Studies in Engaged Buddhism.

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Susan M. Darlington, Hampshire College, USA Mahinda Deegalle, Bath Spa University, United Kingdom Monica Lindberg Falk, Lund University, Sweden Tilman Frasch, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK Charles F. Keyes, University of Washington, USA Patrice Ladwig, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Germany Jonathan Mair, Manchester University, UK John Marston, El Colegio de Mexico, Mexico Donald M. Seekins, Meio University, Japan

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