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By PATRICK BARTA and ALEX FRANGOS, Updated March 29, 2012, 3:31 a.m. ET ...
YANGON—The expected election of pro-democracy dissident Aung San Suu Kyi to her first-ever political office on Sunday won't just be the latest milestone in Myanmar's surprise transformation.
Aung San Suu Kyi in a crowd of supporters during a campaign rally on the outskirts of Yangon on March 21.
It also marks the beginning of a challenging new stage of the 66-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate's career, as she moves from being a dissident icon compared with Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi to a more mainstream politician in a country racked by economic and social problems.
Many observers predict she could struggle to turn her rousing rhetoric, with impassioned but vague pleas for democracy and rule of law, into concrete policy.
Ms. Suu Kyi is running for a seat in Myanmar's new parliament, which was formed last year after the military junta that controlled Myanmar since 1962 recast itself as a civilian government after holding the country's first election in 20 years. Given her widespread popularity, analysts and residents assume she will win easily unless there is rampant fraud, which isn't expected.
Soe Than Win/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
The crowd for an Aung San Suu Kyi speech at a rally earlier this month
But they likely won't move fast if Ms. Suu Kyi is thwarted in efforts to build up more power as leader of the opposition in parliament.
Ms. Suu Kyi has already undergone a transformation over the past year, agreeing to work more closely with Myanmar's government after years of taking on its most senior leaders, who kept her under house arrest for most of the past 20 years.
Her more flexible approach has drawn criticism from some supporters, but may help her build coalitions with allies of Myanmar's previous military junta. It could also help position her for a run at the biggest prize of her career: a shot at becoming president in 2015, when Myanmar holds its next major vote.
Sunday's vote is only for around 45 slots in parliament that were vacated over the past year, out of more than 600 total, with Ms. Suu Kyi running in a constituency south of the commercial capital of Yangon. But Ms. Suu Kyi could wind up serving as something of a shadow president if she is in political office, some analysts have said, or take a cabinet post.
There are still many unanswered questions about Ms. Suu Kyi's political future, as well as what policies she would pursue if elected. It is possible that longtime opponents in the country's armed forces will seek to sideline her. She will be a lonely voice in parliament, with only a few other opposition figures to back her up, guaranteeing she'll have to compromise with former military foes to get things done.
Although Ms. Suu Kyi has said she embraces the concept of a free market, many of her views on economic issues aren't known, and she has continued to support Western sanctions that limit investment.
She is running on a thin platform with little policy substance, says Khin Maung Swe, a dissident who spent 6½ years in prison and broke ranks with Ms. Suu Kyi in 2010 to run in the country's elections that year.
"People want to hear what she will do for them. She doesn't say that. She just says 'if you love me, vote for my [party's] candidates,' " he said.
Ms. Suu Kyi declined to be interviewed ahead of Sunday's vote. In campaign rallies, she has called for changes to the constitution to reduce the military's role in parliament and initiatives on health and legal aid.
"The road ahead is rough and tough," she said before tens of thousands in Mandalay this month. "Democracy is hard to achieve and even if it is obtained, it will not be easy to sustain. We all have to work hard."
Her party spokesman, Nyan Win, said in an interview that her main policy priority will be "reconciliation." He didn't elaborate.
The daughter of a martyred Myanmar independence hero, Ms. Suu Kyi was swept into the country's pro-democracy movement in the late 1980s. Her party, the National League for Democracy, easily won elections in 1990, but the military ignored the results and largely kept Ms. Suu Kyi under house arrest.
She criticized generals regularly whenever she was let out of her home. But when she was released in late 2010, she began parlaying with top officials, especially President Thein Sein, a former soldier. They met privately last August, and a few months later she agreed to take part in the coming by-election after boycotting the country's vote in 2010.
Her engagement with the leaders has already boosted the government's credibility with citizens still wary after years of repression.
"Aun Sang Suu Kyi is a very smart person. So if she believes in this old man [President Thein Sein], there must be something behind it," says Cho Cho Kyaw Nyein, a dissident who ran and lost in Myanmar's 2010 election.
People who know her say she was swayed by several factors, including assurances from Mr. Thein Sein that he would pursue reform as well as encouragement from Western leaders who thought it was worth taking a chance to see if the president followed through. The government subsequently approved amendments to the country's election rules sought by Ms. Suu Kyi, released more political prisoners, and took other steps she approved of.
Many observers believe she concluded that cooperating with the current government could be her last chance to bring about change in the country, given her age.
"She didn't change her mind, but she at least changed her approach--she agreed to take part in this political game," said Bertil Lintner, a Thailand-based analyst and author of several books on Myanmar who remains skeptical of the government's intentions.
"For the first time she seems to have a strategy, which she never seemed to have," he said. "I think being older and smarter is certainly part of it."
—Celine Fernandez contributed to this article.
Write to Patrick Barta at patrick.barta@wsj.com and Alex Frangos at alex.frangos@wsj.com
A version of this article appeared Mar. 29,
2012, on page A14 in some U.S. editions of The Wall Street Journal, with
the headline: For Myanmar's Rebel Icon, Politics Get Real.
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