[Peace-discuss] Thailand

Sun Dec 15 02:59:19 UTC 2013

 December 13, 2013 at 3:31pm

Giles Unpakorn

The hypothesis that the
present long-running unrest in Thailand is primarily caused by a “crisis of
succession”, assumes that the Thai monarch has real power and that he has been
constantly intervening in politics. That is just not the case and the real
cause of the crisis lies elsewhere.

Thailand does not have an absolute monarch or North Korean-style despot in his
twilight years, with factions fighting over who will be the next ruler. The
Thai absolute monarchy was overthrown in the 1932 revolution, and since then,
power has been shared and disputed among the military and civilian elites and
the top businessmen. For much of the time between 1932 and the mid-1980s, the
elites ruled by dictatorship. But this has become harder and harder to do ever
since the mass uprising against the military in 1973. The reason for this is
that the structure of Thai society has changed[1]. There are more and more
workers, both blue collar and white collar and the new generation of workers
and farmers are more confident and educated. That is why the monarchy has become
more important to the ruling class as a symbol of “natural hierarchy”,
necessary to give legitimacy to those who abuse democracy and preside over a
grossly un-equal society. The lèse majesté law is designed to protect the “holy
relic” that serves such a useful purpose for the ruling class[2].

The monarch has always been weak and cowardly, a creature of the military and
the elites who surround him and use him for their own ends. He was ill-prepared
to become king when his older brother died in a gun accident. He was introduced
to the Throne during a time when the most powerful military and police faction
was led by anti-royalists who had participated in the 1932 revolution. But
rivals of this faction sought to use and promote the King. They came to power
during the Sarit coup in the late 1950s and the monarch was promoted as part of
the anti-communist struggle during the Cold War. King Pumipon was used by the
Thai military and conservative elites, together with the U.S. government, as an
anti-communist symbol. He was also required to appear on TV to stop the 1973
uprising from toppling the whole old order[3].

Throughout his reign, Pumipon has swayed like a leaf, bending in the wind and
serving as a willing tool of those who happened to be in power. He failed to
prevent or solve any serious crisis. He supported the extreme right-wing leader
Tanin Kraiwichien in 1976, only to see Tanin swept aside by the military a year
later. He supported the 1991 military coup leader Sujinda, only to see the junta
destroyed by a popular uprising. His “sufficiency Economy” ideology was taken
to heart by neo-liberal conservatives because it supported the idea that the
state should not help the poor. But no one took it seriously enough to think it
could really be an economic strategy which could be practically applied for
economic development.

The fixation by political commentators on the monarch and the royal family may
be understandable, given the way the elites make the king into a deity, but we
should expect a better quality of analysis. Such an analysis should be based on
historical evidence and an investigation into the political dynamics that exist
in the whole of society.

The first question that should be asked is: why do the elites make the king into
a deity and constantly reproduce this myth?

 The more Thai society develops into a modern capitalist one, the more
difficult it has become for the elites to rule over the population using crude
authoritarian means. The Thai military can only justify its anti-democratic
political meddling by promoting the monarch into a deity and then claiming to
follow his “orders”. Similarly, politicians and businessmen, Taksin included,
used the monarchy to increase their own legitimacy. Taksin’s government
kicked-off the semi-compulsory wearing of yellow shirts on one day each week.

The interesting point to bear in mind is that the frenzied promotion of the
King actually accelerated from the mid-1980s onwards, as the elites were forced
to make more and more concessions to parliamentary democracy. It was an attempt
to slow down progress and insulate elite privileges from change.

Before former Prime Minister Taksin had a falling out with the military and the
conservatives, the King was also a willing supporter of his government, for
example, praising his “war on drugs” where thousands were executed in an
extra-judiciary manner[4].

For those who believe that the King is a powerful figure even today, one just
has to look at reality. How can a man who has spent years in hospital or in a
wheel chair and who can hardly speak, order the army to do anything? Or perhaps
he is just hamming it? After the act of speaking in public with such
difficulty, after the cameras stop rolling, perhaps he jumps up from his chair
and does 100 push-ups, followed by a phone call to the army chiefs, where he
barks out his orders in a firm and powerful voice?

    So
there is no absolute monarch in his final years causing a potential power
vacuum.

But what about the idea that the various elite factions are really fighting
about who will control the Crown Prince when he becomes king? Make no mistake;
all sides have agreed that the scandal-prone and despicable prince will be the
next king. To place the Princess, who has no male partner, on the throne
instead, would immediately destroy all the “reinvented tradition” about the
monarchy.

It is probably true that Taksin paid off the Crown Prince’s gambling debts and
that Taksin’s rivals may fear that he would be more dominant in his use of the
Prince as a result. But this is a minor question because the Prince will be an
even weaker creature than his father. “Buying” the Crown Prince doesn’t result
in ownership of power. All this begs the really big question as to why the
present military high command and the conservatives, including the Democrat
Party, are so opposed to Taksin. The answer cannot be found in the problem of
the succession. Neither can it be explained by claiming incorrectly that Taksin
is a closet republican. The long running Thai crisis is a result of an
unintentional clash between the conservative way of operating in a
parliamentary democracy and a more modern one. It is equally related to
attempts by Taksin and his party to modernise Thai society so that the economy
could become more competitive on a global level, especially after the 1996
Asian economic crisis.

Thai political leaders since the early 1970s had always adopted a laissez faire
attitude to development, with minimal government planning, low wages, few trade
union rights and an abdication of responsibility by governments in improving
infrastructure. This strategy worked in the early years, but by the time of the
1996 Asian economic crisis it was becoming obvious that it was seriously
failing. The consequences of this economic crisis are far more important to the
understanding the Thai political crisis today than concentrating on the
so-called problem of succession.

In the first general election since the 1996 crisis, Taksin’s party put forward
a raft of modernising and pro-poor policies, including the first ever universal
health care scheme. Because the Democrat Party had told the unemployed to “go
back to their villages and depend on their families, while spending state
finances in securing the savings for the rich in failed banks, Taksin was able
to say that his government would benefit everyone, not just the rich. Taksin’s
Thai Rak Thai Party won the elections. The government was unique in being both
popular and dynamic, with real policies, which were used to win the election and
were then implemented afterwards. Previously, the old parties had just bought
votes without any policies. Taksin’s policies and his overwhelming electoral
base came to challenge many elements of the old elite order, although this was
not Taksin’s conscious aim at all. In the last 20 years the Democrat Party has
never managed to win more than a quarter of the national vote, often it was
much less. Local political and criminal mafia were edged out of power by
Taksin’s electoral machine. The military could not compete in terms of
democratic legitimacy and support. The middle class started to resent the fact
that the government was helping to raise the standard of living of workers and
poor farmers. This is the real basis for the prolonged crisis in society and it
explains why the conservatives, the middle class and the Democrat Party are so
strongly opposed to democracy.

It would be a mistake to see the present crisis as merely a dispute between two
factions of the elite. It has another important dimension that cannot be
ignored. We need to understand the role of the Red Shirts. One way of
understanding the “dialectical” relationship between Taksin and the Red Shirts
is to see a kind of “parallel war” in the Red Shirt/UDD struggles against the
conservative elites, where thousands of ordinary Red Shirts struggle for
democracy, dignity and social justice, while Taksin and his political allies
wage a very different campaign to regain the political influence that they had
enjoyed before the 2006 coup d'état[5]. However, at the same time, Taksin
remains very popular with most Red Shirts.

Destroying parliamentary democracy may be the aim of Sutep and his middle class
protesters. Yet, the more intelligent members of the ruling class know that
another military coup, or a rolling back of democracy by other means, will not
make it easier to rule over the majority of the electorate who have been
politicised by the Red Shirt movement and have come to expect the government to
produce policies which are beneficial to the majority. There is no easy way out
for them.

If the King were to die soon, and there is no indication that he will, nothing
will change. The Crown Prince is even less capable of supporting democratic
reforms than his father.

Turning the clock back on democratic change will inflame the divisions. To
achieve real democracy, the un-democratic elements need to be crushed
politically by a mass movement. Otherwise we shall end up with just a grubby
compromise and the prospect of another crisis breaking out some time in the
future.

[1] “Thai Spring?” Paper
given at the 5th Annual Nordic NIAS Council Conference organised by The Forum
for Asian Studies/NIAS. 21-23rd November 2011, Stockholm University, Sweden. http://www.scribd.com/doc/73908759/Thai-Spring

[2] Giles Ji Ungpakorn
(2011) “Lèse Majesté, the Monarchy, and the Military in Thailand”. Paper given
at the Department of Peace and Conflict Studies (Pax et Bellum), University of
Uppsala, Sweden, 29th April 2011. http://www.scribd.com/doc/54529804/Lese-majeste-the-Monarchy-and-the-Military-in-Thailand

[3] Giles Ji Ungpakorn
(2010) “Thailand’s Crisis and the Struggle for Democracy”. WD Press, U.K. http://www.scribd.com/doc/47097266/Thailand-s-Crisis-and-the-fight-for-Democracy

[4] Giles Ji Ungpakorn
(2007) “A Coup for the Rich”. WDPress, Bangkok. http://www.scribd.com/doc/41173616/Coup-For-the-Rich-by-Giles-Ji-Ungpakorn

[5] “Thailand:
Reconciliation as Betrayal. The Parallel War: Taksin and the Red Shirts” Paper
given to the Thailand Research Group, Institute of Asian and African Studies,
Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany, October 2012. http://www.scribd.com/doc/177338303/%E2%80%9CThailand-Reconciliation-as-Betrayal-The-Parallel-War-Taksin-and-the-Red-Shirts%E2%80%9D-econciliation-as-Betrayal

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