That’s my understanding as well — that the economy is generally left to technocrats while the politicians fight over the x% of GDP that is lost to graft. Also, my reading says that the post-1997 crash financial regulations have been left intact by every government since (except the occasional attempt to meddle in the money markets, usually withdrawn quickly) so the banking sector is surprisingly transparent.
But is the insulation thick enough to buffer the Great Event?
I was struck by a potentially subversive paragraph tucked away in the middle…
“a cult operates in a closed, hierarchical organisation with a central leader who often boasts divine connections and an ultimate answer to save the world. Cults are dangerous.”
I really do think an amount of free thought and journalism trickles out but you have to search for it…
You don’t have to be rich to devastate the environment but it helps. In general, poor individuals have a much smaller environmental footprint than rich ones. This fact has undermined the feeling of moral superiority of those of us with few or no children but whose weekly garbage now needs to be wheeled out rather than carried. Everybody who has seen the television programme about the recyclers of Mumbai is astonished at how efficiently a poor community uses resources.
Yet none of this means that poor, marginalised people, even people battling starvation can’t also do serious environmental damage. The problem with the authors of this article is that they don’t care, if after absorbing the cherry-picked evidence, the sentimentality, and the loaded prose, their readers go away with the false impression that the poor can do no environmental harm. They have succeeded in their job of advocacy. It is no surprise that they come from the land of lawyers and salesmen, where tens of thousands of innocent people languish in prison because of cherry-picked evidence; and miserable hills of flesh lurch painfully along, victims of the successful advocacy of unsuitable food.
I’m more positive about the potential to carry out this kind of research than some others above. I spent time researching another topic up in Chiang Mai during 2010 – 2011, and was often surprised about people’s willingness to say open and frank things about the most sensitive of topics. I think the key is to establish trust and rapport and to even be willing to say things that are a little critical yourself as an indicator of the kind of conversation that you’re looking to have. Given all this, longer term ethnographic study stands a chance of succeeding where a short-term ‘survey’ approach would I think struggle. As to NRCT, my advice would be to do this kind of study ‘on the side’ of another official project that was accepted by officials. Results would of course be partial and provisional, but such is the way with all ethnographic studies.
Chris L but you must agree the transition period can be sad for many. Such as many of the 2-3 million Issarn people in Bangkok on low wages, intermittent, informal work, or unemployed. Single women working in massage, with no wages, only tips or a cut of the cost of massage. Even graduates working in factories – there are many! And as I say I do not believe they have very good health services or education available to them. Access is not easy, for free health care they have to go to one hospital where they are registered. Some will do informal education if they have the time, resources and motivation – and sometimes you cannot blame them for the lack of motivation.
I may be getting a little off subject, but the econcomic model has always favoured the cities, it is still a pretty much top-down approach. You are right about Japan, and now South Korea and the direction is the same everywhere. But isn’t the argument more about giving people choice and alternatives? Your argument on invetability is based on this economic model, also followed by one-party systems now, but is it inevitable that we can only have this model? Isn’t it falling apart in Europe?
#8
“there are those that blindly worship the King as if he were a God. but most Thais love the King and respect him for all of the good things he has done for the people.”
The latter part of the sentence is the proof/evidence of the former part of the sentence. 🙂
My wife explains the relationship between the Thai people and The King like this: there are those that blindly worship the King as if he were a God. but most Thais love the King and respect him for all of the good things he has done for the people.
@WLH –
Part of the stability is likely due to the fact that economic policy decisions are largely removed from the hands of politicians. The bureaucrats who determine policy are insulated from politics thanks to the way that laws are written; they grant wide discretionary powers to the implementing agencies (BOI, Ministry of Finance, etc).
This protects Thailand from wide swings of economic fortune due to political events, but it also limits the accountability of civil servants.
What is interesting is cases where the politicians do get involved, such as with the current government’s rice-buying scheme. It may be a warning as to what might happen if politicians became more involved in economic policy.
By saying KR-affiliated, I simply meant that the overall majority of prisoners were KR cadres and their families. I understand that to be so from every book I’ve read on the subject and the primary evidence I’ve seen and heard in the museum and beyond.
A “bit of an issue to reference the many non-political actors” as KR-affiliated? Very possibly.
But this returns us to the original subject of this post I think; the dehumanization, to use Fionn’s term, that lubricated extermination under the KR, and continues to influence the way the KR are understood by many Cambodians today. The graffitti on the photos is a part of the backwash from that; even though some of the subjects in the defaced pictures are children, their assocciation, or affiliation, with the KR makes them guilty in the eyes of many visitors.
In regard to your second point, I’m afraid I was actually thinking more of the reactions of art critics, newspapers and gallery visitors when the s21 pictures began to be exhibited around the world, most notably in the Museum of Modern Art in New York in the 90’s. That coincided with Pol Pot’s trial and house-arrest by the KR, and provoked wide discussion on the value and meaning of the photographs from all sorts of perspectives.
I’m certainly no expert on Cambodia or the KR either. My work in 2007 on the subject was to satisfy my personal interest and nothing more, just to be clear.
‘But if you believe that access to quality healthcare and education for everybody is a good thing, this cannot be achieved in an economy where the majority of people are still working on the farm.’
what a sad situation! so should we stop spending billions (millions!) on trying do improving health and education in rural areas. I suspect with modern technology we could have better education, and maybe health too with a bit of creativity. But at the same time I don’t think Thailand has good education or health services for the poor in urban areas. They may be relatively free (with some strings) but quality is generally poor/
Richaard A Ruth #4 Just before the last election I had this in a comment on NM.
“This election is a referendum on the invisible hand. ………………………………….
The royal family have maneuvered themselves into a situation where this election is about them or Thaksin. The Democrats or Pheua Thai are just the chips in play.
All Thais love the king, or so the story goes. Some braver souls have suggested it’s perhaps only 80 to 95 percent. I think this election will project a truer reflection of that disputed number.”
In the last election the royal family allowed themselves to become one of the main policy differentiaters. Like no other election before, they dragged out all their big guns to tell the populace to vote for the ‘right’ guy, and they weren’t talking about Aphisit.
That election has now come and gone and we know how it went. That vote was about Phumiphon and Thaksin. Of course the red shirts will tell you that they love the king, they are not that wacky, but in the privacy of the poll booth we get a fairer idea.
The role of the police in the chaotic scenes at the Bersih 3.0 rally is still a mystery. This website [http://pdrmbrutal.wordpress.com/] paints the picture that the violence was pre-planned by the Home Minister.
Also whilst on the subject of the S-21 photography, one of the best scenes in Brother Number One is when Mark Hamill interviews the previous S-21 photographer (his name off the top of my head escapes me).
In this scene it seems the photographer has been very psychologically affected by his previous role in the prison. The way he describes his work carries some of the traits of categorisation and assignment that my article was alluding to. Indeed, it seems like a linguistic self-defence mechanism aimed at protecting himself from the trauma of having been a participant, whilst continuing to dissociate himself from the victims even today.
Almost perversely, he then turns a compact camera onto Mark Hamill, and compares taking photographs of Mark there and then to when he took portraits in the prison, presumably including Mark’s brother Kerry. It makes for some astonishing, slightly awkward viewing.
Sorry for late reply and thanks for some thought provoking responses
Greg, thank you for the reference. Of course the Malays and Chinese have experienced some friction before, yet have not seen such vicious response as in Cambodia. The two “Malayan Emergencies” ended relatively peacefully by comparison to the khmer case. Not a high standard of judgment, of course, but enough to allow for the rehabilitation and reintegration of Chin Peng and various borderland guerrillas back into society.
Plan B: I enjoy your reasoning, indeed, history is replete with governments double-dealing and engaging in ‘realpolitik’. John Pilger’s “The War You Don’t See” (2010) is an excellent example of similar mechanisms at work elsewhere.
Keith: Thank you for the reference, I am not aware of this work but am looking forward to reading it. Just as language can categorise and group individuals in the service of power, so too the image. This reminds me of another piece on this topic that you should read if interested, Jacqueline Sischy’s “The ethics of remembrance: The S-21 photographs” – available here or contact me if you don’t have access to ProQuest: http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=2073607461&sid=23&Fmt=2&clientId=10306&RQT=309&VName=PQD&cfc=1
nontok: I find it interesting that you mention an interview with Vann Nath that took place in S-21, is this interview in the public domain? I wonder if the location had any emotional impact that may have influenced his testimony, since it was at the sight of his own trauma. Interesting also that his answer you reference seems to suggest that the defacement of the images is a form of a “reclaiming” the physical space of S-21. This echoes recent ideas trending in academia about the influence of space on human agency, which explores how contests over this space influences both the original conflict and its remembrance. Tyner’s ‘Unmaking of Space’ is one example of this line of enquiry. http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Killing-Cambodia-Geography-Genocide/dp/0754670961
Keith Barney: I think nontok is broadly correct in saying that S-21 victims were predominantly KR cadre. Of course you are right that many others got swept up into its net, including innocent dependants and various others such as Kerry Hamill (as depicted in the film I mentioned, Brother Number One). In answer to your question there is a lot of research that shows S-21 as the main central prison for the santebal secret police. S-21 was for “high-ranking” prisoners, mostly cadre but foreigners and dependants of cadre would also fit this category. Chandler’s ‘Voices of S-21’, Meng Try-Ea’s ‘Chain of Terror’, Dith Pran’s ‘S-21: Khmer Rouge Killing Machine’ (film) all demonstrate this point adequately. Of course, the best evidence for S-21’s position in the broader security system can be found at DCCAM, or case 001 of the ECCC.
Our Cambodian editor, Geoffery Cain chose the photo, and has more information on its provenance. Thanks again for all fantastic your comments!
Not only is Cole’s art not interesting, it’s downright depressing. Give everybody a break, we already know Phnom Penh is a blitzed out 3rd world backwater. I agree with #23, Nobody. I’d walk right by Cole’s art without a look or a thought. Personally, I prefer more positive art, Thomas Kinkade comes to mind. Art you can look at and hang on your wall that makes you feel good about yourself and the world. I’m sure if Kinkade were to paint Phnom Penh, he would make it really nice. Probably paint some of the temples and traditional dancers in costumes and charming views of the river.
@Milton Brick knows exactly what is going on. What a terrific analysis.
A couple of footnotes:
Increased guidance by The Brookings Institute, The Council on Foreign Relations and the State Department who will bed down and formalise what wealth extraction and warmongering agreements they can.
The absence of conspicuous snouts in prosperous Thailand from abroad is something Thaksin was looking to beef up and take a cut. Friends abroad are always useful and the UN speech was classic som nom naa timing.
I think that’s why the Privy council took action.
Nobody likes new thieves more than the old thieves.
As Ajarn Somsak said, any broad-based study would run into insurmountable validity problems (besides not being approved by the NRCT re external researchers, and the problem that there would be no Thai institution crazy enough to use Thai or foreign staff to touch on this issue).
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Prisoner writes to Amnesty International
[…] Prisoner writes to Amnesty International (asiapacific.anu.edu.au) […]
Thailand’s resilient economy
@JR
That’s my understanding as well — that the economy is generally left to technocrats while the politicians fight over the x% of GDP that is lost to graft. Also, my reading says that the post-1997 crash financial regulations have been left intact by every government since (except the occasional attempt to meddle in the money markets, usually withdrawn quickly) so the banking sector is surprisingly transparent.
But is the insulation thick enough to buffer the Great Event?
Review of Saying the Unsayable
There is an interesting article in BKK Post today:
http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/298974/islamic-scholar-gave-buddhist-point-to-ponder
I was struck by a potentially subversive paragraph tucked away in the middle…
“a cult operates in a closed, hierarchical organisation with a central leader who often boasts divine connections and an ultimate answer to save the world. Cults are dangerous.”
I really do think an amount of free thought and journalism trickles out but you have to search for it…
Blaming villagers for global warming
You don’t have to be rich to devastate the environment but it helps. In general, poor individuals have a much smaller environmental footprint than rich ones. This fact has undermined the feeling of moral superiority of those of us with few or no children but whose weekly garbage now needs to be wheeled out rather than carried. Everybody who has seen the television programme about the recyclers of Mumbai is astonished at how efficiently a poor community uses resources.
Yet none of this means that poor, marginalised people, even people battling starvation can’t also do serious environmental damage. The problem with the authors of this article is that they don’t care, if after absorbing the cherry-picked evidence, the sentimentality, and the loaded prose, their readers go away with the false impression that the poor can do no environmental harm. They have succeeded in their job of advocacy. It is no surprise that they come from the land of lawyers and salesmen, where tens of thousands of innocent people languish in prison because of cherry-picked evidence; and miserable hills of flesh lurch painfully along, victims of the successful advocacy of unsuitable food.
Review of Saying the Unsayable
I’m more positive about the potential to carry out this kind of research than some others above. I spent time researching another topic up in Chiang Mai during 2010 – 2011, and was often surprised about people’s willingness to say open and frank things about the most sensitive of topics. I think the key is to establish trust and rapport and to even be willing to say things that are a little critical yourself as an indicator of the kind of conversation that you’re looking to have. Given all this, longer term ethnographic study stands a chance of succeeding where a short-term ‘survey’ approach would I think struggle. As to NRCT, my advice would be to do this kind of study ‘on the side’ of another official project that was accepted by officials. Results would of course be partial and provisional, but such is the way with all ethnographic studies.
Leaving the farm
Chris L but you must agree the transition period can be sad for many. Such as many of the 2-3 million Issarn people in Bangkok on low wages, intermittent, informal work, or unemployed. Single women working in massage, with no wages, only tips or a cut of the cost of massage. Even graduates working in factories – there are many! And as I say I do not believe they have very good health services or education available to them. Access is not easy, for free health care they have to go to one hospital where they are registered. Some will do informal education if they have the time, resources and motivation – and sometimes you cannot blame them for the lack of motivation.
I may be getting a little off subject, but the econcomic model has always favoured the cities, it is still a pretty much top-down approach. You are right about Japan, and now South Korea and the direction is the same everywhere. But isn’t the argument more about giving people choice and alternatives? Your argument on invetability is based on this economic model, also followed by one-party systems now, but is it inevitable that we can only have this model? Isn’t it falling apart in Europe?
Review of Saying the Unsayable
#8
“there are those that blindly worship the King as if he were a God. but most Thais love the King and respect him for all of the good things he has done for the people.”
The latter part of the sentence is the proof/evidence of the former part of the sentence. 🙂
Leaving the farm
Allan GB,
It’s not a sad situation. What is needed is for more people to leave the farm to get educated as, for instance, teachers and doctors.
With higher productivity and more efficient farming practices, the same amount of food will be produced by less farmers.
This is called development. Some people don’t like it because things will not be the same as before when things were supposedly much better.
Review of Saying the Unsayable
My wife explains the relationship between the Thai people and The King like this: there are those that blindly worship the King as if he were a God. but most Thais love the King and respect him for all of the good things he has done for the people.
How the Khmer Rouge dehumanised their “enemies”
Fionn, Nontok:
Many thanks for the interesting and informative replies.
– keith
Thailand’s resilient economy
@WLH –
Part of the stability is likely due to the fact that economic policy decisions are largely removed from the hands of politicians. The bureaucrats who determine policy are insulated from politics thanks to the way that laws are written; they grant wide discretionary powers to the implementing agencies (BOI, Ministry of Finance, etc).
This protects Thailand from wide swings of economic fortune due to political events, but it also limits the accountability of civil servants.
What is interesting is cases where the politicians do get involved, such as with the current government’s rice-buying scheme. It may be a warning as to what might happen if politicians became more involved in economic policy.
How the Khmer Rouge dehumanised their “enemies”
Keith,
By saying KR-affiliated, I simply meant that the overall majority of prisoners were KR cadres and their families. I understand that to be so from every book I’ve read on the subject and the primary evidence I’ve seen and heard in the museum and beyond.
A “bit of an issue to reference the many non-political actors” as KR-affiliated? Very possibly.
But this returns us to the original subject of this post I think; the dehumanization, to use Fionn’s term, that lubricated extermination under the KR, and continues to influence the way the KR are understood by many Cambodians today. The graffitti on the photos is a part of the backwash from that; even though some of the subjects in the defaced pictures are children, their assocciation, or affiliation, with the KR makes them guilty in the eyes of many visitors.
In regard to your second point, I’m afraid I was actually thinking more of the reactions of art critics, newspapers and gallery visitors when the s21 pictures began to be exhibited around the world, most notably in the Museum of Modern Art in New York in the 90’s. That coincided with Pol Pot’s trial and house-arrest by the KR, and provoked wide discussion on the value and meaning of the photographs from all sorts of perspectives.
I’m certainly no expert on Cambodia or the KR either. My work in 2007 on the subject was to satisfy my personal interest and nothing more, just to be clear.
Regards
Leaving the farm
‘But if you believe that access to quality healthcare and education for everybody is a good thing, this cannot be achieved in an economy where the majority of people are still working on the farm.’
what a sad situation! so should we stop spending billions (millions!) on trying do improving health and education in rural areas. I suspect with modern technology we could have better education, and maybe health too with a bit of creativity. But at the same time I don’t think Thailand has good education or health services for the poor in urban areas. They may be relatively free (with some strings) but quality is generally poor/
Review of Saying the Unsayable
Richaard A Ruth #4 Just before the last election I had this in a comment on NM.
“This election is a referendum on the invisible hand. ………………………………….
The royal family have maneuvered themselves into a situation where this election is about them or Thaksin. The Democrats or Pheua Thai are just the chips in play.
All Thais love the king, or so the story goes. Some braver souls have suggested it’s perhaps only 80 to 95 percent. I think this election will project a truer reflection of that disputed number.”
In the last election the royal family allowed themselves to become one of the main policy differentiaters. Like no other election before, they dragged out all their big guns to tell the populace to vote for the ‘right’ guy, and they weren’t talking about Aphisit.
That election has now come and gone and we know how it went. That vote was about Phumiphon and Thaksin. Of course the red shirts will tell you that they love the king, they are not that wacky, but in the privacy of the poll booth we get a fairer idea.
Polis, Raja Di Malaysia [Police, Kings in Malaysia]
The role of the police in the chaotic scenes at the Bersih 3.0 rally is still a mystery. This website [http://pdrmbrutal.wordpress.com/] paints the picture that the violence was pre-planned by the Home Minister.
How the Khmer Rouge dehumanised their “enemies”
Also whilst on the subject of the S-21 photography, one of the best scenes in Brother Number One is when Mark Hamill interviews the previous S-21 photographer (his name off the top of my head escapes me).
In this scene it seems the photographer has been very psychologically affected by his previous role in the prison. The way he describes his work carries some of the traits of categorisation and assignment that my article was alluding to. Indeed, it seems like a linguistic self-defence mechanism aimed at protecting himself from the trauma of having been a participant, whilst continuing to dissociate himself from the victims even today.
Almost perversely, he then turns a compact camera onto Mark Hamill, and compares taking photographs of Mark there and then to when he took portraits in the prison, presumably including Mark’s brother Kerry. It makes for some astonishing, slightly awkward viewing.
How the Khmer Rouge dehumanised their “enemies”
Sorry for late reply and thanks for some thought provoking responses
Greg, thank you for the reference. Of course the Malays and Chinese have experienced some friction before, yet have not seen such vicious response as in Cambodia. The two “Malayan Emergencies” ended relatively peacefully by comparison to the khmer case. Not a high standard of judgment, of course, but enough to allow for the rehabilitation and reintegration of Chin Peng and various borderland guerrillas back into society.
Plan B: I enjoy your reasoning, indeed, history is replete with governments double-dealing and engaging in ‘realpolitik’. John Pilger’s “The War You Don’t See” (2010) is an excellent example of similar mechanisms at work elsewhere.
Keith: Thank you for the reference, I am not aware of this work but am looking forward to reading it. Just as language can categorise and group individuals in the service of power, so too the image. This reminds me of another piece on this topic that you should read if interested, Jacqueline Sischy’s “The ethics of remembrance: The S-21 photographs” – available here or contact me if you don’t have access to ProQuest:
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=2073607461&sid=23&Fmt=2&clientId=10306&RQT=309&VName=PQD&cfc=1
nontok: I find it interesting that you mention an interview with Vann Nath that took place in S-21, is this interview in the public domain? I wonder if the location had any emotional impact that may have influenced his testimony, since it was at the sight of his own trauma. Interesting also that his answer you reference seems to suggest that the defacement of the images is a form of a “reclaiming” the physical space of S-21. This echoes recent ideas trending in academia about the influence of space on human agency, which explores how contests over this space influences both the original conflict and its remembrance. Tyner’s ‘Unmaking of Space’ is one example of this line of enquiry. http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Killing-Cambodia-Geography-Genocide/dp/0754670961
Keith Barney: I think nontok is broadly correct in saying that S-21 victims were predominantly KR cadre. Of course you are right that many others got swept up into its net, including innocent dependants and various others such as Kerry Hamill (as depicted in the film I mentioned, Brother Number One). In answer to your question there is a lot of research that shows S-21 as the main central prison for the santebal secret police. S-21 was for “high-ranking” prisoners, mostly cadre but foreigners and dependants of cadre would also fit this category. Chandler’s ‘Voices of S-21’, Meng Try-Ea’s ‘Chain of Terror’, Dith Pran’s ‘S-21: Khmer Rouge Killing Machine’ (film) all demonstrate this point adequately. Of course, the best evidence for S-21’s position in the broader security system can be found at DCCAM, or case 001 of the ECCC.
Our Cambodian editor, Geoffery Cain chose the photo, and has more information on its provenance. Thanks again for all fantastic your comments!
Noir nights in Phnom Penh
Not only is Cole’s art not interesting, it’s downright depressing. Give everybody a break, we already know Phnom Penh is a blitzed out 3rd world backwater. I agree with #23, Nobody. I’d walk right by Cole’s art without a look or a thought. Personally, I prefer more positive art, Thomas Kinkade comes to mind. Art you can look at and hang on your wall that makes you feel good about yourself and the world. I’m sure if Kinkade were to paint Phnom Penh, he would make it really nice. Probably paint some of the temples and traditional dancers in costumes and charming views of the river.
Coup talk in Thailand 2012
@Milton Brick knows exactly what is going on. What a terrific analysis.
A couple of footnotes:
Increased guidance by The Brookings Institute, The Council on Foreign Relations and the State Department who will bed down and formalise what wealth extraction and warmongering agreements they can.
The absence of conspicuous snouts in prosperous Thailand from abroad is something Thaksin was looking to beef up and take a cut. Friends abroad are always useful and the UN speech was classic som nom naa timing.
I think that’s why the Privy council took action.
Nobody likes new thieves more than the old thieves.
Review of Saying the Unsayable
As Ajarn Somsak said, any broad-based study would run into insurmountable validity problems (besides not being approved by the NRCT re external researchers, and the problem that there would be no Thai institution crazy enough to use Thai or foreign staff to touch on this issue).