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This thread could do with some robust and verifiable evidence of Chulalongkorn’s international standing. While I suspect that the comments here may well contain some truth, I also suspect they’re self-satisfactory stabs in the dark. Anybody have credible information?
I recently visited a village fund in Pak Phanang, near Nakhon Si Thammarat.
This is one of the successful ones. Their village fund is now valued at 11 million baht. It is pretty much operating like any bank. It is open Mon-Fri and they are employing 14 staff.
Members can open saving accounts, and deposit and withdraw money as they like. Members are rated from “AAA” to “C”. This rating together with the proposed project serves as a basis for the size and duration of the loan. Repayment rate is close to 100%. Only 4 out of 1000 members have a “C” rating.
I understand that this village fund is an exception, but it would be interesting to know how many of these there are.
If, in some cases, 90% of government program funds go to corrupt intermediaries, the village funds would have to be pretty bad not to be an improvement.
“A recent PACC investigation found that less than 10% of disaster relief funds reached those in need.”
Most Thai corruption is the fruit of an organized patronage system in which soldiers, politicians and bureaucrats conspire to loot public funds. No one in power, or with the potential to be in power, wants to change it.
“…it doesn’t really matter what political party or military clique is in power, the Thai state lacks the political and cultural will to check corruption and there is no evidence that this state of affairs will change any time soon. ”
In any case, given the track record of graft in government programs it seems obvious that some form of direct support would be far more effective.
It also seems important that these forms of support are clearly identified as coming from the state not from individual parties or politicians (or others that won’t be named).
The Bangkok Post (February 20) reports that “Democrat MP Watchara Petchthong has filed a lese majeste complaint against Thaksin Shinaeatra, Robert Amsterdam, his lawyer, and Thanapol Eiwsakal, editor of the Fah Diew Kan left-leaning political magazine.”
“The lawsuit, filed with the Crime Suppression Division, claims that the three colluded to publish a white paper entitled The Bangkok Massacre: A Call for Accountability, which contains allegedly defamatory messages against the country’s highest institution. It also says the white paper accuses Thai courts of being unfair and non-transparent in Thaksin’s asets seizure case.”
Recently, Maha Sarakham University had an advertisement in a Thai-language paper in which it also claimed to be a “world class university” (they probably also meant the “national” rather than the “international” meaning of “world class”).
I recently spoke with a professor from the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Sweden.
According to him, the exchange students they receive from Chulalongkorn University are consistently in the top 10% of their classes. The same is true for students from many other Asian countries, though he did not have much good to say about students from Malaysia.
As almost all observers of the Thailand situation know, Amnesty International Thailand has its head buried in the PAD/Yellow Royalist sand when it comes to Lese Majeste and the case of Darunee….and as a result has almost no credibility left either in Thailand or the surrounding human rights wasteland of Burma, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.
I agree, Darunee should be granted bail immediately. Being held in prison after one’s sentence has been vacated is a violation of essential rights and liberties. Where is Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International on this one?
The University of Miami in Florida, along with a thousand other ordinary hard-working unpretentious universities, are more “world class” than Chula University in its present sorry state of political regression and conformity, its staggering percentage of hi-so & students & faculty from “privileged backgrounds”, its focus on “pretend” to be great instead of “really be great”.
What a typically Thai, farsical piece of wordplay! How can you describe yourself as world-class in a “national sense” but not in an “international sense”? That completely misses the definition of “world-class”! Furthermore, there is no way by any standard of scholarship (faculty publication record, number of international citations of journal articles by Chula faculty and students, number of Ph.D. programs, etc.) that Chulalongkorn University is in the same class as other prominent Asian universities, such as the University of Hong Kong, the National University of Singapore, or the University of Tokyo. The sad fact is that the institution has been slipping in prestige for the last 30 years because it insists on playing by its own antiquated rules. On the other hand, Mahidol University has been expending a significant amount of time and energy to raise its ranking with the international community and in 2010 was ranked 28th in Asia compared to Chulalongkorn University’s rank of 44th(http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/asian-university-rankings/2010).
Perhaps CU would be better off and serve the nation better if it asked whether other people categorise it as a ‘world-class’ university. That would be a more significant verdict than whether or not CU believes itself to be ‘world-class’.
The Thai university system is riddled with cheating, bribery, buying graduations and the rest of it, all the ills of dishonesty and intellectual laziness that pervade Thai society seen in microcosm. The best they seem to be able to do is produce stunningly mediocre graduates. Their lawyers are largely incompetent, their doctors are generally just plain ridiculous, and their engineers rely upon the King’s advice for their inspiration, and he didn’t do so well in Switzerland as we know.
Mediocrity is about the only thing that Thailand really excels at, but that isn’t how the Thais see it.
What is your source regarding the results of the village funds? Are there infomration available on the percentage of successful funds, how many failed, why did they fail, what are the total value of the funds today, etc?
I’d love to read “Memory is Another Country: Women of the Vietnamese Diaspora” next, having just finished “The Vietnam War” by Mark Atwood Lawrence which provides a very neat strategic overview of the war’s origin and aftermath.
The Vietnamese really have been shafted from all sides over the past century. Their agony never ended with the peace agreement in 1974 either – continuing through the 80s in a little known border war with China and a further couple of hundred thousand murders amid the internal wrangling that followed the American War. The casualties run into the millions, compared with the 80,000 or so suffered by both French and American forces in the various conflicts that followed WW2.
I live quite close to a large Vietnamese community in Sydney and their unsmiling, almost mean-spirited dispositions always struck me in contrast to the friendly and engaging Thais. I hope books like “Memory is Another Country: Women of the Vietnamese Diaspora” will provide some forgiving insight into their horrors.
Former US Ambassador to Malaysia, John Mallot pointed this out:
“…In its report on the 2010 Annual Article IV Consultations with Malaysia, the IMF said that there is “a stark choice for Malaysians and their political leadership, a choice between muddling through in a business-as-usual mode – or going for an historic transformation of the economy”. The report also says that “rolling back affirmative action” and improving human capital are “necessary to revive the business climate and double Malaysia’s per capita income by 2020.”
For its part, the World Bank has said in their report, “Until solid implementation of reforms is seen, there is unlikely to be a groundswell of positive sentiment of foreign investors towards Malaysia.
Malaysia, US, Australia – still convinced that Barisan Nasiaonal and Najib is your best bet?
It has been brought to my attention that my word version of The Devil’s Discus is missing the photographs on pages facing 114 and 115. I have now corrected this and uploaded the revised file. It can be found here:
I have also converted it into a PDF file for anyone who cannot open microsoft word files. Unfortunately I do not possess the know-how to keep the hyperlinks in the PDF file, but the PDF version can be downloaded from here:
[…] For more on superstition and its influence on Thai politics I recommend you an article written by Pasuk Phongpaichit and Chris Baker called “The spirits, the stars, and Thai politics”, available here. […]
Not to toot my own horn, but I made a similar point about the business climate in Burma 8 years ago in an op-ed (http://irrawaddy.cc/opinion_story.php?art_id=387). People forget now, but even in the 1990s a lot of Western companies that had invested in Burma were pulling out, such as Pepsi. Some of this was due to boycotts and pressure back home, but much was also due to the poor business climate within Burma. I recall one Burmese lawyer recalling that he’d told a foreigner not to threaten litigation because he could never win in Burma’s court system’ “we (Burmese) know the game,” and foreigners don’t.
This in my mind is why Burma isn’t quite like Vietnam, as Senator Jim Webb seems to think. Vietnam had already started reforming by 1986, years before West lifted sanctions. Not only had it become an attractive business destination, but the government in Hanoi had already demonstrated it was committed to reform. By contrast, Burma has yet to enact its doi moi.
[…] were not granted bail next week.” Other estimates were of up to 40,000 red shirts, with rallies in other parts of the country as well. The 12 March date is symbolic as this date marks the anniversary of the red shirt rallies […]
There are several logical mis-constructs regarding misuse of poor logic to defend or even make arguments. not a lot of people would protest giving money to the poor per se, but they would protest just giving it without some sort of meritorious effort on the behalf of those receiving it.
Thaksin gave out one million Baht per village, and look what happened. Not a lot.
When a poor person asks you for money and you say sure, come over to my place, help me wash dishes, clean the floor and sweep the sidewalk…see what happens….
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Not The Nation on Kasit Piromya
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Kris, New Mandala. New Mandala said: Not The Nation on Kasit Piromya: Not The Nation is continuing what has become its fine tradition of social and p… http://bit.ly/eBJD7Y […]
University rankings from Chula’s perspective
This thread could do with some robust and verifiable evidence of Chulalongkorn’s international standing. While I suspect that the comments here may well contain some truth, I also suspect they’re self-satisfactory stabs in the dark. Anybody have credible information?
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
Leah – 44
I recently visited a village fund in Pak Phanang, near Nakhon Si Thammarat.
This is one of the successful ones. Their village fund is now valued at 11 million baht. It is pretty much operating like any bank. It is open Mon-Fri and they are employing 14 staff.
Members can open saving accounts, and deposit and withdraw money as they like. Members are rated from “AAA” to “C”. This rating together with the proposed project serves as a basis for the size and duration of the loan. Repayment rate is close to 100%. Only 4 out of 1000 members have a “C” rating.
I understand that this village fund is an exception, but it would be interesting to know how many of these there are.
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
If, in some cases, 90% of government program funds go to corrupt intermediaries, the village funds would have to be pretty bad not to be an improvement.
“A recent PACC investigation found that less than 10% of disaster relief funds reached those in need.”
Most Thai corruption is the fruit of an organized patronage system in which soldiers, politicians and bureaucrats conspire to loot public funds. No one in power, or with the potential to be in power, wants to change it.
“…it doesn’t really matter what political party or military clique is in power, the Thai state lacks the political and cultural will to check corruption and there is no evidence that this state of affairs will change any time soon. ”
http://asiancorrespondent.com/42088/flood-relief-opens-new-opportunities-for-corrupution/
In any case, given the track record of graft in government programs it seems obvious that some form of direct support would be far more effective.
It also seems important that these forms of support are clearly identified as coming from the state not from individual parties or politicians (or others that won’t be named).
Justice on Trial: Darunee Charnchoengsilpakul and the Thai Constitutional Court
The Bangkok Post (February 20) reports that “Democrat MP Watchara Petchthong has filed a lese majeste complaint against Thaksin Shinaeatra, Robert Amsterdam, his lawyer, and Thanapol Eiwsakal, editor of the Fah Diew Kan left-leaning political magazine.”
“The lawsuit, filed with the Crime Suppression Division, claims that the three colluded to publish a white paper entitled The Bangkok Massacre: A Call for Accountability, which contains allegedly defamatory messages against the country’s highest institution. It also says the white paper accuses Thai courts of being unfair and non-transparent in Thaksin’s asets seizure case.”
University rankings from Chula’s perspective
Recently, Maha Sarakham University had an advertisement in a Thai-language paper in which it also claimed to be a “world class university” (they probably also meant the “national” rather than the “international” meaning of “world class”).
University rankings from Chula’s perspective
I recently spoke with a professor from the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Sweden.
According to him, the exchange students they receive from Chulalongkorn University are consistently in the top 10% of their classes. The same is true for students from many other Asian countries, though he did not have much good to say about students from Malaysia.
Justice on Trial: Darunee Charnchoengsilpakul and the Thai Constitutional Court
As almost all observers of the Thailand situation know, Amnesty International Thailand has its head buried in the PAD/Yellow Royalist sand when it comes to Lese Majeste and the case of Darunee….and as a result has almost no credibility left either in Thailand or the surrounding human rights wasteland of Burma, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.
Justice on Trial: Darunee Charnchoengsilpakul and the Thai Constitutional Court
I agree, Darunee should be granted bail immediately. Being held in prison after one’s sentence has been vacated is a violation of essential rights and liberties. Where is Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International on this one?
University rankings from Chula’s perspective
The University of Miami in Florida, along with a thousand other ordinary hard-working unpretentious universities, are more “world class” than Chula University in its present sorry state of political regression and conformity, its staggering percentage of hi-so & students & faculty from “privileged backgrounds”, its focus on “pretend” to be great instead of “really be great”.
University rankings from Chula’s perspective
What a typically Thai, farsical piece of wordplay! How can you describe yourself as world-class in a “national sense” but not in an “international sense”? That completely misses the definition of “world-class”! Furthermore, there is no way by any standard of scholarship (faculty publication record, number of international citations of journal articles by Chula faculty and students, number of Ph.D. programs, etc.) that Chulalongkorn University is in the same class as other prominent Asian universities, such as the University of Hong Kong, the National University of Singapore, or the University of Tokyo. The sad fact is that the institution has been slipping in prestige for the last 30 years because it insists on playing by its own antiquated rules. On the other hand, Mahidol University has been expending a significant amount of time and energy to raise its ranking with the international community and in 2010 was ranked 28th in Asia compared to Chulalongkorn University’s rank of 44th(http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/asian-university-rankings/2010).
University rankings from Chula’s perspective
Hmmm. Thai self-satisfaction at its best.
Perhaps CU would be better off and serve the nation better if it asked whether other people categorise it as a ‘world-class’ university. That would be a more significant verdict than whether or not CU believes itself to be ‘world-class’.
The Thai university system is riddled with cheating, bribery, buying graduations and the rest of it, all the ills of dishonesty and intellectual laziness that pervade Thai society seen in microcosm. The best they seem to be able to do is produce stunningly mediocre graduates. Their lawyers are largely incompetent, their doctors are generally just plain ridiculous, and their engineers rely upon the King’s advice for their inspiration, and he didn’t do so well in Switzerland as we know.
Mediocrity is about the only thing that Thailand really excels at, but that isn’t how the Thais see it.
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
Frank – 42
What is your source regarding the results of the village funds? Are there infomration available on the percentage of successful funds, how many failed, why did they fail, what are the total value of the funds today, etc?
Review of Memory is Another Country
I’d love to read “Memory is Another Country: Women of the Vietnamese Diaspora” next, having just finished “The Vietnam War” by Mark Atwood Lawrence which provides a very neat strategic overview of the war’s origin and aftermath.
The Vietnamese really have been shafted from all sides over the past century. Their agony never ended with the peace agreement in 1974 either – continuing through the 80s in a little known border war with China and a further couple of hundred thousand murders amid the internal wrangling that followed the American War. The casualties run into the millions, compared with the 80,000 or so suffered by both French and American forces in the various conflicts that followed WW2.
I live quite close to a large Vietnamese community in Sydney and their unsmiling, almost mean-spirited dispositions always struck me in contrast to the friendly and engaging Thais. I hope books like “Memory is Another Country: Women of the Vietnamese Diaspora” will provide some forgiving insight into their horrors.
Malaysia’s economic future
Former US Ambassador to Malaysia, John Mallot pointed this out:
For its part, the World Bank has said in their report, “Until solid implementation of reforms is seen, there is unlikely to be a groundswell of positive sentiment of foreign investors towards Malaysia.
Malaysia, US, Australia – still convinced that Barisan Nasiaonal and Najib is your best bet?
The Devil’s Discus – in Thai
Reference to post #142
It has been brought to my attention that my word version of The Devil’s Discus is missing the photographs on pages facing 114 and 115. I have now corrected this and uploaded the revised file. It can be found here:
URL: http://www.sendspace.com/file/00pv4p
password: discus
I have also converted it into a PDF file for anyone who cannot open microsoft word files. Unfortunately I do not possess the know-how to keep the hyperlinks in the PDF file, but the PDF version can be downloaded from here:
URL: http://www.sendspace.com/file/5q7qk6
password: discus
Both versions will only be available to download for a limited time, but if in the future anyone wants a copy just email me.
Steve
thehouse30AThotmailDOTcom
Pasuk and Baker on “spirits, stars and Thai politics”
[…] For more on superstition and its influence on Thai politics I recommend you an article written by Pasuk Phongpaichit and Chris Baker called “The spirits, the stars, and Thai politics”, available here. […]
Analysis of Ross Dunkley’s fate
Not to toot my own horn, but I made a similar point about the business climate in Burma 8 years ago in an op-ed (http://irrawaddy.cc/opinion_story.php?art_id=387). People forget now, but even in the 1990s a lot of Western companies that had invested in Burma were pulling out, such as Pepsi. Some of this was due to boycotts and pressure back home, but much was also due to the poor business climate within Burma. I recall one Burmese lawyer recalling that he’d told a foreigner not to threaten litigation because he could never win in Burma’s court system’ “we (Burmese) know the game,” and foreigners don’t.
This in my mind is why Burma isn’t quite like Vietnam, as Senator Jim Webb seems to think. Vietnam had already started reforming by 1986, years before West lifted sanctions. Not only had it become an attractive business destination, but the government in Hanoi had already demonstrated it was committed to reform. By contrast, Burma has yet to enact its doi moi.
Strong showing at red shirt fundraiser in Khon Kaen
[…] were not granted bail next week.” Other estimates were of up to 40,000 red shirts, with rallies in other parts of the country as well. The 12 March date is symbolic as this date marks the anniversary of the red shirt rallies […]
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
There are several logical mis-constructs regarding misuse of poor logic to defend or even make arguments. not a lot of people would protest giving money to the poor per se, but they would protest just giving it without some sort of meritorious effort on the behalf of those receiving it.
Thaksin gave out one million Baht per village, and look what happened. Not a lot.
When a poor person asks you for money and you say sure, come over to my place, help me wash dishes, clean the floor and sweep the sidewalk…see what happens….