In my opinion, there should be one standard; everyone pays tax like all other countries. The Crown Property should pay tax. If one person can evade paying tax, many others would try to avoid as well. The property and the income taxes from the Crown Property would definitely reduce the income gap in Thailand.
[…] of these results are consistent with results of an earlier study by Robert Albritton and Thawilwadee Bureekul that found high levels of satisfaction with the […]
Nigel/Phil, for the record (which has only a marginal relationship to this blog!) No, I do not endorse any zero tolerant campaigns now or in the past under TRT; the counterarguments from families protected by such covert practices also have a voice; facts: illicit drugs increased dramatically over the past five years and especially now, the dramatic rise of second public concern (after ya ba) crystal methamphetamine/ or ice (“ya aii”)/War on Drugs or Zero tolerance programs cannot work over the medium to long term without understanding causes, particular power interests and networks behind the production and distribution…TRT/Thaksin’s Reagan-like campaign such as it was may have caught a few medium size fish at best; many targeted were simply small time local mischief makers or even hapless ethnic minorities…There are more qualified folk than me out there to talk to this subject…
Christians bringing their intolerance to northern Thailand and Burma. Not too surprising. Vulnerable people make easy targets for these cultural terrorists. And Christian indoctrination guarantees that the hill tribes will be unable to assimilate into larger society.
To the anonymous poster who said the BoT was an NGO. Actually its a central bank who’s data standards follow the International Monetary Fund’s Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS). The standard requires member countries to disseminate 5 categories of economic data; namely, data on real sector, fiscal sector, financial sector, external sector as well as data on population. There are also 4 rules governing dissemination process 1) the data coverage 2) access by the public 3) integrity of the dissemination, and 4) quality of the disseminated data. While I’m in total agreement to the argument that as a country Thailand has not done enough in poverty alleviation and there is so much more to do; rather than let personal political feelings get in the way, I’d rather look at the data first. Also to JT, the SEC case is very different from the tax evasion case, and involved illegal structures to trade and own Thai securities to avoid disclosure.
Of course, if I was to let personal political feelings get in the way, I be pointing at the Red violent tendencies, the fact that they advocate political assassination as a tool of their movement, that one of their core leaders wants to “burn Bangkok to the ground” and the total lack of any ideology other than removal of the current government. If I had a political bias I’d be fascinated to hear of their economic and social plans and would not be surprised if they were rapidly translating as much of Hugo Chavez’s economic manifesto as they could. I’m glad that I dont have personal political feelings that get in the way.
Seems like this email/letter (spin piece) is designed to influence foreign observers, but how many foreigners get to vote in Thailand?
Lets disseminate these ideas far and wide in Thailand, and then the voters can decide if they agree or disagree with this rosy view of Thai life.
Also in the interest of improving knowledge in the electorate, how about unblocking all the political websites & tv, and remove the ban on certain books, and stop using the LM law & Computer Crimes Act to stifle dissenting views.
(and release Darunee, Suwicha, Boonyuen etc, and drop all pending thought crime charges http://thaipoliticalprisoners.wordpress.com/pendingcases/)
Let the electorate vote, and it’s chosen government rule!
This article promised to change my mind. I had seen those wealth distribution numbers myself, and thought maybe it’s not so bad after all, then. It’s also interesting to see the author trace all improvement back to the country’s time of pure democracy, though I won’t pretend I have the background to judge.
But pretty much every fact in the article that I could verify from personal experience over the past few years (because it’s hard to know what else to trust in such a polarized, state-moderated discussion!) contradicts what I’ve seen.
Take hospitals. I’ve lost several people in my surroundings in the past few years, all lower-class people who died of inadequate medical care. In some cases it was that they could not afford better; others could but care was unavailable regardless. A white-skinned friend was abundantly satisfied with the service in one Bangkok state hospital where another, lower-class family I know was consistently denied contact with doctors. (The patient eventually died of an unspecified infection contracted during a debilitating, costly, and in retrospect probably unnecessary operation). In another case someone of relatively low station, not new to death and disease, came away traumatized from a few days visiting in a hospital because of the constant deaths around her, which were treated with indifference. In that case, better medicine was denied to the patient at any price until we took up the “what if this patient were in your private clinic” angle.
Then there’s infrastructure. Mobile phone coverage is not on a par with Europe at all; I’ve lived in fairly diverse countries there. What rural coverage there is in Thailand is almost invariably from Thaksin’s company, though I’m not pretending to know whether that speaks in his favor or not. Maybe he stopped the competition from catching up, maybe his company was the only one to realize nobody was going to wire the entire country in a wireless age, maybe he wanted to squeeze the rural market, maybe he figured a rising tide raises all boats. I don’t know.
One friend living in the country has told me of the impact he saw of roads that were constructed under Thaksin’s administration, unlocking villages that previously only had limited and costly access to markets, education, or modern comforts. People could get to those before if they really wanted, but having a road turned the possible into the practical. He showed me other roads that had nominally been constructed under the current administration, but only by putting an unnecessary new layer of asphalt on a perfectly good existing road and not putting the white lines back. On paper both administrations did the same thing there, but in practice one made things a lot better and the other only made things slightly worse at a similar cost (more accidents at night because of the missing white lines). To what extent we can credit either prime minister with this, I’m in no position to say. But consider how meaningless or misleading any public account would be, especially in a country where critical reporting is officially frowned upon.
The income distribution statistics look suspicious to me. On one end of the spectrum I see a lot more Ferrari dealers in Bangkok than in European cities, despite much higher prices. A German I spoke to was downright embarrassed by the opulence of Mercedes models he said you couldn’t even get in Germany, and that in my experience is not something a German will easily say about nice cars. He saw several dozen of this particular model outside a wedding at his hotel, apparently privately owned. At the other end of the spectrum, I knew one rural woman who had done fairly well for herself and had a state pension… nominally 5,000 Baht, a pittance by Western standards but better than some working-class people I know make in Bangkok. Of that amount only 50 Baht were actually paid to her, the rest disappearing somewhere along the way. The difference is staggering even if you look at her paper income with the two fictitious zeroes at the end.
From these and countless other experiences I do think there are differences far beyond those in Europe, in both income and treatment, even if the numbers say otherwise.
More illustrations: entirely unrelated people have related personal experiences to me where government officials opposed education for the rural poor, based on their inferiority. This is particularly painful because the “yellow-shirt” movement that has produced the current government has been seeking a predominantly appointed government and/or limitations on the vote on the grounds that the lower classes do not have the education to know what’s good for them or the country.
Some of this may be religious, similar to old Christian interpretations of colored people as the descendants of Cain. I’ve experienced a few cases of otherwise very friendly, reasonable, well-educated higher-class Thais calling other Thais liars, or unreliable, or saying that they “deserve to die” based solely on the station they were born to–without any knowledge of them beyond the color of their faces. Some of it is probably just social deference: in the last decent newspaper I read, an underage prostitute from up-country who had allegedly drugged and mugged a prospective client was shown with full name, photograph, and place of birth. In the same issue, a gang of youths who had stolen a car and murdered someone, but whose number included the son of a policeman, was kept nicely anonymous.
All of this is anecdotal, but the contradiction with the article’s view is striking. If others see the same things, maybe it’s time to question the numbers.
I respect your thought on that one, but a country need to have some certain criteria to be called Democratic. My point is, without either of the right to vote, freedom of speech and expression, total sovereignty, rule of law, and power by the people. Lacking any one of those criteria, then, a country cannot be call democratic. I believed Thailand is still lacking the freedom of speech and expression, total sovereignty, rule of law, and power by the people department. Therefore, I still hold my believe that Thailand is not democracy.
One more point I want to add that, it seems like many Thais has this sense of fault democracy about voting. Voting is not in itself a sufficient condition for the existence of democracy. Elections have often been used by authoritarian regimes or dictatorships to give a false sense of democracy. Historical examples include the USSR under the CPSU before its collapse in 1991, Iraq under Saddam Hussein, and the Philippines under Ferdinand Marcos. I think Thailand election is just a ritual and not a proper democratic procedure anymore, evidence from the 18 Coup Detat that we had.
Portman – 16
I don’t want to bash Thai students but their lag of understanding of the history, (some student don’t even know about the different between 6 Oct 1976 and 14 Oct 1973) and even some TU students doesnt even know about Pridi, the founder of their own university. Do you think those “quality” students are able to think abstractly and appeal to any “ideology” ? I’m sorry to say this but Thai university graduates are just too shallow.
The “nakleng” style of the leaders and the black shirt guards combined with the aggressive, cracked gramophone record rhetoric and old fogies’ mor lam music are designed to appeal to the Por 6 education of their parents and probably represent better the type of society the students want to escape from than what they want for the whole of Thaland.
I have no doubt that for many students this is absolutely true.
Unfortunately, given the way most of them have been “educated”, very few of them have the slightest clue that this, and not relentlessly copying the gestural tics of Korean music videos, might be a part of what is necessary to change Thailand for the better.
It’s a shame that the Korean Wave has not somehow managed to communicate to young Thais what sort of protest movements and how many deaths and imprisonments took place in the South Korea they now idealize for its cool pop culture to have evolved.
You cannot buy knockoffs of democratic reform at JJ Mall any more than you can get a decent education in Thai history and politics in a Thai school, at any level.
Football colors – this year reds clearly lost – Man U lost the Premier League title, Arsenal all their chances at top spot, and Liverpool Champions League place.
Blue Chelsea won the title and white Spurs edged blue, post Thaksin Man City for Champions League last spot.
Relative differences. Relative poverty. So what? Wonderful bag of facts that avoid the central discussion of “political inclusion”, which is the key. It is sad that in this country you cannot address contoversial issues clearly, honestly, publicly; maybe except for here and another couple places. A blogsite such as New Mandala has not been blocked by the government, because the audience is relatively small, and thus not as threatening, say like Pratchathai, etc., and you also have reputed academic protection in an Australian university. After reading this item, it has not forwarded any solutions. Solutions? We will have to plod along with multiple elections ahead. On another note about poverty, it is hardscrabble, “impoverished” world out here by the Emerald Triangle, but most confusingly, the people here appear to be happier, or are able to stomach their woes with a smile. They have to face countless hardships and overcome them without government help. Rural folks, in this respect, are much toughened and hardened, because they have to be. Everywhere in the world.
Perhaps some of you may be interested in the following scrumptious morsel:
” SEEING RED: Football clubs with red team strips are more successful than rivals with other colours, according to a 2008 analysis of post-World War II English league data by experts from the universities of Durham and Plymouth. Red-wearing teams (such as Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal) won more often, while teams wearing YELLOW or orange fared worst. The theory: there’s a psychological boost from wearing RED, a colour which is often associated in nature with male aggression and display.”
By Manager Online 10 May 2010 13:13
Why undermine your own side at such a crucial point in the game? If I had been the editor in charge I would not have permitted this blurb to have been posted. Just goes to show how a bunch of clowns can lead a nation-wide movement of amart, sunshine patriots, Marie Antoinettes, defrocked monks and pretty entertainers to disaster. I am hesitant to donate any more funds to a Movement that chooses such a weak and effeminate colour.
By the way, I am a Bangkok resident and if you believe that the city is engulfed by indiscriminate terrorism or that everyone lives in fear for their mediocre lives then I suggest you head over either to Kabul or to Baghdad. I have been to those places and “random acts of violence” are an everyday occurrence and trepidation does indeed hang in the air. But life goes on and that is the reason why I do admire the people of those war-torn cities; they are resilient and tough and hardly engage in self-pity. Bangkokians, on the other hand, are just haughty, pseudo-Western, air-conditioned junkies (except the proletariat) who freak out whenever they are inconvenienced. Still, exaggeration of the Red Shirt menace does illustrate an aspect about the true nature of Bangkokians seldom captured so viscerally in the open: their ignorance of their own country.
Well, it’s almost 6 o’clock and I am running late. I do not want to keep my Isaan mistress waiting. Cheerio!
When the e-mail writer divulges, “Two or three years ago, I found it impossible for several weeks to find a plumber to put in a new bathroom,” one wonders just why that task proved so difficult. Perhaps the impossibility owed not to a near total absence of plumbers but rather a lack of plumbers whom the writer could employ at a pittance wage.
Those rural types, always thwarting urban comfort.
[…] The third point is to deny that there is any element of class struggle “or urban-rural division…”. The current government line on this is to simply note that “many other democracies [have] economic and social disparities” and that all Thai governments face this problem. Mirroring Kraisak Choonhavan‘s recent line, the ambassador says a “more thorough study of its welfare-oriented policy is recommended for those who believe the government is not pro-poor.” PPT has already commented on this. There are now a plethora of yellow-shirted semi-serious emails circulating claiming the same thing. […]
Actually not that many people were killed in the drug war, not enough to make personal impressions on drug dealers, I’d say it was no more dangerous than driving on Songkran, but the rumors and media spin made it look very very scary indeed.
I’d say it was the overwhelming fear that stopped the drug trade then, not the danger itself.
Similarly, last Songkran it was the mass panic that soldiers were shooting people that dispersed the red crowd, not the non-existing killings.
This time the government failed to create the fear of overwhelming force and so its measures have been ineffective.
This time, as Somsak argues, reds are daring the army to a fight instead of running.
Things have changed since 2006 coup when no one in his right mind ever thought of actually fighting back. I’m not sure things have changed for the better, though.
Red willingness to sacrifice dozens, perhaps hundreds of lives to simply move elections forward by a few months might seem like a progress to them but, as Thongchai rightly says, many people don’t think in the same ways.
At the beginning of the protest one government intelligence source said red acceptable casualties were up to two thousand. I hope they revised that downwards but their pre–roadmap rhetoric was not very promising at all.
The relationships between leaders and followers are indeed more complicated than simple “use”, they all need and feed off each other, to the point of red leaders being unable to make a deal with the government in front of their followers, they need time to talk to their people. Still, it doesn’t rule out the conspiracy by red leaders to use the masses to their own ends, even if they appear so believable, so in accord with the followers.
Conmen can do it, gold-digger brides can do it, bar girls can do it, why not politicians?
Portman: as a thai academic (not sure about DB though?) in fact the tax exemption was quite legal and something that many rich investors were doing at the time (not just one person); but the question relates more to the appropriateness of such action at that time…I am not a legal expert but “appropriatness” is not as far as I know a criminal act? I also remember that the Thailand Securities and Exchange Commission which investigated the transaction found that him clear from all wrongdoing. So endeth the issue. But the coup makers and their judicial mates later wanted to find Thaksin guilty retrospectively (which is wee bit dodgey eh?) Thai law can be Ok for some and not Ok for others. Rich folk in Thailand have long flaunted the system but Thaksin as PM had too much at risk. Finally, why the devil should he “cough up the tax voluntarily”? jeez – even if he was rich. If the law entitled one to this commercial practice would you? No, the amaart wanted his dosh desparately and were prepared to do anything even more recently of course grab his money in Thailand/But then he is rich so it doesnt matter right?
Re: “All main roads in Thailand are paved (close to First-World standards), and most secondary roads are surfaced…”
These are fighting words! Don’t get me started on the quality of roads in Isaan! Pot hole country! This inequality between Bangkok and the rural poor upcountry should hit any visitor right between the eyes! All the public works dollars nowadays go to Bangkok and the surrounding provinces. A pittance goes to the northeast! How dare Robert Woodrow suggest that these roads are up to First-World standards. He obviously hasn’t visited Roi Et for quite some time (if ever). This is a perfect example of the myopia of the Bangkok cottled and pampered class. It’s no wonder that the Democrats don’t stand a chance of getting enough votes to carry Parliament in a new election.
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The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
In my opinion, there should be one standard; everyone pays tax like all other countries. The Crown Property should pay tax. If one person can evade paying tax, many others would try to avoid as well. The property and the income taxes from the Crown Property would definitely reduce the income gap in Thailand.
Is Thai democracy really so bad?
[…] of these results are consistent with results of an earlier study by Robert Albritton and Thawilwadee Bureekul that found high levels of satisfaction with the […]
Thongchai Winichakul on the Red “germs”
Nigel/Phil, for the record (which has only a marginal relationship to this blog!) No, I do not endorse any zero tolerant campaigns now or in the past under TRT; the counterarguments from families protected by such covert practices also have a voice; facts: illicit drugs increased dramatically over the past five years and especially now, the dramatic rise of second public concern (after ya ba) crystal methamphetamine/ or ice (“ya aii”)/War on Drugs or Zero tolerance programs cannot work over the medium to long term without understanding causes, particular power interests and networks behind the production and distribution…TRT/Thaksin’s Reagan-like campaign such as it was may have caught a few medium size fish at best; many targeted were simply small time local mischief makers or even hapless ethnic minorities…There are more qualified folk than me out there to talk to this subject…
Confronting Karen homophobia in Burma
Christians bringing their intolerance to northern Thailand and Burma. Not too surprising. Vulnerable people make easy targets for these cultural terrorists. And Christian indoctrination guarantees that the hill tribes will be unable to assimilate into larger society.
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
To the anonymous poster who said the BoT was an NGO. Actually its a central bank who’s data standards follow the International Monetary Fund’s Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS). The standard requires member countries to disseminate 5 categories of economic data; namely, data on real sector, fiscal sector, financial sector, external sector as well as data on population. There are also 4 rules governing dissemination process 1) the data coverage 2) access by the public 3) integrity of the dissemination, and 4) quality of the disseminated data. While I’m in total agreement to the argument that as a country Thailand has not done enough in poverty alleviation and there is so much more to do; rather than let personal political feelings get in the way, I’d rather look at the data first. Also to JT, the SEC case is very different from the tax evasion case, and involved illegal structures to trade and own Thai securities to avoid disclosure.
Of course, if I was to let personal political feelings get in the way, I be pointing at the Red violent tendencies, the fact that they advocate political assassination as a tool of their movement, that one of their core leaders wants to “burn Bangkok to the ground” and the total lack of any ideology other than removal of the current government. If I had a political bias I’d be fascinated to hear of their economic and social plans and would not be surprised if they were rapidly translating as much of Hugo Chavez’s economic manifesto as they could. I’m glad that I dont have personal political feelings that get in the way.
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
Seems like this email/letter (spin piece) is designed to influence foreign observers, but how many foreigners get to vote in Thailand?
Lets disseminate these ideas far and wide in Thailand, and then the voters can decide if they agree or disagree with this rosy view of Thai life.
Also in the interest of improving knowledge in the electorate, how about unblocking all the political websites & tv, and remove the ban on certain books, and stop using the LM law & Computer Crimes Act to stifle dissenting views.
(and release Darunee, Suwicha, Boonyuen etc, and drop all pending thought crime charges http://thaipoliticalprisoners.wordpress.com/pendingcases/)
Let the electorate vote, and it’s chosen government rule!
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
This article promised to change my mind. I had seen those wealth distribution numbers myself, and thought maybe it’s not so bad after all, then. It’s also interesting to see the author trace all improvement back to the country’s time of pure democracy, though I won’t pretend I have the background to judge.
But pretty much every fact in the article that I could verify from personal experience over the past few years (because it’s hard to know what else to trust in such a polarized, state-moderated discussion!) contradicts what I’ve seen.
Take hospitals. I’ve lost several people in my surroundings in the past few years, all lower-class people who died of inadequate medical care. In some cases it was that they could not afford better; others could but care was unavailable regardless. A white-skinned friend was abundantly satisfied with the service in one Bangkok state hospital where another, lower-class family I know was consistently denied contact with doctors. (The patient eventually died of an unspecified infection contracted during a debilitating, costly, and in retrospect probably unnecessary operation). In another case someone of relatively low station, not new to death and disease, came away traumatized from a few days visiting in a hospital because of the constant deaths around her, which were treated with indifference. In that case, better medicine was denied to the patient at any price until we took up the “what if this patient were in your private clinic” angle.
Then there’s infrastructure. Mobile phone coverage is not on a par with Europe at all; I’ve lived in fairly diverse countries there. What rural coverage there is in Thailand is almost invariably from Thaksin’s company, though I’m not pretending to know whether that speaks in his favor or not. Maybe he stopped the competition from catching up, maybe his company was the only one to realize nobody was going to wire the entire country in a wireless age, maybe he wanted to squeeze the rural market, maybe he figured a rising tide raises all boats. I don’t know.
One friend living in the country has told me of the impact he saw of roads that were constructed under Thaksin’s administration, unlocking villages that previously only had limited and costly access to markets, education, or modern comforts. People could get to those before if they really wanted, but having a road turned the possible into the practical. He showed me other roads that had nominally been constructed under the current administration, but only by putting an unnecessary new layer of asphalt on a perfectly good existing road and not putting the white lines back. On paper both administrations did the same thing there, but in practice one made things a lot better and the other only made things slightly worse at a similar cost (more accidents at night because of the missing white lines). To what extent we can credit either prime minister with this, I’m in no position to say. But consider how meaningless or misleading any public account would be, especially in a country where critical reporting is officially frowned upon.
The income distribution statistics look suspicious to me. On one end of the spectrum I see a lot more Ferrari dealers in Bangkok than in European cities, despite much higher prices. A German I spoke to was downright embarrassed by the opulence of Mercedes models he said you couldn’t even get in Germany, and that in my experience is not something a German will easily say about nice cars. He saw several dozen of this particular model outside a wedding at his hotel, apparently privately owned. At the other end of the spectrum, I knew one rural woman who had done fairly well for herself and had a state pension… nominally 5,000 Baht, a pittance by Western standards but better than some working-class people I know make in Bangkok. Of that amount only 50 Baht were actually paid to her, the rest disappearing somewhere along the way. The difference is staggering even if you look at her paper income with the two fictitious zeroes at the end.
From these and countless other experiences I do think there are differences far beyond those in Europe, in both income and treatment, even if the numbers say otherwise.
More illustrations: entirely unrelated people have related personal experiences to me where government officials opposed education for the rural poor, based on their inferiority. This is particularly painful because the “yellow-shirt” movement that has produced the current government has been seeking a predominantly appointed government and/or limitations on the vote on the grounds that the lower classes do not have the education to know what’s good for them or the country.
Some of this may be religious, similar to old Christian interpretations of colored people as the descendants of Cain. I’ve experienced a few cases of otherwise very friendly, reasonable, well-educated higher-class Thais calling other Thais liars, or unreliable, or saying that they “deserve to die” based solely on the station they were born to–without any knowledge of them beyond the color of their faces. Some of it is probably just social deference: in the last decent newspaper I read, an underage prostitute from up-country who had allegedly drugged and mugged a prospective client was shown with full name, photograph, and place of birth. In the same issue, a gang of youths who had stolen a car and murdered someone, but whose number included the son of a policeman, was kept nicely anonymous.
All of this is anecdotal, but the contradiction with the article’s view is striking. If others see the same things, maybe it’s time to question the numbers.
“Sufficiency democracy” – my contribution to political science vocabulary?
Jay – 19
I respect your thought on that one, but a country need to have some certain criteria to be called Democratic. My point is, without either of the right to vote, freedom of speech and expression, total sovereignty, rule of law, and power by the people. Lacking any one of those criteria, then, a country cannot be call democratic. I believed Thailand is still lacking the freedom of speech and expression, total sovereignty, rule of law, and power by the people department. Therefore, I still hold my believe that Thailand is not democracy.
One more point I want to add that, it seems like many Thais has this sense of fault democracy about voting. Voting is not in itself a sufficient condition for the existence of democracy. Elections have often been used by authoritarian regimes or dictatorships to give a false sense of democracy. Historical examples include the USSR under the CPSU before its collapse in 1991, Iraq under Saddam Hussein, and the Philippines under Ferdinand Marcos. I think Thailand election is just a ritual and not a proper democratic procedure anymore, evidence from the 18 Coup Detat that we had.
Map of “Bangkok Dangerous”
Portman – 16
I don’t want to bash Thai students but their lag of understanding of the history, (some student don’t even know about the different between 6 Oct 1976 and 14 Oct 1973) and even some TU students doesnt even know about Pridi, the founder of their own university. Do you think those “quality” students are able to think abstractly and appeal to any “ideology” ? I’m sorry to say this but Thai university graduates are just too shallow.
Map of “Bangkok Dangerous”
The “nakleng” style of the leaders and the black shirt guards combined with the aggressive, cracked gramophone record rhetoric and old fogies’ mor lam music are designed to appeal to the Por 6 education of their parents and probably represent better the type of society the students want to escape from than what they want for the whole of Thaland.
I have no doubt that for many students this is absolutely true.
Unfortunately, given the way most of them have been “educated”, very few of them have the slightest clue that this, and not relentlessly copying the gestural tics of Korean music videos, might be a part of what is necessary to change Thailand for the better.
It’s a shame that the Korean Wave has not somehow managed to communicate to young Thais what sort of protest movements and how many deaths and imprisonments took place in the South Korea they now idealize for its cool pop culture to have evolved.
You cannot buy knockoffs of democratic reform at JJ Mall any more than you can get a decent education in Thai history and politics in a Thai school, at any level.
Map of “Bangkok Dangerous”
Football colors – this year reds clearly lost – Man U lost the Premier League title, Arsenal all their chances at top spot, and Liverpool Champions League place.
Blue Chelsea won the title and white Spurs edged blue, post Thaksin Man City for Champions League last spot.
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
In response to middle-income peasants,
Relative differences. Relative poverty. So what? Wonderful bag of facts that avoid the central discussion of “political inclusion”, which is the key. It is sad that in this country you cannot address contoversial issues clearly, honestly, publicly; maybe except for here and another couple places. A blogsite such as New Mandala has not been blocked by the government, because the audience is relatively small, and thus not as threatening, say like Pratchathai, etc., and you also have reputed academic protection in an Australian university. After reading this item, it has not forwarded any solutions. Solutions? We will have to plod along with multiple elections ahead. On another note about poverty, it is hardscrabble, “impoverished” world out here by the Emerald Triangle, but most confusingly, the people here appear to be happier, or are able to stomach their woes with a smile. They have to face countless hardships and overcome them without government help. Rural folks, in this respect, are much toughened and hardened, because they have to be. Everywhere in the world.
ET (Emerald Triangle)
Map of “Bangkok Dangerous”
Perhaps some of you may be interested in the following scrumptious morsel:
” SEEING RED: Football clubs with red team strips are more successful than rivals with other colours, according to a 2008 analysis of post-World War II English league data by experts from the universities of Durham and Plymouth. Red-wearing teams (such as Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal) won more often, while teams wearing YELLOW or orange fared worst. The theory: there’s a psychological boost from wearing RED, a colour which is often associated in nature with male aggression and display.”
By Manager Online 10 May 2010 13:13
Why undermine your own side at such a crucial point in the game? If I had been the editor in charge I would not have permitted this blurb to have been posted. Just goes to show how a bunch of clowns can lead a nation-wide movement of amart, sunshine patriots, Marie Antoinettes, defrocked monks and pretty entertainers to disaster. I am hesitant to donate any more funds to a Movement that chooses such a weak and effeminate colour.
By the way, I am a Bangkok resident and if you believe that the city is engulfed by indiscriminate terrorism or that everyone lives in fear for their mediocre lives then I suggest you head over either to Kabul or to Baghdad. I have been to those places and “random acts of violence” are an everyday occurrence and trepidation does indeed hang in the air. But life goes on and that is the reason why I do admire the people of those war-torn cities; they are resilient and tough and hardly engage in self-pity. Bangkokians, on the other hand, are just haughty, pseudo-Western, air-conditioned junkies (except the proletariat) who freak out whenever they are inconvenienced. Still, exaggeration of the Red Shirt menace does illustrate an aspect about the true nature of Bangkokians seldom captured so viscerally in the open: their ignorance of their own country.
Well, it’s almost 6 o’clock and I am running late. I do not want to keep my Isaan mistress waiting. Cheerio!
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
“farm incomes are up some 40%. (data from BoT on the URL) ”
Hmmm, not where I go to in Issaan it isn’t, nor anything like it.
But wait… the BoT is a NGO isn’t it? Spotted the weakness in your argument yet?
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
When the e-mail writer divulges, “Two or three years ago, I found it impossible for several weeks to find a plumber to put in a new bathroom,” one wonders just why that task proved so difficult. Perhaps the impossibility owed not to a near total absence of plumbers but rather a lack of plumbers whom the writer could employ at a pittance wage.
Those rural types, always thwarting urban comfort.
Confronting Karen homophobia in Burma
great article Violet and Dave. thanks for posting.
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
[…] The third point is to deny that there is any element of class struggle “or urban-rural division…”. The current government line on this is to simply note that “many other democracies [have] economic and social disparities” and that all Thai governments face this problem. Mirroring Kraisak Choonhavan‘s recent line, the ambassador says a “more thorough study of its welfare-oriented policy is recommended for those who believe the government is not pro-poor.” PPT has already commented on this. There are now a plethora of yellow-shirted semi-serious emails circulating claiming the same thing. […]
Thongchai Winichakul on the Red “germs”
Actually not that many people were killed in the drug war, not enough to make personal impressions on drug dealers, I’d say it was no more dangerous than driving on Songkran, but the rumors and media spin made it look very very scary indeed.
I’d say it was the overwhelming fear that stopped the drug trade then, not the danger itself.
Similarly, last Songkran it was the mass panic that soldiers were shooting people that dispersed the red crowd, not the non-existing killings.
This time the government failed to create the fear of overwhelming force and so its measures have been ineffective.
This time, as Somsak argues, reds are daring the army to a fight instead of running.
Things have changed since 2006 coup when no one in his right mind ever thought of actually fighting back. I’m not sure things have changed for the better, though.
Red willingness to sacrifice dozens, perhaps hundreds of lives to simply move elections forward by a few months might seem like a progress to them but, as Thongchai rightly says, many people don’t think in the same ways.
At the beginning of the protest one government intelligence source said red acceptable casualties were up to two thousand. I hope they revised that downwards but their pre–roadmap rhetoric was not very promising at all.
The relationships between leaders and followers are indeed more complicated than simple “use”, they all need and feed off each other, to the point of red leaders being unable to make a deal with the government in front of their followers, they need time to talk to their people. Still, it doesn’t rule out the conspiracy by red leaders to use the masses to their own ends, even if they appear so believable, so in accord with the followers.
Conmen can do it, gold-digger brides can do it, bar girls can do it, why not politicians?
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
Portman: as a thai academic (not sure about DB though?) in fact the tax exemption was quite legal and something that many rich investors were doing at the time (not just one person); but the question relates more to the appropriateness of such action at that time…I am not a legal expert but “appropriatness” is not as far as I know a criminal act? I also remember that the Thailand Securities and Exchange Commission which investigated the transaction found that him clear from all wrongdoing. So endeth the issue. But the coup makers and their judicial mates later wanted to find Thaksin guilty retrospectively (which is wee bit dodgey eh?) Thai law can be Ok for some and not Ok for others. Rich folk in Thailand have long flaunted the system but Thaksin as PM had too much at risk. Finally, why the devil should he “cough up the tax voluntarily”? jeez – even if he was rich. If the law entitled one to this commercial practice would you? No, the amaart wanted his dosh desparately and were prepared to do anything even more recently of course grab his money in Thailand/But then he is rich so it doesnt matter right?
The rebellion of Thailand’s middle-income peasants
Re: “All main roads in Thailand are paved (close to First-World standards), and most secondary roads are surfaced…”
These are fighting words! Don’t get me started on the quality of roads in Isaan! Pot hole country! This inequality between Bangkok and the rural poor upcountry should hit any visitor right between the eyes! All the public works dollars nowadays go to Bangkok and the surrounding provinces. A pittance goes to the northeast! How dare Robert Woodrow suggest that these roads are up to First-World standards. He obviously hasn’t visited Roi Et for quite some time (if ever). This is a perfect example of the myopia of the Bangkok cottled and pampered class. It’s no wonder that the Democrats don’t stand a chance of getting enough votes to carry Parliament in a new election.