Thank you for posting this as I was trying to get more information about the seminar. I agree the crisis was set off by Thai internal politics, but the consequences have gone way beyond that. What could be other [underlying] causes that sustain the dispute, particularly public opinion. Was this discussed in the seminar?
“As a historical site, Phra Viharn is also useful in evoking a former period of national glory in which the extent of the Thai kingdom is imagined to be much extensive than it is now, before it was emasculated by colonial incursions.”
I can’t disagree since I don’t have much insight into Thai perspective, but I don’t understand. Preah Vihear was built by Khmer kings in the 11th century deep inside Cambodia’s interior and at least a century before the emergence of a Thai state. It would be logical/natural for the site to evoke memories of former glories of the Khmer Empire to Cambodians, but I don’t see the connection it could bring with Thai people’s sense of loss of territory due to colonial power. The ‘geo-body’ perhaps can, but not the cultural, ancestral, and historical aspect of the site per se – unless such connection is either falsely created or wrongly imagined. In this case, public opinion and misunderstanding weighs in heavily.
Too bad those of us English speakers who can’t read French (and likewise French speakers who can’t read English) won’t be able to read the entire volume – given that it took 5 years in preparation.
A 1998 study of Karen State by the Burma Ethnic Research Group reported that with a population about 70% rural, over 60 per cent of farmers cultivate agricultural land of under 5 hectares (12.35 acres).
Some ham-fisted and inept acts on the part of the Samak government have assisted them in this cause
That’s an understatement!
What were they thinking having Thaksin’s lawyer do the temple deal at the same time as Thaksin was doing business deals with Cambodia?
Although their nationalistic tone has been disgraceful, you cannot blame the PAD for bringing up the possible conflict of interest – they could hardly ignore it.
I googled and I searched but I just can’t locate that NIDA poll Jim Taylor (#43) claimed was just done recently and reflected Thai people’s losing faith in their judicial system. Jim Taylor, you’re not NOW reduced to fudging facts and polls to defend the disgraced Thaksin, are you?
But my question to you Jim Taylor is why in the hell is Thaksin Shinawatra running sooo pissing scared . . . even to the extent of forfeiting his frozen Baht 76 billion to the authorities? (Personally I would defend to death my measly, but all earned honestly Baht 2.0 against anyone.) And his sudden attack of fear immediately after his wife Potjaman was convicted of tax evasion and after one of his lawyers also convicted for attempting to bribe the judges . . .
If Thaksin Shinawatra would not dare face the judicial music while his nominee-Samak is PM and his ex-TRT party (now PPP) members are still running the government, not to mention his numerous police general friends and army general friends, still in power, then just when, if ever, will Thaksin Shinawatra gather the courage and the conviction to defend himself , and his principles, and his beloved democracy, in person in Thailand.
Criminals when found guilty do easily turn to color yellow. And I suggest to you Jim Taylor that your hero Thaksin (while himself not one to endear himself to the Thai royalty) now ironically finds himself in color deep blazing embarrassing yellow!
This kind of material does not trigger the same excitement from your readers as do PAD, HMK, CPB, Thaksin, etc (if the number of comments per post is anything to go by). Too bad. My view of the spectre of evictions is that it draws up a particular image of the state (punitive, aggressive, anti-community) that sure is in need of some revision. What we need, along with critique, is some interesting ethnography that pushes the understanding of the region toward some greater complexity and thus makes some of our cliches untenable. I tried to argue this in my book: “To define communities are opposed to or as fundamentally distinct from the state would require a dismissal of the connections that constitute contemporary villages and the imagery that animates their self-presentation at festivals and their attempts to bargain for recognition and benefits” (146). Academics and NGO types are a part of the landscape, as are government officials of various ilk, Thai nationalism, and other sets of ideas and images that make it hard to draw clear lines between facts and rhetoric. So I hope you’ll keep at it (and keep the rest of us posted)!
Leif, thanks for your thoughtful comments on our article. We appreciate your agreement on the basic point that when it comes to eviction “the cases are few and far between.” We also welcome your more critical points. At this stage we have a few quick responses:
1. We are not suggesting that the “spectre of eviction” is just a product of academic and NGO discourse. We emphasise that state systems of land classification, state policy and statements by government officials have all contributed to it.
2. Nor do we wish to deny that upland people in northern Thailand are often socially, economically, politically and culturally disadvantaged. But we are questioning the usefulness of the “spectre of eviction” in addressing this disadvantage.
3. Your points about discourses of ethnicity and nature are well made. In Forest Guardians, Forest Destroyers, Forsyth and Walker explore the political implications of these discourses at some length (as have other scholars). In this paper we had a more specific purpose.
Jon seems convinced that there must be many cases of eviction, whatever the evidence. Once he has read the article he will see that we do document a series of cases of eviction, including the high profile cases from Chiang Rai province that he seems to be referring to. If any New Mandala readers are aware of other cases of eviction that have occurred in northern Thailand over the past 20 years, please post the details here. We would be vary happy to prepare a special post highlighting these cases.
Jim Taylor: I ask you direct questions and you avoid the question – I will leave it up to readers which of us is practicing obfuscation.
Upon re-reading this thread, I can see that you have partly answered some of my questions in you post #8 above.
“All the innuendos and allegations about Thaksin are without substance but have been taken as fact in itself. Whether we like it or not, he in fact acted within the law during his political tenure (though the question of whether his actions were “appropriate” are quite another matter).”
I disagree that there is no substance and think many of the allegations deserve to be tested in court – which, btw, is more of a chance than the drug war & Tak Bai victims were given.
Well I guess with all that money floating around the CPB will be able to settle the asbestos claims arising from all that chrysotile dust floating around.
Just wait. The asbestos issue is going to explode over here sooner or later. If you were an investigative journalist you could write a book on this one.
Approximately 1978 I did a Parachute course at Williamstown Australia with you and your bodyguard.
I’am intending to visit your country in the near future and if possible would like to meet with you providing this is convenient.
Should this request be accepted by you, I can be contacted via my email address [email protected]
“The review of the literature in this article suggests, however, that very few evictions have in fact taken place since the early 1980s…”
Rely on a “review of the literature” ?
I am sitting in an internet cafe about 30-40 kilometres away from some of the best article referees for statements like this:
The people who live in villages in the hills bounded by Fang-Maesai-Chiang Rai.
As a historian would say, the necessary primary sources probably don’t exist to write this history. As a computer programmer would say: garbage in garbage out.
Has anyone adequately documented evictions? I doubt it. First, the facts, then post-modernist discourse analysis.
I’d confused the khor jor kor programme’s purpose — I thought the possibility of eviction by that policy was due to impoverishment resulting from the lack of connection to the state rather than afforestation.
I’m more interested and more confused after reading it awake. I don’t see how a realistic regime of images is going to occur when images are always subjective and dependent on the perception of the viewer. I think any regime of images is going to continue to foster a schism because the image is only ever going to have been painted (adjudicated) by someone on one particular side of the fence in Thailand, and not by someone on either side. At least with your argument, there is time for the fostering of mutual respect to take place. Although, how long should it be that one lives without options?
BTW, links to the mischievous Puppet Master Prem? Yes- it first sounds odd that the PAD will pick this Tuesday as the big day for the climatic move against to government since normally big rallies by these goons is reserved for the weekends when people are free from work to join. But this Tuesday falls on Prem’s 88 birthday and according PAD a day under lucky signs!!??
Another example of obfuscation by blog name nganadeeleg. It is not just Thaksin who is pissed off with the corrupt judiciary by according to recent NIDA polls conducted with over a thousand (urban) Thais 40% now believe the judicial system is being manipulated to attack Thaksin. One foreign legal advisory firm noted that Thailand is entering new waters on the subject since traditionally nearly 100% of Thais respected the courts: he said is a recent i/v “I have never seen Thais criticising the courts as casual as this before”. see http://thaiintelligentnews.wordpress.com/. Come on boys – time to wake up!
The article is squarely in an empiricist tradition of exposing some erroneous ideas (the truth will set us all free, eh?). The specter of evictions is a stark image that calls attention to livelihood insecurity in these hinterland areas. This insecurity (marginality, whatever to call it) is anchored to a string of images that you do not mention. One is thammachat, that couples forests and Buddhism. Another is Thai, which assumes that ethnic minority peoples are recent (and unlawful) immigrants on Thai soil. These concepts intersect in many ways and are above criticism, it seems.
It is fine to pick at the representations of (environmental) problems in northern Thailand, but ideally there should also be some new ways of describing people and places — beyond the Karen consensus that Andrew made famous, the Bangkok Post had something of an Akha consensus (colorful and interesting people who are in danger of losing their culture and we should all feel sad for as long as it takes to read the feature article in the weekend section), and there is also the Hmong consensus of the authorities (that they are illegals from Laos, and the only way is to truck them over to the Lao border).
Thai movies have a notorious record for how they depict ethnic minority highlanders. While they don’t aim for ethnographic value about chao-khao, they offer an interesting and sometimes troubling ethnographic glimpse of (subconscious?) Thai imagery. I am assuming that the CMU academics are in part trying to fight that regime of images (illegals, dying traditionalists, babbling idiots, forest destroyers, all rolled into one) with the specter of evictions and other notions. I’d give them the benefit of the doubt. I look forward to more interesting ethnographic work about the region, on farmers as much as on the “collaborative and realistic regime of images” that will emerge from extended interactions with state agencies in Thailand.
Editor’s note (NF): Readers hoping to learn more about Paul Handley (mentioned below) would be well-advised to start here. His record speaks for itself.
Jo // Aug 24, 2008 at 5:10 am
Yo – you freaks are all talking about how the King is so this and that – but every country all over the world – and every president is greedy – you all complain about The Thai King – but look at Bush? He has in the last 10 years killed the majority of The Middle East – and he is close friends with Taksin – They are close friends. And Taksin’s bithazz is the one contributing to most of the problems in Thailand now – I don’t understand? The Thai people are not like you Western small-minded idiots who think driving big cars and making only money for your life is everything – they value family, and belief, and they love their country and their King – The one thing that you western freaks never learn is that to leave others alone and look at your own idiot reflection in the mirror before you try to fix everybody else’s – Since the beginning it’s pretty much been westerners going around trying to change every country to be Christian, and bombing other countries – Let me ask you a question? What is any of somelse’s business with yours? Let me tell you something this Handley. He can’t speak Thai, he’s never lived in Thailand, and doesn’t know anything about Thai Culture. Culture of a country is not written in a book – and can not be explained by words – it is felt and experienced in real time – And I am from America, but speak Thai fluently, and have lived in Thailand for already about 2 years.
Facebook 
Twitter 
Soundcloud 
Youtube 
Rss
PAD and the Democrats will miss Thaksin
Hello?
What happened to Thaksin’s voluble handyman Jim Taylor?
nganadeeleg, bangkok pundit and matty await your response or have you ran out of cock-and-bull stories?
Phra Viharn: the dividing line in Thailand
Thank you for posting this as I was trying to get more information about the seminar. I agree the crisis was set off by Thai internal politics, but the consequences have gone way beyond that. What could be other [underlying] causes that sustain the dispute, particularly public opinion. Was this discussed in the seminar?
“As a historical site, Phra Viharn is also useful in evoking a former period of national glory in which the extent of the Thai kingdom is imagined to be much extensive than it is now, before it was emasculated by colonial incursions.”
I can’t disagree since I don’t have much insight into Thai perspective, but I don’t understand. Preah Vihear was built by Khmer kings in the 11th century deep inside Cambodia’s interior and at least a century before the emergence of a Thai state. It would be logical/natural for the site to evoke memories of former glories of the Khmer Empire to Cambodians, but I don’t see the connection it could bring with Thai people’s sense of loss of territory due to colonial power. The ‘geo-body’ perhaps can, but not the cultural, ancestral, and historical aspect of the site per se – unless such connection is either falsely created or wrongly imagined. In this case, public opinion and misunderstanding weighs in heavily.
Laos ne s’est pas fait en un jour!
Too bad those of us English speakers who can’t read French (and likewise French speakers who can’t read English) won’t be able to read the entire volume – given that it took 5 years in preparation.
Phra Viharn: the dividing line in Thailand
Thank you Andrew for posting your presentation into the public sphere.
As a student here @ the ANU, I had hoped to attend this seminar but circumstances occurred.
I’m curious as to what views were expressed by the other presenters.
Response to Kaplan on Burma
Twenty to fifty acres is a small plot of land?
A 1998 study of Karen State by the Burma Ethnic Research Group reported that with a population about 70% rural, over 60 per cent of farmers cultivate agricultural land of under 5 hectares (12.35 acres).
PAD and the Democrats will miss Thaksin
Jim: Are you able to provide a link to the NIDA poll? I note that the website/blog you refer to mentions the poll, but that also contains no link.
Phra Viharn: the dividing line in Thailand
Some ham-fisted and inept acts on the part of the Samak government have assisted them in this cause
That’s an understatement!
What were they thinking having Thaksin’s lawyer do the temple deal at the same time as Thaksin was doing business deals with Cambodia?
Although their nationalistic tone has been disgraceful, you cannot blame the PAD for bringing up the possible conflict of interest – they could hardly ignore it.
The origins of temple madness
[…] week the National Thai Studies Centre hosted a discussion on the current border dispute between Cambodia and Thailand. Here is the text of my […]
PAD and the Democrats will miss Thaksin
I googled and I searched but I just can’t locate that NIDA poll Jim Taylor (#43) claimed was just done recently and reflected Thai people’s losing faith in their judicial system. Jim Taylor, you’re not NOW reduced to fudging facts and polls to defend the disgraced Thaksin, are you?
But my question to you Jim Taylor is why in the hell is Thaksin Shinawatra running sooo pissing scared . . . even to the extent of forfeiting his frozen Baht 76 billion to the authorities? (Personally I would defend to death my measly, but all earned honestly Baht 2.0 against anyone.) And his sudden attack of fear immediately after his wife Potjaman was convicted of tax evasion and after one of his lawyers also convicted for attempting to bribe the judges . . .
If Thaksin Shinawatra would not dare face the judicial music while his nominee-Samak is PM and his ex-TRT party (now PPP) members are still running the government, not to mention his numerous police general friends and army general friends, still in power, then just when, if ever, will Thaksin Shinawatra gather the courage and the conviction to defend himself , and his principles, and his beloved democracy, in person in Thailand.
Criminals when found guilty do easily turn to color yellow. And I suggest to you Jim Taylor that your hero Thaksin (while himself not one to endear himself to the Thai royalty) now ironically finds himself in color deep blazing embarrassing yellow!
Northern Thailand’s specter of eviction
This kind of material does not trigger the same excitement from your readers as do PAD, HMK, CPB, Thaksin, etc (if the number of comments per post is anything to go by). Too bad. My view of the spectre of evictions is that it draws up a particular image of the state (punitive, aggressive, anti-community) that sure is in need of some revision. What we need, along with critique, is some interesting ethnography that pushes the understanding of the region toward some greater complexity and thus makes some of our cliches untenable. I tried to argue this in my book: “To define communities are opposed to or as fundamentally distinct from the state would require a dismissal of the connections that constitute contemporary villages and the imagery that animates their self-presentation at festivals and their attempts to bargain for recognition and benefits” (146). Academics and NGO types are a part of the landscape, as are government officials of various ilk, Thai nationalism, and other sets of ideas and images that make it hard to draw clear lines between facts and rhetoric. So I hope you’ll keep at it (and keep the rest of us posted)!
Northern Thailand’s specter of eviction
Leif, thanks for your thoughtful comments on our article. We appreciate your agreement on the basic point that when it comes to eviction “the cases are few and far between.” We also welcome your more critical points. At this stage we have a few quick responses:
1. We are not suggesting that the “spectre of eviction” is just a product of academic and NGO discourse. We emphasise that state systems of land classification, state policy and statements by government officials have all contributed to it.
2. Nor do we wish to deny that upland people in northern Thailand are often socially, economically, politically and culturally disadvantaged. But we are questioning the usefulness of the “spectre of eviction” in addressing this disadvantage.
3. Your points about discourses of ethnicity and nature are well made. In Forest Guardians, Forest Destroyers, Forsyth and Walker explore the political implications of these discourses at some length (as have other scholars). In this paper we had a more specific purpose.
Jon seems convinced that there must be many cases of eviction, whatever the evidence. Once he has read the article he will see that we do document a series of cases of eviction, including the high profile cases from Chiang Rai province that he seems to be referring to. If any New Mandala readers are aware of other cases of eviction that have occurred in northern Thailand over the past 20 years, please post the details here. We would be vary happy to prepare a special post highlighting these cases.
PAD and the Democrats will miss Thaksin
Jim Taylor: I ask you direct questions and you avoid the question – I will leave it up to readers which of us is practicing obfuscation.
Upon re-reading this thread, I can see that you have partly answered some of my questions in you post #8 above.
“All the innuendos and allegations about Thaksin are without substance but have been taken as fact in itself. Whether we like it or not, he in fact acted within the law during his political tenure (though the question of whether his actions were “appropriate” are quite another matter).”
I disagree that there is no substance and think many of the allegations deserve to be tested in court – which, btw, is more of a chance than the drug war & Tak Bai victims were given.
Sufficient discipline, sufficient wealth
Well I guess with all that money floating around the CPB will be able to settle the asbestos claims arising from all that chrysotile dust floating around.
Just wait. The asbestos issue is going to explode over here sooner or later. If you were an investigative journalist you could write a book on this one.
Thailand’s crown prince
Dear Crown Prince,
Approximately 1978 I did a Parachute course at Williamstown Australia with you and your bodyguard.
I’am intending to visit your country in the near future and if possible would like to meet with you providing this is convenient.
Should this request be accepted by you, I can be contacted via my email address [email protected]
Regards James Jones
Northern Thailand’s specter of eviction
“The review of the literature in this article suggests, however, that very few evictions have in fact taken place since the early 1980s…”
Rely on a “review of the literature” ?
I am sitting in an internet cafe about 30-40 kilometres away from some of the best article referees for statements like this:
The people who live in villages in the hills bounded by Fang-Maesai-Chiang Rai.
As a historian would say, the necessary primary sources probably don’t exist to write this history. As a computer programmer would say: garbage in garbage out.
Has anyone adequately documented evictions? I doubt it. First, the facts, then post-modernist discourse analysis.
Northern Thailand’s specter of eviction
I’d confused the khor jor kor programme’s purpose — I thought the possibility of eviction by that policy was due to impoverishment resulting from the lack of connection to the state rather than afforestation.
I’m more interested and more confused after reading it awake. I don’t see how a realistic regime of images is going to occur when images are always subjective and dependent on the perception of the viewer. I think any regime of images is going to continue to foster a schism because the image is only ever going to have been painted (adjudicated) by someone on one particular side of the fence in Thailand, and not by someone on either side. At least with your argument, there is time for the fostering of mutual respect to take place. Although, how long should it be that one lives without options?
PAD and the Democrats will miss Thaksin
BTW, links to the mischievous Puppet Master Prem? Yes- it first sounds odd that the PAD will pick this Tuesday as the big day for the climatic move against to government since normally big rallies by these goons is reserved for the weekends when people are free from work to join. But this Tuesday falls on Prem’s 88 birthday and according PAD a day under lucky signs!!??
PAD and the Democrats will miss Thaksin
Another example of obfuscation by blog name nganadeeleg. It is not just Thaksin who is pissed off with the corrupt judiciary by according to recent NIDA polls conducted with over a thousand (urban) Thais 40% now believe the judicial system is being manipulated to attack Thaksin. One foreign legal advisory firm noted that Thailand is entering new waters on the subject since traditionally nearly 100% of Thais respected the courts: he said is a recent i/v “I have never seen Thais criticising the courts as casual as this before”. see http://thaiintelligentnews.wordpress.com/. Come on boys – time to wake up!
Northern Thailand’s specter of eviction
The article is squarely in an empiricist tradition of exposing some erroneous ideas (the truth will set us all free, eh?). The specter of evictions is a stark image that calls attention to livelihood insecurity in these hinterland areas. This insecurity (marginality, whatever to call it) is anchored to a string of images that you do not mention. One is thammachat, that couples forests and Buddhism. Another is Thai, which assumes that ethnic minority peoples are recent (and unlawful) immigrants on Thai soil. These concepts intersect in many ways and are above criticism, it seems.
It is fine to pick at the representations of (environmental) problems in northern Thailand, but ideally there should also be some new ways of describing people and places — beyond the Karen consensus that Andrew made famous, the Bangkok Post had something of an Akha consensus (colorful and interesting people who are in danger of losing their culture and we should all feel sad for as long as it takes to read the feature article in the weekend section), and there is also the Hmong consensus of the authorities (that they are illegals from Laos, and the only way is to truck them over to the Lao border).
Thai movies have a notorious record for how they depict ethnic minority highlanders. While they don’t aim for ethnographic value about chao-khao, they offer an interesting and sometimes troubling ethnographic glimpse of (subconscious?) Thai imagery. I am assuming that the CMU academics are in part trying to fight that regime of images (illegals, dying traditionalists, babbling idiots, forest destroyers, all rolled into one) with the specter of evictions and other notions. I’d give them the benefit of the doubt. I look forward to more interesting ethnographic work about the region, on farmers as much as on the “collaborative and realistic regime of images” that will emerge from extended interactions with state agencies in Thailand.
Royal hydrology
Editor’s note (NF): Readers hoping to learn more about Paul Handley (mentioned below) would be well-advised to start here. His record speaks for itself.
Jo // Aug 24, 2008 at 5:10 am
Yo – you freaks are all talking about how the King is so this and that – but every country all over the world – and every president is greedy – you all complain about The Thai King – but look at Bush? He has in the last 10 years killed the majority of The Middle East – and he is close friends with Taksin – They are close friends. And Taksin’s bithazz is the one contributing to most of the problems in Thailand now – I don’t understand? The Thai people are not like you Western small-minded idiots who think driving big cars and making only money for your life is everything – they value family, and belief, and they love their country and their King – The one thing that you western freaks never learn is that to leave others alone and look at your own idiot reflection in the mirror before you try to fix everybody else’s – Since the beginning it’s pretty much been westerners going around trying to change every country to be Christian, and bombing other countries – Let me ask you a question? What is any of somelse’s business with yours? Let me tell you something this Handley. He can’t speak Thai, he’s never lived in Thailand, and doesn’t know anything about Thai Culture. Culture of a country is not written in a book – and can not be explained by words – it is felt and experienced in real time – And I am from America, but speak Thai fluently, and have lived in Thailand for already about 2 years.