It’s good to see these issues becoming the subject of careful historical scrutiny and analysis, as evidenced by the important academic journal the article appeared in (see below) and the detailed evidence garnered in the paper.
As the paper shows, the different modes of rural participation have been the subject of many cursory generalisations not backed by evidence in the past (probably under the time constraints of journalism).
However, a rebuttal or review is called for. One issue may be whether one country’s experience can be studied in isolation (this prompted me to compare South Korea’s New Village Movement). You could still concede that money transactions are a legitimate part of rural voting practice, while arguing that pure equity-based money transfers to the rural sector without any accompanying increase in productivity might ultimate lead to a Latin American populist style drag on the economy that Anek Laothamatas discusses. http://www.geocities.com/changnoi2/prophet.htm
Vote Buying and Village Outrage in an Election
in Northern Thailand: Recent Legal Reforms in
Historical Context, KATHERINE A. BOWIE
The Journal of Asian Studies Vol. 67, No. 2 (May) 2008: 469–511.
Samuel Schwartz’s comment on Ji’s need to issue a little red book is misplaced.If there is a concern about out of control personality cults and associated half baked philosophy in Thailand, it has nothing to do with Acharn Ji.
The long lists of Chinese investments in Burma in Dr Maung Aung Myoe ‘s 2007 paper at national University of Singapore show where Burma’s future is probably heading:
Moe Aung: “Jon, you are such a doom merchant, but why state the obvious that the generals have already won and all they are doing is slowly and systematically consolidate their position.”
Because no one treats it as obvious. It’s always, what can we do now to overthrow the generals, regime change, over and over again, something that might well never happen.
I’m only trying to project what the future will be like. I’d say that China and Yunnan will become more important in Burma’s future.
I don’t make any money from prognosticating about Burma’s future, so I’m not a “merchant” and it is only “doom” if the west continues to deal with Burma in the same dysfunctional way it has in the past, and even then it’s probably not “doom” because China is coming into its own as an economic power, and may eventually be able to offer Burma a real alternative to the west.
Moe Aung: “So like good liberal parents, do we just let the generals do their own thing, learn from their own mistakes, find themselves at the end of a leisurely soul searching?”
The generals may catch a ride on Chinese economic development, and eventually become, as a class, a lot more benign than they are now hopefully, through the mellowing effect of an internal middle class. Certainly the west’s unrelenting strategy of isolation will not make them any more benign.
Name a single Asian or Southeast Asian state that hasn’t had its share of human rights violating generals. My standard of comparison is Park Chung Hee who developed South Korea into the 11th largest economy in the world, and an essential part of that was overcoming Korea’s much-warranted aversion to the Japanese, a country that had recently colonised and oppressed Koreans. Having overcome that largely psychological barrier he essentially rode the end of the Japanese product life cycle to prosperity. If you want to see human rights violations right under the nose of the US, with pretty much tacit acquiescence look at the security state of Park Chung Hee the KCIA, and later the Kwangju massacre.
In Burma’s case, the psychological barrier has been moving on from the 1991 election result which the west keeps harping on, does the west still harp on China’s Tiannamen massacre? No. The subject is taboo in China itself, the Chinese have simply moved on to an activity that makes this past event largely irrelevant for most, namely rapid economic development.
Moe Aung: “Burmese Buddhists don’t need a lecture on the law of impermanence… ”
“And death, you should know better, hasn’t the same significance to people who believe in Samsara – the cycle of births and rebirths. ”
Who said the remarks were directed towards Burmese Buddhists?
I don’t lecture anyone.
It’s a sobering thought (and tragic) though when you think back over generations and generations of dreams that have never come to fruition.
The depiction of Samsara in Buddhist cultures, whether Chinese, Japanese, Thai, or Burmese, does seem to share a common forlorn sadness and sense of futility in human action.
Somsak J said:“if we disagree with such governments, we can of course campaign to win over the mind of voters so they will get rid of them in the next elections”
A few questions for you:
– Did (do) you disagree with such governments?
– If the answer to the first question was YES, then what have you done to ‘win over the mind’ of the voters to get rid of them?
– If the answer to the first question was NO, then why do you find such violations as acceptable?
So he has weaknesses. Such a huge deal! He probably is never going to be PM anyway.
It is perhaps worth noting that there is an absolute political vacuum between Ji and the current worm burden of parasites who monopolize Thai politics. It is not much of a local trait to spend years trying to forge an alternative political force with carefully thought-out policies. Folks are into short-term political fixes. No one wants to back a short-term loser. Just short-term winners that usually drop dead just over the finish line.Thaksin’s policies were something akin to Cargo Cult. The sky will open up and shower you all with goodies, just so long as you remember the TRT/PPP mumbo-jumbo. Nothing new there! The local monarchy and monarchists have been selling us all that hocus-pocus for decades.
Rich people are good at making themselves rich. They are overqualified to represent the real needs of the rest of us. The same probably goes for Ji too, for that matter.
I would like to suggest that some of the “I told you so” brand of professional political pundits ( that this site seems to attract in droves) would be far better investing in some REAL political alternatives rather than always trying to back a short-term winner. Or perhaps, even better still, sit down, shut up and let ordinary locals figure it out for themselves. And no quick fix. That’s actually what is so wrong with Thaksinism. it is yet another over-privileged person’s attempt to subvert people’s desires and needs for personal enrichment.
Is Ajarn Somsak VS Ajarn Ji superheavyweight bout an example of infighting amongst lefties? Hence right-wingers always hold the title?(As in anywhere else e.g. Bush’s USA, those on the left are just too complex to put out an easy coherent position for the voting masses)
“The number of Iraqi killed because of the Bush-Blare’s policy far exceeded anything said above. Is anybody in the two administrations prosecuted for ‘human rights violations’?”
I am utterly shocked and taken aback by this statement coming from Ajarn Somsak… Ajarn Somsak, who I understand wants justice for 1976, seemingly endorsing human rights violations as a means that justifies specific ends… If AjarnSomsak wants to take a relativist position (which I admittedly fall into occasionally myself), millions (both combatants and mainly civilians) have died in Southeast Asia during the war on Communism in the 1960s-1970s. I hope I have not misunderstood AjarnSomsak’s statements….
Do the individuals disrupt the neat lines of ethnicity, or are their lines simply different than what outsiders draw? For example, for some tribal groups, I’m inclined to think part of their identity is what other tribal groups they intermarry with.
The fact that people in Burma seem to be adding to their linguistic diversity and Bret’s example of immigrants to the US doing the same is really interesting. Globally, the trend is the opposite, with the number of languages and dialects spoken decreasing. Why and how are these groups able to run counter to the trend?
Bret, I was just curious since my understanding has always been California was the hotspot of linguistic diversity until everybody got killed off in the 19th Century. Of course, the Plains were pretty diverse to, with the added twist of a non-verbal language, sign language, thrown in to the mix. My maternal grandmother was trilingual: Kiowa, English and Comanche.
Thaksin’s administration clearly presided over numerous human rights abuses – Tak bai, kru sae and the war on drugs. For these crimes, they should be held accountable. These should be matters that should be – but no doubt won’t – be dealt with by the courts. Maybe at some future date. This should be the most important point of criticism – lots of people were killed.
The number of Iraqi killed because of the Bush-Blare’s policy far exceeded anything said above. Is anybody in the two administrations prosecuted for ‘human rights violations’?
I an NOT saying that the above incidents under Thaksin’s admin and the Iraq war were good things. They are not. But unless we see ourselves as God whose opinions always amount to TRUTH no matter what, we must accept that :
1. many instances we see as ‘human rights violations’, many people – often more numerous than us – see as justified or justifiable.
2. if we accept that government should come from open elections, there will always be governments whose public policy we dislike or see as violating human rights or some other sins, but still many, many more people see as good governments. (cf. Thaksin’s ‘war on drug’ which was very popular).
3. if we disagree with such governments, we can of course campaign to win over the mind of voters so they will get rid of them in the next elections.
Now, the campaign to oust Thaksin in 2006 was completely different from this. It was, from the beginning, the campaign to ‘activate’ (or to create the situations which activated) all the extra-parliamentary forces to overthrow Thaksin by non-electoral means (since everybody knew Thaksin still commanded popular support in general elections).
Ji’s decision to join such campaign was not only a mistake strategically, it’s also an arrogant disregard for the clear support of the real people (not the imaginary one he often invokes) for Thaksin – the arrogance he shared with all the aristocratic supporters of the PAD.
As I see it, there have been three distinct matters on which Thaksin and the so-called nominee administration have been opposed.
Two are matters of principle and the other is not.
Thaksin’s administration clearly presided over numerous human rights abuses – Tak bai, kru sae and the war on drugs. For these crimes, they should be held accountable. These should be matters that should be – but no doubt won’t – be dealt with by the courts. Maybe at some future date. This should be the most important point of criticism – lots of people were killed.
Second, is the matter of corruption. Also a subject for the courts. they don’t seem to be doing too much which may mean there is a more fundamental problem than Thaksin.
But the PAD has not concentrated on clear issues such as this. They have focused on vague issues of economic mismanagement and economic envy – villagers getting bribed with mobile phones and motorbikes – petrol prices, nationalistic diversions such as Preah Vihar, all of which are matters for the electorate to pass judgement on. Yes, even the uneducated, stupid ones who don’t have bachelor’s degrees.
Somsak points to strategic mistakes in Gi Ungpakhorn’s approach to things. Maybe he did make such mistakes. But of all the commentators I have read, he is one of the very few who has been able to separate the matters of defining principle from the incidental politics of the situations and he deserves congratulations for this. He has a set of priorities.
I just wanted to jump back in briefly an respond to Aiontay’s query…I wish I knew more about the facts behind the anecdote that I was admittedly passing along second-hand here. Maybe pre-contact was a bad choice of words? I suppose contact would have already had to happen for the linguistic diversity of Native America to be documented for a European audience. I imagine things did get even more interesting after contact.
Something I forgot to throw in last time…the linguistic cosmopolitanism we’ve been discussing here is sometimes reproduced outside Southeast Asia. I’ve seen cases where refugees from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, thrown into low-wage jobs soon after arriving in the States, end up learning each others’ languages and dialects in the workplace. A strategy for building some kind of social cohesiveness (i.e. at least we are all Southeast Asian) in a challenging new setting?
Jon, you are such a doom merchant, but why state the obvious that the generals have already won and all they are doing is slowly and systematically consolidate their position. They are entrenched for goodness sake. Forty six years not consolidated enough for you? But I agree they never let their guard down and remain determined to hang on to power at all costs. No news whatsoever to the Burmese nation.
You seem to be paraphrasing John Maynard Keynes that in the long run we are all dead. Something to look forward to, eh? Burmese Buddhists don’t need a lecture on the law of impermanence – this of course applies to militray rule like everything else that must rise and fall – or the benefit of good karma to be invested here and now i.e. right effort to strive for the common good. And death, you should know better, hasn’t the same significance to people who believe in Samsara – the cycle of births and rebirths.
So like good liberal parents, do we just let the generals do their own thing, learn from their own mistakes, find themselves at the end of a leisurely soul searching? Give them the benefit of the doubt and they’ll come to their senses and bungle their way in the next 20 years into semi-economic development. Wonderful, you cheered me up no end Jon.
Yes, Burmese politics has always been fractious. The expression ‘all chiefs and no indians’ appears to have been invented for the Burmese. It doesn’t necessarily mean they can’t unite under one organisation for a common goal. They’ve done it before under the umbrella organisation the Anti-Fascist People’s Freedom League (AFPFL) in the fight for independence.
BTW it was ‘Ludu aungthan’ (The People Win Through), the US funded anti-Communist play by the late Socialist prime minister U Nu in the early days of the civil war of Socialists vs Communists & Ethnics. I’ve seen the B&W film with Bo Ba Ko as the lead, read the comic printed in the US, and the prescribed school text taught to my older cousins, with full US blessing.
[…] in 2008 I drew New Mandala reader attention to the academic work of Serhat ├Ьnaldi. He has recently finished his (undergraduate) degree at the Southeast Asian […]
Let me re-iterate once again why the ‘song mai aw’ stance was utterly mistaken before the coup with example from one crucial, turning point in the pre-coup crises.
Ji and other claimed (or thought) that they were opposed to bothThaksin and the PAD (and those behind it).
But when the King launched the so-called ‘Judiciary Revolution’ with his speech of 25 April 2006, where was Ji? In fact where were all the ‘song mai aw’ activists?
Nowhere! They were all in complete silence!
I am not saying that they could have done something. Even myself was too scared to say anything at the time (or now).
On the other hand, when it came to matters relating to Thaksin, was Ji holding anything back?
Even disregarding the fact that, during the crises, Ji and all the other Thai activists undeniably focused their fire on Thaksin anyway, the episode shows beyond doubt why the ‘song mai aw’ were only effective when contributing to the anti-Thaksin wave led by the PAD and its backers but ‘powerless’ when they were ‘opposing’ the latter.
As I repeatedly said during the crises, the “fundamental political mathematics” was that: given the still very strong electoral support for Thaksin and the TRT, the only way to bring them down, was to “activate” (to bring to the fore) all those reactionary, extra-parliamentary forces. Or to put the matter even more bruntly, the only way to overthrow Thaksin at the time was the use of Royal Power. And this was exactly what happened in 2006 (the coup, especially). All those ‘song mai aw’ activists including Ji helped pave the way for this.
Yet the P.A.D. demands were thoroughly reactionary. We could not join them, yet we were far too small to influence the thousands that did.
Ji still refuses to accept his share of responsibility for his wrong-headed ‘song mai aw’ stance before the coup. In fact, look at the record of his group (or, for that matter, virtually ALL those ‘on the left’ of Thai political activism during the pre-coup crises: If the PAD was thoroughly reactionary (indeed it was), what was Ji doing then? The record would show that he still concentrated his fire on Thaksin! In fact, even after the coup, while claiming that he ‘opposed the coup’, Ji still shouted ‘Thaksin Out’. Now wasn’t this ‘inconsistent/incoherent? If you really opposed the coup, should you not have demanded Thaksin’s re-instalement, since what the coup had done, and what you should mean when you said you opposed it, was this very fact of the topple of Thaksin by the coup? Instead what Ji’s stance amounted to was acceptance of this central act of the coup.
Ji claims heritage of Leninism and the October Revolution, but has learned nothing from the history of the Bolsheviks’ highly flexible tactics. E.g. their position when face with the choice between Karensky and Kornilov. cf. Trotsky’s telling, in My Life of Aurora sailors visiting him in jail during the Kornilov coup to ask whether they should finish off both Kerensky and Kornilov at the same time (or even Kerensky first). And remember how strong the Bolsheviks were at that time, compare to Ji’s group!
One of the ‘thoroughly reactionary’ traits of the PAD since before the coup, was its refusal to accept that Thaksin had won the elections. And this is the very thing that Ji shared with the PAD. Ji’s (and virtually all the Thai ‘left’s) stubborn refusal to acknowledge the legitimacy of Thaksin’s popular support through successive general elections victory played right into the hands of the PAD and all the reactionary forces behind it.
“In the end however armed resistance may yet prove to be the only option left….”
…to return to, once again….
…as in U Nu’s Pyi-thu Aung-lan from the 1950s, even made into a Hollywood motion picture, in which everyone in the family seems to be in revolt.
Trouble is, the Pyi-thu never found an Aung-lan.
The full lists of acronyms for political oppposition groups in Burma is pretty much proof that unified armed resistance is unlikely if not impossible.
Interesting reading Ashley South’s paper and your comments Moe Aung, but honestly can anyone guess how this is going to play out?
An alternative counterfactual world is that over the next 20 years the generals just bungle their way into semi-economic development, and we all die before the final act of this drama. Not that I sympathise with the generals, just that I am not afraid to explicitly mention the rather horrible possibility that everyone religiously works around in the language of every comment and analysis of Burma’s political situation, that the generals may have already won, that all they have to do is slowly and systematically consolidate their position.
A post 6 October interview with Seni Pramoj. Maybe I am being overly critical, but air-head comes to mind. This rationale seems to be what is a major inhibition to democracy taking real root here.
Both statements were part of larger pieces that had lots more detail. I don’t feel the need to post an entire US Foresry or FAO report here. Sedimentation doesn’t just make water unclean for consumption, it can stop it from flowing at all. Therefore, forests protect our water supply. What both pieces are pointing to, however, is obvious and commonly accepted science: while forest may use water, they also play important roles in the ecosystems that generate and protect water resources.
If I’m going to have to choose between the FAO, the US Forestry Service and dozens of other reputable sources and you, I’m not going to choose you, as you haven’t demonstrated to me that your expertise on this matter is superior. This is widely accepted science. You’re saying it’s mythology. The onus is on you to prove that it is a myth. You certainly haven’t done that in what you posted.
Facebook 
Twitter 
Soundcloud 
Youtube 
Rss
Revisiting the rural constitution
It’s good to see these issues becoming the subject of careful historical scrutiny and analysis, as evidenced by the important academic journal the article appeared in (see below) and the detailed evidence garnered in the paper.
As the paper shows, the different modes of rural participation have been the subject of many cursory generalisations not backed by evidence in the past (probably under the time constraints of journalism).
However, a rebuttal or review is called for. One issue may be whether one country’s experience can be studied in isolation (this prompted me to compare South Korea’s New Village Movement). You could still concede that money transactions are a legitimate part of rural voting practice, while arguing that pure equity-based money transfers to the rural sector without any accompanying increase in productivity might ultimate lead to a Latin American populist style drag on the economy that Anek Laothamatas discusses.
http://www.geocities.com/changnoi2/prophet.htm
Vote Buying and Village Outrage in an Election
in Northern Thailand: Recent Legal Reforms in
Historical Context, KATHERINE A. BOWIE
The Journal of Asian Studies Vol. 67, No. 2 (May) 2008: 469–511.
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
Samuel Schwartz’s comment on Ji’s need to issue a little red book is misplaced.If there is a concern about out of control personality cults and associated half baked philosophy in Thailand, it has nothing to do with Acharn Ji.
Ashley South on post-cyclone Burma
The long lists of Chinese investments in Burma in Dr Maung Aung Myoe ‘s 2007 paper at national University of Singapore show where Burma’s future is probably heading:
http://www.ari.nus.edu.sg/publication_details.asp?pubtypeid=WP&pubid=647
Ashley South on post-cyclone Burma
Moe Aung: “Jon, you are such a doom merchant, but why state the obvious that the generals have already won and all they are doing is slowly and systematically consolidate their position.”
Because no one treats it as obvious. It’s always, what can we do now to overthrow the generals, regime change, over and over again, something that might well never happen.
I’m only trying to project what the future will be like. I’d say that China and Yunnan will become more important in Burma’s future.
I don’t make any money from prognosticating about Burma’s future, so I’m not a “merchant” and it is only “doom” if the west continues to deal with Burma in the same dysfunctional way it has in the past, and even then it’s probably not “doom” because China is coming into its own as an economic power, and may eventually be able to offer Burma a real alternative to the west.
Moe Aung: “So like good liberal parents, do we just let the generals do their own thing, learn from their own mistakes, find themselves at the end of a leisurely soul searching?”
The generals may catch a ride on Chinese economic development, and eventually become, as a class, a lot more benign than they are now hopefully, through the mellowing effect of an internal middle class. Certainly the west’s unrelenting strategy of isolation will not make them any more benign.
Name a single Asian or Southeast Asian state that hasn’t had its share of human rights violating generals. My standard of comparison is Park Chung Hee who developed South Korea into the 11th largest economy in the world, and an essential part of that was overcoming Korea’s much-warranted aversion to the Japanese, a country that had recently colonised and oppressed Koreans. Having overcome that largely psychological barrier he essentially rode the end of the Japanese product life cycle to prosperity. If you want to see human rights violations right under the nose of the US, with pretty much tacit acquiescence look at the security state of Park Chung Hee the KCIA, and later the Kwangju massacre.
In Burma’s case, the psychological barrier has been moving on from the 1991 election result which the west keeps harping on, does the west still harp on China’s Tiannamen massacre? No. The subject is taboo in China itself, the Chinese have simply moved on to an activity that makes this past event largely irrelevant for most, namely rapid economic development.
Moe Aung: “Burmese Buddhists don’t need a lecture on the law of impermanence… ”
“And death, you should know better, hasn’t the same significance to people who believe in Samsara – the cycle of births and rebirths. ”
Who said the remarks were directed towards Burmese Buddhists?
I don’t lecture anyone.
It’s a sobering thought (and tragic) though when you think back over generations and generations of dreams that have never come to fruition.
The depiction of Samsara in Buddhist cultures, whether Chinese, Japanese, Thai, or Burmese, does seem to share a common forlorn sadness and sense of futility in human action.
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
Somsak J said:“if we disagree with such governments, we can of course campaign to win over the mind of voters so they will get rid of them in the next elections”
A few questions for you:
– Did (do) you disagree with such governments?
– If the answer to the first question was YES, then what have you done to ‘win over the mind’ of the voters to get rid of them?
– If the answer to the first question was NO, then why do you find such violations as acceptable?
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
So he has weaknesses. Such a huge deal! He probably is never going to be PM anyway.
It is perhaps worth noting that there is an absolute political vacuum between Ji and the current worm burden of parasites who monopolize Thai politics. It is not much of a local trait to spend years trying to forge an alternative political force with carefully thought-out policies. Folks are into short-term political fixes. No one wants to back a short-term loser. Just short-term winners that usually drop dead just over the finish line.Thaksin’s policies were something akin to Cargo Cult. The sky will open up and shower you all with goodies, just so long as you remember the TRT/PPP mumbo-jumbo. Nothing new there! The local monarchy and monarchists have been selling us all that hocus-pocus for decades.
Rich people are good at making themselves rich. They are overqualified to represent the real needs of the rest of us. The same probably goes for Ji too, for that matter.
I would like to suggest that some of the “I told you so” brand of professional political pundits ( that this site seems to attract in droves) would be far better investing in some REAL political alternatives rather than always trying to back a short-term winner. Or perhaps, even better still, sit down, shut up and let ordinary locals figure it out for themselves. And no quick fix. That’s actually what is so wrong with Thaksinism. it is yet another over-privileged person’s attempt to subvert people’s desires and needs for personal enrichment.
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
Is Ajarn Somsak VS Ajarn Ji superheavyweight bout an example of infighting amongst lefties? Hence right-wingers always hold the title?(As in anywhere else e.g. Bush’s USA, those on the left are just too complex to put out an easy coherent position for the voting masses)
“The number of Iraqi killed because of the Bush-Blare’s policy far exceeded anything said above. Is anybody in the two administrations prosecuted for ‘human rights violations’?”
I am utterly shocked and taken aback by this statement coming from Ajarn Somsak… Ajarn Somsak, who I understand wants justice for 1976, seemingly endorsing human rights violations as a means that justifies specific ends… If AjarnSomsak wants to take a relativist position (which I admittedly fall into occasionally myself), millions (both combatants and mainly civilians) have died in Southeast Asia during the war on Communism in the 1960s-1970s. I hope I have not misunderstood AjarnSomsak’s statements….
Ola Hanson from the archive on vocabulary size
Do the individuals disrupt the neat lines of ethnicity, or are their lines simply different than what outsiders draw? For example, for some tribal groups, I’m inclined to think part of their identity is what other tribal groups they intermarry with.
The fact that people in Burma seem to be adding to their linguistic diversity and Bret’s example of immigrants to the US doing the same is really interesting. Globally, the trend is the opposite, with the number of languages and dialects spoken decreasing. Why and how are these groups able to run counter to the trend?
Bret, I was just curious since my understanding has always been California was the hotspot of linguistic diversity until everybody got killed off in the 19th Century. Of course, the Plains were pretty diverse to, with the added twist of a non-verbal language, sign language, thrown in to the mix. My maternal grandmother was trilingual: Kiowa, English and Comanche.
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
Thaksin’s administration clearly presided over numerous human rights abuses – Tak bai, kru sae and the war on drugs. For these crimes, they should be held accountable. These should be matters that should be – but no doubt won’t – be dealt with by the courts. Maybe at some future date. This should be the most important point of criticism – lots of people were killed.
The number of Iraqi killed because of the Bush-Blare’s policy far exceeded anything said above. Is anybody in the two administrations prosecuted for ‘human rights violations’?
I an NOT saying that the above incidents under Thaksin’s admin and the Iraq war were good things. They are not. But unless we see ourselves as God whose opinions always amount to TRUTH no matter what, we must accept that :
1. many instances we see as ‘human rights violations’, many people – often more numerous than us – see as justified or justifiable.
2. if we accept that government should come from open elections, there will always be governments whose public policy we dislike or see as violating human rights or some other sins, but still many, many more people see as good governments. (cf. Thaksin’s ‘war on drug’ which was very popular).
3. if we disagree with such governments, we can of course campaign to win over the mind of voters so they will get rid of them in the next elections.
Now, the campaign to oust Thaksin in 2006 was completely different from this. It was, from the beginning, the campaign to ‘activate’ (or to create the situations which activated) all the extra-parliamentary forces to overthrow Thaksin by non-electoral means (since everybody knew Thaksin still commanded popular support in general elections).
Ji’s decision to join such campaign was not only a mistake strategically, it’s also an arrogant disregard for the clear support of the real people (not the imaginary one he often invokes) for Thaksin – the arrogance he shared with all the aristocratic supporters of the PAD.
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
No need to worry, it’s in the stars that everything is gonna be alright after July 2, so from today things get better.
Hopefully, for Thailand’s sake, song mai ow will be the ‘winning’ position.
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
As I see it, there have been three distinct matters on which Thaksin and the so-called nominee administration have been opposed.
Two are matters of principle and the other is not.
Thaksin’s administration clearly presided over numerous human rights abuses – Tak bai, kru sae and the war on drugs. For these crimes, they should be held accountable. These should be matters that should be – but no doubt won’t – be dealt with by the courts. Maybe at some future date. This should be the most important point of criticism – lots of people were killed.
Second, is the matter of corruption. Also a subject for the courts. they don’t seem to be doing too much which may mean there is a more fundamental problem than Thaksin.
But the PAD has not concentrated on clear issues such as this. They have focused on vague issues of economic mismanagement and economic envy – villagers getting bribed with mobile phones and motorbikes – petrol prices, nationalistic diversions such as Preah Vihar, all of which are matters for the electorate to pass judgement on. Yes, even the uneducated, stupid ones who don’t have bachelor’s degrees.
Somsak points to strategic mistakes in Gi Ungpakhorn’s approach to things. Maybe he did make such mistakes. But of all the commentators I have read, he is one of the very few who has been able to separate the matters of defining principle from the incidental politics of the situations and he deserves congratulations for this. He has a set of priorities.
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
I wonder when Comrade Ji will finally collect all of his writings and publish them in a handy, red-cover-bound book. I look forward to the day when I can rise twice a day, at 8:00 am and 6:00 pm, with my copy of щ╗Дф╕╗х╕ншпнх╜Х ( Ungpakorn zhuxi yulu, if I’m not mistaken) and shout “The sunlight of Ji Ungpakorn Thought illuminates the road of the Thai People’s Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution!”
Criticize the reactionary thought of Qiu Daxin and John Maynard Keynes, firmly walk with the workers and peasants on the road of unity!
Hold high the great red banner of Ji Ungpakorn Thought; thoroughly smash the reactionary line of Lin Mingda and Lu Jinhe!
Ola Hanson from the archive on vocabulary size
I just wanted to jump back in briefly an respond to Aiontay’s query…I wish I knew more about the facts behind the anecdote that I was admittedly passing along second-hand here. Maybe pre-contact was a bad choice of words? I suppose contact would have already had to happen for the linguistic diversity of Native America to be documented for a European audience. I imagine things did get even more interesting after contact.
Something I forgot to throw in last time…the linguistic cosmopolitanism we’ve been discussing here is sometimes reproduced outside Southeast Asia. I’ve seen cases where refugees from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, thrown into low-wage jobs soon after arriving in the States, end up learning each others’ languages and dialects in the workplace. A strategy for building some kind of social cohesiveness (i.e. at least we are all Southeast Asian) in a challenging new setting?
Ashley South on post-cyclone Burma
Jon, you are such a doom merchant, but why state the obvious that the generals have already won and all they are doing is slowly and systematically consolidate their position. They are entrenched for goodness sake. Forty six years not consolidated enough for you? But I agree they never let their guard down and remain determined to hang on to power at all costs. No news whatsoever to the Burmese nation.
You seem to be paraphrasing John Maynard Keynes that in the long run we are all dead. Something to look forward to, eh? Burmese Buddhists don’t need a lecture on the law of impermanence – this of course applies to militray rule like everything else that must rise and fall – or the benefit of good karma to be invested here and now i.e. right effort to strive for the common good. And death, you should know better, hasn’t the same significance to people who believe in Samsara – the cycle of births and rebirths.
So like good liberal parents, do we just let the generals do their own thing, learn from their own mistakes, find themselves at the end of a leisurely soul searching? Give them the benefit of the doubt and they’ll come to their senses and bungle their way in the next 20 years into semi-economic development. Wonderful, you cheered me up no end Jon.
Yes, Burmese politics has always been fractious. The expression ‘all chiefs and no indians’ appears to have been invented for the Burmese. It doesn’t necessarily mean they can’t unite under one organisation for a common goal. They’ve done it before under the umbrella organisation the Anti-Fascist People’s Freedom League (AFPFL) in the fight for independence.
BTW it was ‘Ludu aungthan’ (The People Win Through), the US funded anti-Communist play by the late Socialist prime minister U Nu in the early days of the civil war of Socialists vs Communists & Ethnics. I’ve seen the B&W film with Bo Ba Ko as the lead, read the comic printed in the US, and the prescribed school text taught to my older cousins, with full US blessing.
Crown, Caricatures and Critics, and other papers
[…] in 2008 I drew New Mandala reader attention to the academic work of Serhat ├Ьnaldi. He has recently finished his (undergraduate) degree at the Southeast Asian […]
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
Let me re-iterate once again why the ‘song mai aw’ stance was utterly mistaken before the coup with example from one crucial, turning point in the pre-coup crises.
Ji and other claimed (or thought) that they were opposed to bothThaksin and the PAD (and those behind it).
But when the King launched the so-called ‘Judiciary Revolution’ with his speech of 25 April 2006, where was Ji? In fact where were all the ‘song mai aw’ activists?
Nowhere! They were all in complete silence!
I am not saying that they could have done something. Even myself was too scared to say anything at the time (or now).
On the other hand, when it came to matters relating to Thaksin, was Ji holding anything back?
Even disregarding the fact that, during the crises, Ji and all the other Thai activists undeniably focused their fire on Thaksin anyway, the episode shows beyond doubt why the ‘song mai aw’ were only effective when contributing to the anti-Thaksin wave led by the PAD and its backers but ‘powerless’ when they were ‘opposing’ the latter.
As I repeatedly said during the crises, the “fundamental political mathematics” was that: given the still very strong electoral support for Thaksin and the TRT, the only way to bring them down, was to “activate” (to bring to the fore) all those reactionary, extra-parliamentary forces. Or to put the matter even more bruntly, the only way to overthrow Thaksin at the time was the use of Royal Power. And this was exactly what happened in 2006 (the coup, especially). All those ‘song mai aw’ activists including Ji helped pave the way for this.
Ji Ungpakorn on the “carnival of reaction”
Yet the P.A.D. demands were thoroughly reactionary. We could not join them, yet we were far too small to influence the thousands that did.
Ji still refuses to accept his share of responsibility for his wrong-headed ‘song mai aw’ stance before the coup. In fact, look at the record of his group (or, for that matter, virtually ALL those ‘on the left’ of Thai political activism during the pre-coup crises: If the PAD was thoroughly reactionary (indeed it was), what was Ji doing then? The record would show that he still concentrated his fire on Thaksin! In fact, even after the coup, while claiming that he ‘opposed the coup’, Ji still shouted ‘Thaksin Out’. Now wasn’t this ‘inconsistent/incoherent? If you really opposed the coup, should you not have demanded Thaksin’s re-instalement, since what the coup had done, and what you should mean when you said you opposed it, was this very fact of the topple of Thaksin by the coup? Instead what Ji’s stance amounted to was acceptance of this central act of the coup.
Ji claims heritage of Leninism and the October Revolution, but has learned nothing from the history of the Bolsheviks’ highly flexible tactics. E.g. their position when face with the choice between Karensky and Kornilov. cf. Trotsky’s telling, in My Life of Aurora sailors visiting him in jail during the Kornilov coup to ask whether they should finish off both Kerensky and Kornilov at the same time (or even Kerensky first). And remember how strong the Bolsheviks were at that time, compare to Ji’s group!
One of the ‘thoroughly reactionary’ traits of the PAD since before the coup, was its refusal to accept that Thaksin had won the elections. And this is the very thing that Ji shared with the PAD. Ji’s (and virtually all the Thai ‘left’s) stubborn refusal to acknowledge the legitimacy of Thaksin’s popular support through successive general elections victory played right into the hands of the PAD and all the reactionary forces behind it.
Ashley South on post-cyclone Burma
“In the end however armed resistance may yet prove to be the only option left….”
…to return to, once again….
…as in U Nu’s Pyi-thu Aung-lan from the 1950s, even made into a Hollywood motion picture, in which everyone in the family seems to be in revolt.
Trouble is, the Pyi-thu never found an Aung-lan.
The full lists of acronyms for political oppposition groups in Burma is pretty much proof that unified armed resistance is unlikely if not impossible.
Interesting reading Ashley South’s paper and your comments Moe Aung, but honestly can anyone guess how this is going to play out?
An alternative counterfactual world is that over the next 20 years the generals just bungle their way into semi-economic development, and we all die before the final act of this drama. Not that I sympathise with the generals, just that I am not afraid to explicitly mention the rather horrible possibility that everyone religiously works around in the language of every comment and analysis of Burma’s political situation, that the generals may have already won, that all they have to do is slowly and systematically consolidate their position.
The Devil’s Discus – in Thai
http://www.2519.net/autopage/print.php?t=3&s_id=6&d_id=7&page=1
A post 6 October interview with Seni Pramoj. Maybe I am being overly critical, but air-head comes to mind. This rationale seems to be what is a major inhibition to democracy taking real root here.
More forest mythology
Both statements were part of larger pieces that had lots more detail. I don’t feel the need to post an entire US Foresry or FAO report here. Sedimentation doesn’t just make water unclean for consumption, it can stop it from flowing at all. Therefore, forests protect our water supply. What both pieces are pointing to, however, is obvious and commonly accepted science: while forest may use water, they also play important roles in the ecosystems that generate and protect water resources.
If I’m going to have to choose between the FAO, the US Forestry Service and dozens of other reputable sources and you, I’m not going to choose you, as you haven’t demonstrated to me that your expertise on this matter is superior. This is widely accepted science. You’re saying it’s mythology. The onus is on you to prove that it is a myth. You certainly haven’t done that in what you posted.