You should be thanking Michael for drawing these ridiculous scenes to your attention, not trying to HIS background.
Where did I try to ??? his background? (A little too much Xmas cheer???)
The reports from Chachoengsao have been quite interesting to me, and I have no idea of Mr Nelson’s nationality, nor am I sure of what his capacity is in observing the electoral processes in that province.
One of his statements sounded a little strange, so I asked a question. In his response, Mr Nelson raised the point about the relationship between the school and the students, which led me to ask another question.
FWIW, I agree with much of what you said, Rationaliser, although I wonder just who is being xenophobic.
…it is a bad sign of the moral characters of those being elected into public office
Thank you Teth for addressing my question – I agree, and IMO that far outweighs any short term gain that a voter may get from selling his or her vote.
Pathetic. You must be Thai. So much rich observation and all you can come up with is a typical reactionary, nationalist Thai response, in defence of a clearly brainwashed country. You do not face the discussion at hand but point the finger at the suspected nationality of the writer. Grow a brain. Learn how to think. Stop attacking the messenger and engage with the ideas the messenger is communicating,.
You should be thanking Michael for drawing these ridiculous scenes to your attention, not trying to HIS background.
Talk about missing the point. The whole scene above is pathetic. As if the PEC are going to fight people selling their votes for money when they can’t even provide somewhere for people to sit.
I quote an AP story December 20….
“Whichever party pays us more, we vote for it,” said Sin Mapula, a 50-year-old farmer in Roi Et province
“I know Thaksin is not good,” said Charaen, 67, the environmental activist. “But I will vote for (his supporters’ party) because my grandson is a village headman and a canvasser. My grandson said Thaksin’s party has lots of money.”
Typical …
nganadeeleg… your xenophobic response is an hypocritical as the guy on the stage criticising foreign influences, after dancers wearing western costumes but with Thai characteristics…. (the west is moving away from dressing up underage children in sexy gear… as Thailand revels in it) parade around in a Las Vegas showgirl style.
And the same Thai institutions criticise democracy itself as a foreign influence, as they call up their canvassers on Nokia mobile phones, slip into their German luxury cars, ogle Japanese comic books, buy coffee at American style coffee shops, while buying Danish furniture…. bloody hypocrites.
And what’s foreign about not wanting politicians to abuse tax money, about wanting equal opportunities for people of ALL races, religions and language groups. What’s foreign about wanting decent work conditions for decent pay. What’s foreign about expecting one part of government to check the power of another part of government? What’s foreign about wanting to read the truth in the media? What’s foreign about expecting that those who seek the truth shouldn’t feel in danger when they are asking questions about abuses of power?
Nothing…. nothing is foreign about these things,…. these are human HUMAN!!!! RIGHTS not foreign rights….
You idiots who say “this is Thailand” are forgetting what came from building this nation…. BUTCHERY…. blood… and rich generals
Andrew, about “…how severe, or strictly enforced, the penalties for non-voting are…”, from my personal experience, there are none. I (shamefully) admit not voting in the Thai elections (at all levels – national, Bangkok governor, Bangkok parliament) over the past 7-8 years, being in Australia (bad excuse as there is an absentee voting system which my fellow countrymen in Australia said was quite easeful to use). I have just casted my advance vote the past Sunday – my name on the housing register (in the house I haven’t lived in for 20 years) and my voting right intact.
With the issue of the rural vote being raised here, Viengrat Nethipo of Chulalongkorn recently wrote a very insightful two-part article on Bangkok Post about the impacts of the 1997 Constitution decentralization policies on rural democratization:
Sorry for the late entry into this thread, but for the past week I was in the process of repatriating back to my home country. Not to escape any sort of dukkha, as Sidh suggests, but rather that my research on Thai sociopedagogy was finished and other personal/family reasons.
Anyway, while it is hearting to see Teth fight the good fight after Sidh hijacked this thread, I would like to return to the topic of the rationale behind the Thai military’s current spending. While I don’t begrudge the Thai military for modernizing it’s hardware, the question is “why?”
I’m going to take a large leap of faith and assume some modicum of competency on the part of the Thai strategic command and not write all these expenditures as, based on recent troop movements, the fevered paranoid nightmares of Gen. Prem, where the р╕зр╕┤р╕Нр╕Нр╕▓р╕У of Sim├│n Bol├нvar enters the body of Thaksin and instigates a 70’s-style Issan insurgency. I only assume this because I’m pretty certain that Prem and his band of senile р╕Ьр╕╣р╣Йр╣Гр╕лр╕Н have no idea who Bol├нvar was.
Officers are trained to prepare for the possible as opposed to the probable. This is why both the American and Canadian militaries for a long time had plans to invade each other’s countries (War Plan Red and Defence Scheme No.1 respectively). So what contingencies do Sonthi and the boys think are possible?
As I’ve stated in another thread, a Burmese attack, while not probable, is certainly possible. A Burmese blitzkrieg into Bangkok would have a devastating effect. While the Thais, counting on their Major Non-NATO Ally status with the United States, would eventually prevail in such a conflict, the damage done to the Thai economy via the destruction of the infrastructure of Thailand’s only urban center would be enough to count any victory as a Pyrrhic one (Sorry for the elitist use of Greco-Roman cultural idiom, by the way). This could be behind the push for Air Force purchases; Thai air superiority would be one way to slow down a Burmese push into the Central heartland.
Looking 10 or 20 years into the future, another “possible” threat would be an aggressive China. Again, it is not very likely that a hawkish, irredentist D┼Нngf─Бng H├│ng movement will take hold in the PRC, it is possible; and while Siam was never traditionally part of Greater China, it was most definitely a tributary, and even now, is being expected to act as such. A Chinese attack could come in the form of a preemptive strike on airfields, like Udon Thani, that could be used as American staging grounds for an attack on China’s economically developed Southern underbelly. And again, Thailand’s strategy would be to hold off the invading forces until help arrives.
Finally, if either Laos or Cambodia take a turn for the worse and become “failed states” then Thailand might need to perform an Ethiopian-like intervention to keep a massive refugee/insurgency crisis from spilling over onto its borders.
Now, as stated before, I understand why the Thai military sees the need to modernize its forces; however, none of this explains what they are going to do about the situation that has proven itself to be both possible and probable, i.e. the Southern insurgency. As Restorationist pointed out, submarines and tanks aren’t usually used for COINOPS; as PSYOPS has proven itself as the way to win insurgencies, I ask, how much of this money is going to the Department of Applied Psychology at the Institute of Strategic Studies on Vipawadee-Rangsit Road? (You know, the place right next to UTTC with all those Mercedes driving into it?)
Ah, Teth, writing like a true relativist! All a sudden you make perfect sense. Welcome to my “religion” Teth!
My apologies for assuming you harbour deep hatred of the monarchy. I now understand that your offending of the monarchy are all just “analogies”. It’s all for the sake of healthy argument and debate (you are getting good at that that I am not sure now what you really think and where your standpoint is – like a true relativist).
Thus I happily rest my case too. Like I said in #36, this is futile and is not getting anywhere – now I am “ignorant”, “sprouting bullocks”, “lack sufficient knowledge”, “cowardly”, “crap judge”, “think the world is flat”…etc…etc. If this goes on, pretty soon you will “not hate” me more than the monarchy!
Whatever you really believe Teth, I will just assume that you are “right” if that makes you happy – and hold back on the offending. At the end of the day, everybody have someone or something they hold dear – God, gods, kings, democracy, demogogues, ideologies, rock stars, footballers, money, family members…etc. They often look “ignorant”, “sprouting bullocks”, “lack sufficient knowledge”, “cowardly”, “crap judge”, “think the world is flat” from ‘nonbelievers’ viewpoints – “statistics” also say that they are happy to be so (yet they are “wrong” – oh how confusing)…
Personally, vote buying can be “not bad” when it is performed by everyone because in the end, the populace will be richer, and will still be voting for who they like more.
But it is a bad sign of the moral characters of those being elected into public office.
On the contrary, I am very interested in those arguments.
As for the relationship between the schools and the students, do you feel the same way about students in Commonwealth countries having school excursions to line up to see a procession of the British queen or other royals, or school visits to government houses/parliament etc?
Andrew, Jon already pointed out that the issue is not the electoral registration but the housing register. The voter rolls are merely print-outs of the ministry of interior’s computerized house register data bases. Similarly, in Germany, you don’t enroll in electoral districts, but you change your address by de-registering at your old place (municipality) and re-registering at your new one. This automatically leads you to be located in a new constituency and a new polling area. This change-of-address procedure is a strictly enforced legal requirement. In Thailand, however, it has obviously not been possible to enforce similar requirements–for whatever reasons. Another viable method for absentee voters would be postal voting. However, there have been too many doubts about whether this would not open the door for more cheating as to make this an attractive alternative to the central polling stations for advance voting. As for whether the high turnout is an indicator of PPP’s “looming” success, I really don’t know. PS: Sorry for the “brake.”
Nganadeeleg: You probably don’t expect me to provide you with the opposing arguments you are interested in, right? After all, the sentence you quote is about the relationship between the schools and the students, not about whether vote buying is good or bad. This latter issue is rather more complex than the usual black-and-white approach suggests.
What is the effect of Prof. Keyes’ use of the key term in the king’s “sufficiency economy” discourse? It will be taken to mean that one of the most prominent academics in the field of Thai Studies is giving intellectual support to the king’s concept of “sufficiency economy”. This gives the discourse increased legitimacy, which naturally transforms into political support for the king in the current political crisis.
Republican: I am having trouble understanding the logic of your statement above.
Is your concern about the “sufficiency economy” concept, or are you concerned that an academic might agree with the king on something? (not necessarily SE)
If it is the former, then why not just make your case against SE and let individual academics say whatever they want to?
If it is the latter, then there is no logic at all to your argument as academics would be precluded from ever agreeing with the king, which is nonsense.
(Fortunately, it was not printed in The Nation so there is no need to turn this into a > 100 post thread !)
“Or should one assume that the students demanded or agreed to wear these caps because they had individually come to the conviction that vote buying was a bad thing?”
Mr Nelson: I would be interested to hear the opposing arguments to the message that ‘vote buying was a bad thing’.
[…] way” earlier already when it participated in “Celebrating the King” (see post no. 4). This second time, the slogan turned out to be somewhat ambivalent again. Should citizens […]
I have one comment on the interview with Prof. Keyes.
First, let me say that I have enormous respect for Prof. Keyes’ pioneering work in Thai Studies. This includes not only his own path-breaking research but his training of so many graduate students who themselves have shaped and are shaping the field of Thai Studies.
It is because of Prof. Keyes’ prominence in the field that I believe it is important to criticize his use of the king’s “sufficiency economy” language:
“…What is striking is that the village still remains a viable community. Non-residents return regularly for festivals and many come back to settle permanently in the village. It remains because it provides a moral world centred on Thai-Lao Buddhism which people find meaningful. This is why in my keynote address for the International Thai Studies Conference in Bangkok in January I argue that the northeastern village economy is both a capitalist and a sufficiency economy….”
I question why Prof. Keyes should make use of the “sufficiency economy” discourse of the king, and especially in the keynote address at an international conference that is being held in honour of the king. While I have not seen the paper, even from this section of the interview one can sense the positive associations inherent in his use of the concept, “sufficiency economy”.
I have no problem whatsoever with academics pointing out the deficiencies of capitalist economies, or the advantages of pre-capitalist, alternative or hybrid forms of economic organization.
But please, don’t call the latter “sufficiency economy”.
What is the effect of Prof. Keyes’ use of the key term in the king’s “sufficiency economy” discourse? It will be taken to mean that one of the most prominent academics in the field of Thai Studies is giving intellectual support to the king’s concept of “sufficiency economy”. This gives the discourse increased legitimacy, which naturally transforms into political support for the king in the current political crisis.
It will lend support to the relentless propaganda in Thailand that the king is a genius (since no-one can criticize him because of lese majeste) which is itself one of the main obstacles to democratization in Thailand (put bluntly: why let the ignorant, uneducated villagers who sell their votes govern themselves when the genius king and his officials are so much better informed? – just read the king’s “Mahachanok” and you can see that this is exactly the way the king sees things).
Prof. Keyes says in the interview that “…I feel it is imperative to speak out when one is aware of situations that clearly are unjust…”
There is no more unjust situation in Thailand today than the king’s abuse of democratic principles.
Given the king’s staunch support for the dictatorship in Thailand and the disenfranchisement of the Thai population, together with the fact that Thais themselves are forbidden from questioning publicly anything that the king says, even when it is a pseudo-economic policy that affects the lives of the entire population, I urge Prof. Keyes not to use the term or the concept “sufficiency economy” in his keynote address. I urge him to change the title of his address.
Dear Sirs:
My name is Roque Lemarroy, I live in Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz, Mexico. I went to school with Sirivat, also we play soccer in the team of the Pan American University located in Edinburg, Texas. When we took Calculus class he was a very intelligent person with that subject.
I also mentioned Not the Nation yesterday, but wonder who are the writers behind this great satire: former disgruntle Nation editors? Whoever, it’s great writing, but I do wish they had a RSS feed so I don’t miss an issue.
I am off topic but I want to say something. These people share similar background as the people of Laos and Thailand.
When I look at the video in YouTube of the people of Sipsongpanna, I can not help but thinking I am looking at a video of people from Laos or Thailand.
China just want to erase any identity they have and make them become Chinese. It is a good idea because maybe later on these people want to become their own state.
The outcome is actually very certain. One set of lying bastards will be replaced by another set of lying bastards. Not really much need for an intellectual analysis of that.
Gigantic sidewalk engulfing election posters are
nice addition to noodle cart and pork ball vendor slalom course and
motorcycle taxi highway.
Knocked one onto Soi 26 accidentally Sunday.
Almost causing 10 car pile up.
Sidewalks don’t really exist and aren’t really for humans, at least if you’ve read the Diamond Sutra which helps unlearn “preconceived, and limited, notions of what reality is.”
Facebook 
Twitter 
Soundcloud 
Youtube 
Rss
Chachoengsao: Provincial election commission advertises the election
You should be thanking Michael for drawing these ridiculous scenes to your attention, not trying to HIS background.
Where did I try to ??? his background? (A little too much Xmas cheer???)
The reports from Chachoengsao have been quite interesting to me, and I have no idea of Mr Nelson’s nationality, nor am I sure of what his capacity is in observing the electoral processes in that province.
One of his statements sounded a little strange, so I asked a question. In his response, Mr Nelson raised the point about the relationship between the school and the students, which led me to ask another question.
FWIW, I agree with much of what you said, Rationaliser, although I wonder just who is being xenophobic.
…it is a bad sign of the moral characters of those being elected into public office
Thank you Teth for addressing my question – I agree, and IMO that far outweighs any short term gain that a voter may get from selling his or her vote.
Chachoengsao: Provincial election commission advertises the election
nganadeeleg:
Pathetic. You must be Thai. So much rich observation and all you can come up with is a typical reactionary, nationalist Thai response, in defence of a clearly brainwashed country. You do not face the discussion at hand but point the finger at the suspected nationality of the writer. Grow a brain. Learn how to think. Stop attacking the messenger and engage with the ideas the messenger is communicating,.
You should be thanking Michael for drawing these ridiculous scenes to your attention, not trying to HIS background.
Talk about missing the point. The whole scene above is pathetic. As if the PEC are going to fight people selling their votes for money when they can’t even provide somewhere for people to sit.
I quote an AP story December 20….
“Whichever party pays us more, we vote for it,” said Sin Mapula, a 50-year-old farmer in Roi Et province
“I know Thaksin is not good,” said Charaen, 67, the environmental activist. “But I will vote for (his supporters’ party) because my grandson is a village headman and a canvasser. My grandson said Thaksin’s party has lots of money.”
Typical …
nganadeeleg… your xenophobic response is an hypocritical as the guy on the stage criticising foreign influences, after dancers wearing western costumes but with Thai characteristics…. (the west is moving away from dressing up underage children in sexy gear… as Thailand revels in it) parade around in a Las Vegas showgirl style.
And the same Thai institutions criticise democracy itself as a foreign influence, as they call up their canvassers on Nokia mobile phones, slip into their German luxury cars, ogle Japanese comic books, buy coffee at American style coffee shops, while buying Danish furniture…. bloody hypocrites.
And what’s foreign about not wanting politicians to abuse tax money, about wanting equal opportunities for people of ALL races, religions and language groups. What’s foreign about wanting decent work conditions for decent pay. What’s foreign about expecting one part of government to check the power of another part of government? What’s foreign about wanting to read the truth in the media? What’s foreign about expecting that those who seek the truth shouldn’t feel in danger when they are asking questions about abuses of power?
Nothing…. nothing is foreign about these things,…. these are human HUMAN!!!! RIGHTS not foreign rights….
You idiots who say “this is Thailand” are forgetting what came from building this nation…. BUTCHERY…. blood… and rich generals
Table 46
Andrew, about “…how severe, or strictly enforced, the penalties for non-voting are…”, from my personal experience, there are none. I (shamefully) admit not voting in the Thai elections (at all levels – national, Bangkok governor, Bangkok parliament) over the past 7-8 years, being in Australia (bad excuse as there is an absentee voting system which my fellow countrymen in Australia said was quite easeful to use). I have just casted my advance vote the past Sunday – my name on the housing register (in the house I haven’t lived in for 20 years) and my voting right intact.
With the issue of the rural vote being raised here, Viengrat Nethipo of Chulalongkorn recently wrote a very insightful two-part article on Bangkok Post about the impacts of the 1997 Constitution decentralization policies on rural democratization:
“The ‘networks of influence’ of local politicians”
http://www.bangkokpost.net/News/19Dec2007_news20.php
“Master of the provinces: Politics of the Northeast – a typical case study”
http://www.bangkokpost.net/News/20Dec2007_news18.php
Military sufficiency
Sorry for the late entry into this thread, but for the past week I was in the process of repatriating back to my home country. Not to escape any sort of dukkha, as Sidh suggests, but rather that my research on Thai sociopedagogy was finished and other personal/family reasons.
Anyway, while it is hearting to see Teth fight the good fight after Sidh hijacked this thread, I would like to return to the topic of the rationale behind the Thai military’s current spending. While I don’t begrudge the Thai military for modernizing it’s hardware, the question is “why?”
I’m going to take a large leap of faith and assume some modicum of competency on the part of the Thai strategic command and not write all these expenditures as, based on recent troop movements, the fevered paranoid nightmares of Gen. Prem, where the р╕зр╕┤р╕Нр╕Нр╕▓р╕У of Sim├│n Bol├нvar enters the body of Thaksin and instigates a 70’s-style Issan insurgency. I only assume this because I’m pretty certain that Prem and his band of senile р╕Ьр╕╣р╣Йр╣Гр╕лр╕Н have no idea who Bol├нvar was.
Officers are trained to prepare for the possible as opposed to the probable. This is why both the American and Canadian militaries for a long time had plans to invade each other’s countries (War Plan Red and Defence Scheme No.1 respectively). So what contingencies do Sonthi and the boys think are possible?
As I’ve stated in another thread, a Burmese attack, while not probable, is certainly possible. A Burmese blitzkrieg into Bangkok would have a devastating effect. While the Thais, counting on their Major Non-NATO Ally status with the United States, would eventually prevail in such a conflict, the damage done to the Thai economy via the destruction of the infrastructure of Thailand’s only urban center would be enough to count any victory as a Pyrrhic one (Sorry for the elitist use of Greco-Roman cultural idiom, by the way). This could be behind the push for Air Force purchases; Thai air superiority would be one way to slow down a Burmese push into the Central heartland.
Looking 10 or 20 years into the future, another “possible” threat would be an aggressive China. Again, it is not very likely that a hawkish, irredentist D┼Нngf─Бng H├│ng movement will take hold in the PRC, it is possible; and while Siam was never traditionally part of Greater China, it was most definitely a tributary, and even now, is being expected to act as such. A Chinese attack could come in the form of a preemptive strike on airfields, like Udon Thani, that could be used as American staging grounds for an attack on China’s economically developed Southern underbelly. And again, Thailand’s strategy would be to hold off the invading forces until help arrives.
Finally, if either Laos or Cambodia take a turn for the worse and become “failed states” then Thailand might need to perform an Ethiopian-like intervention to keep a massive refugee/insurgency crisis from spilling over onto its borders.
Now, as stated before, I understand why the Thai military sees the need to modernize its forces; however, none of this explains what they are going to do about the situation that has proven itself to be both possible and probable, i.e. the Southern insurgency. As Restorationist pointed out, submarines and tanks aren’t usually used for COINOPS; as PSYOPS has proven itself as the way to win insurgencies, I ask, how much of this money is going to the Department of Applied Psychology at the Institute of Strategic Studies on Vipawadee-Rangsit Road? (You know, the place right next to UTTC with all those Mercedes driving into it?)
Military sufficiency
Ah, Teth, writing like a true relativist! All a sudden you make perfect sense. Welcome to my “religion” Teth!
My apologies for assuming you harbour deep hatred of the monarchy. I now understand that your offending of the monarchy are all just “analogies”. It’s all for the sake of healthy argument and debate (you are getting good at that that I am not sure now what you really think and where your standpoint is – like a true relativist).
Thus I happily rest my case too. Like I said in #36, this is futile and is not getting anywhere – now I am “ignorant”, “sprouting bullocks”, “lack sufficient knowledge”, “cowardly”, “crap judge”, “think the world is flat”…etc…etc. If this goes on, pretty soon you will “not hate” me more than the monarchy!
Whatever you really believe Teth, I will just assume that you are “right” if that makes you happy – and hold back on the offending. At the end of the day, everybody have someone or something they hold dear – God, gods, kings, democracy, demogogues, ideologies, rock stars, footballers, money, family members…etc. They often look “ignorant”, “sprouting bullocks”, “lack sufficient knowledge”, “cowardly”, “crap judge”, “think the world is flat” from ‘nonbelievers’ viewpoints – “statistics” also say that they are happy to be so (yet they are “wrong” – oh how confusing)…
Chachoengsao: Provincial election commission advertises the election
Personally, vote buying can be “not bad” when it is performed by everyone because in the end, the populace will be richer, and will still be voting for who they like more.
But it is a bad sign of the moral characters of those being elected into public office.
Chachoengsao: Provincial election commission advertises the election
On the contrary, I am very interested in those arguments.
As for the relationship between the schools and the students, do you feel the same way about students in Commonwealth countries having school excursions to line up to see a procession of the British queen or other royals, or school visits to government houses/parliament etc?
Table 46
Andrew, Jon already pointed out that the issue is not the electoral registration but the housing register. The voter rolls are merely print-outs of the ministry of interior’s computerized house register data bases. Similarly, in Germany, you don’t enroll in electoral districts, but you change your address by de-registering at your old place (municipality) and re-registering at your new one. This automatically leads you to be located in a new constituency and a new polling area. This change-of-address procedure is a strictly enforced legal requirement. In Thailand, however, it has obviously not been possible to enforce similar requirements–for whatever reasons. Another viable method for absentee voters would be postal voting. However, there have been too many doubts about whether this would not open the door for more cheating as to make this an attractive alternative to the central polling stations for advance voting. As for whether the high turnout is an indicator of PPP’s “looming” success, I really don’t know. PS: Sorry for the “brake.”
Interview with Professor Charles Keyes
C. Keyes opened himself up for an attack, and Republican could not fail to detect that.
Chachoengsao: Provincial election commission advertises the election
Nganadeeleg: You probably don’t expect me to provide you with the opposing arguments you are interested in, right? After all, the sentence you quote is about the relationship between the schools and the students, not about whether vote buying is good or bad. This latter issue is rather more complex than the usual black-and-white approach suggests.
Interview with Professor Charles Keyes
What is the effect of Prof. Keyes’ use of the key term in the king’s “sufficiency economy” discourse? It will be taken to mean that one of the most prominent academics in the field of Thai Studies is giving intellectual support to the king’s concept of “sufficiency economy”. This gives the discourse increased legitimacy, which naturally transforms into political support for the king in the current political crisis.
Republican: I am having trouble understanding the logic of your statement above.
Is your concern about the “sufficiency economy” concept, or are you concerned that an academic might agree with the king on something? (not necessarily SE)
If it is the former, then why not just make your case against SE and let individual academics say whatever they want to?
If it is the latter, then there is no logic at all to your argument as academics would be precluded from ever agreeing with the king, which is nonsense.
(Fortunately, it was not printed in The Nation so there is no need to turn this into a > 100 post thread !)
Chachoengsao: Provincial election commission advertises the election
“Or should one assume that the students demanded or agreed to wear these caps because they had individually come to the conviction that vote buying was a bad thing?”
Mr Nelson: I would be interested to hear the opposing arguments to the message that ‘vote buying was a bad thing’.
Chachoengsao: Celebrating the King’s 80th Birthday
[…] way” earlier already when it participated in “Celebrating the King” (see post no. 4). This second time, the slogan turned out to be somewhat ambivalent again. Should citizens […]
Interview with Professor Charles Keyes
I have one comment on the interview with Prof. Keyes.
First, let me say that I have enormous respect for Prof. Keyes’ pioneering work in Thai Studies. This includes not only his own path-breaking research but his training of so many graduate students who themselves have shaped and are shaping the field of Thai Studies.
It is because of Prof. Keyes’ prominence in the field that I believe it is important to criticize his use of the king’s “sufficiency economy” language:
“…What is striking is that the village still remains a viable community. Non-residents return regularly for festivals and many come back to settle permanently in the village. It remains because it provides a moral world centred on Thai-Lao Buddhism which people find meaningful. This is why in my keynote address for the International Thai Studies Conference in Bangkok in January I argue that the northeastern village economy is both a capitalist and a sufficiency economy….”
I question why Prof. Keyes should make use of the “sufficiency economy” discourse of the king, and especially in the keynote address at an international conference that is being held in honour of the king. While I have not seen the paper, even from this section of the interview one can sense the positive associations inherent in his use of the concept, “sufficiency economy”.
I have no problem whatsoever with academics pointing out the deficiencies of capitalist economies, or the advantages of pre-capitalist, alternative or hybrid forms of economic organization.
But please, don’t call the latter “sufficiency economy”.
What is the effect of Prof. Keyes’ use of the key term in the king’s “sufficiency economy” discourse? It will be taken to mean that one of the most prominent academics in the field of Thai Studies is giving intellectual support to the king’s concept of “sufficiency economy”. This gives the discourse increased legitimacy, which naturally transforms into political support for the king in the current political crisis.
It will lend support to the relentless propaganda in Thailand that the king is a genius (since no-one can criticize him because of lese majeste) which is itself one of the main obstacles to democratization in Thailand (put bluntly: why let the ignorant, uneducated villagers who sell their votes govern themselves when the genius king and his officials are so much better informed? – just read the king’s “Mahachanok” and you can see that this is exactly the way the king sees things).
Prof. Keyes says in the interview that “…I feel it is imperative to speak out when one is aware of situations that clearly are unjust…”
There is no more unjust situation in Thailand today than the king’s abuse of democratic principles.
Given the king’s staunch support for the dictatorship in Thailand and the disenfranchisement of the Thai population, together with the fact that Thais themselves are forbidden from questioning publicly anything that the king says, even when it is a pseudo-economic policy that affects the lives of the entire population, I urge Prof. Keyes not to use the term or the concept “sufficiency economy” in his keynote address. I urge him to change the title of his address.
Sirivat’s sufficiency sandwich success
Dear Sirs:
My name is Roque Lemarroy, I live in Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz, Mexico. I went to school with Sirivat, also we play soccer in the team of the Pan American University located in Edinburg, Texas. When we took Calculus class he was a very intelligent person with that subject.
Please give him my E mail [email protected]
Thank you very much
Sincerely
Roque Lemarroy
Na-chua but Not The Nation
I also mentioned Not the Nation yesterday, but wonder who are the writers behind this great satire: former disgruntle Nation editors? Whoever, it’s great writing, but I do wish they had a RSS feed so I don’t miss an issue.
Rethinking Sipsongpanna
I am off topic but I want to say something. These people share similar background as the people of Laos and Thailand.
When I look at the video in YouTube of the people of Sipsongpanna, I can not help but thinking I am looking at a video of people from Laos or Thailand.
China just want to erase any identity they have and make them become Chinese. It is a good idea because maybe later on these people want to become their own state.
Thai election special
The outcome is actually very certain. One set of lying bastards will be replaced by another set of lying bastards. Not really much need for an intellectual analysis of that.
Na-chua but Not The Nation
“Election Posters Now Visible From Space”
Gigantic sidewalk engulfing election posters are
nice addition to noodle cart and pork ball vendor slalom course and
motorcycle taxi highway.
Knocked one onto Soi 26 accidentally Sunday.
Almost causing 10 car pile up.
Sidewalks don’t really exist and aren’t really for humans, at least if you’ve read the Diamond Sutra which helps unlearn “preconceived, and limited, notions of what reality is.”
Table 46
Further to #6 hi-thaksin is back up again.