“Our party has won an overwhelming majority of the seats but we won’t take them all,” Suu Kyi said, referring to cabinet seats in an interview with Radio Free Asia’s Myanmar language service broadcast on Thursday.
“We will include ethnic representatives who are not NLD members and others who can benefit the country.”
I agree I lived in Thailand for a year and couldn’t count how many times people from foreign countries were so quick to point out the corruption there while insisting their governments were far more altruistic in governing. I would suggest they look at the global arms trade and see how many so called corruption free Western governments are involved in that.
This article is a little misleading in the attempts to minimise the corruption in the rice pledging scheme. You state, “The scheme operated at a loss and cost the state several million baht” in an attempt to show how the scheme was relatively minor to the atrocities of the junta.
While I agree that history has shown corruption is worse with military government than in those elected, the rice pledging scheme was a disaster. The estimated losses, on an accounting basis, are estimated to be just under 500 billion baht, far more than the several million you suggest.
I realize there are many ways to calculate the losses, either economically or using accounting principles, but either way, if you are going to compare administrations, you have to use fair comparisons.
All very well and good. But the question that haunts this unique country is this:
Who has been at the centre of all and everything for five odd decades?
Since Sarit gave the mutually convenient and mutually reinvented sacred institution the green light to move among the people, its beacon began to realize what power could really be had, and since then any ‘democratic’ process or outcome has simply been a tightly controlled sham.
Thai Air,as an example of the crippling corruption in Thailand, may yet hold the key to a number of these answerable questions.
Thanks for an interesting piece. I’m not sure I agree entirely with your implication that ethnic people no long have a voice as a result of the weak showing of ethnic parties. Indeed, to think of it another way – the NLD is now the largest ethnic party in the country! This is true based both on the number of non-Bamar folks elected in constituencies around the country and the fact that many voters clearly see it as a vehicle for minority voices as much as national transformation. It would be impossible for the NLD not to be changed as a result of the influx of a generation of ethnic representatives elected under it’s banner and rearing to support a more perfect union for their ethnic constituencies. Certainly, 12 of 15 members of the NLD Central Executive Committee are currently Bamar – an imbalance which surely isn’t sustainable. But I would be very surprised if we don’t start to see some very strong ethnic sub-committees etc emerge within the NLD at NPD and state level that could serve many of the same functions of pushing for ethnic language instructions etc that ethnic parties have since 2010.
Glad to see this issue getting coverage. One note about names of political parties. SNLD – Shan ‘Nationalities’ League for ‘Democracy’ I think? Or are you referring to the SNDP – Shan National Democratic Party? (Is the ‘development’ reference slipping in from USDP?).
‘“Wrong statements” about royalty in Great Britain can get you excluded from a Garden Party, with you and/or your business dying a painful social death.’ As a Brit, I don’t recognise even the first of these ideas – even the people invited to garden parties at Buck House are a pretty diverse bunch in terms of their attitudes towards royalty. And it would be considered terribly bad form to ask anyone at a private garden party what they thought of the monarchy – that is a private matter. As for the second, I can’t even imagine a circumstance under which one’s views on the monarchy could have an impact on one’s business fortunes. Unless, I suppose, you were a vendor of royalist memorabilia, and chose to use the execution of Charles I as your logo.
Cassandra: You are addressing a mindset that usually speaks with a very loud voice on NM: i.e., if it ain’t a republic it can’t be a democracy.
This assertion flies in the face of all the evidence, both contemporary and historical; it depends on the kind of shrill denial that is essential to the ultra-royalist project in Thailand; and it speaks to the same sort of disconnected rage that appears to fuel much of what passes for anti-monarchy sentiment among western observers of Thai politics.
Given the reality of Thai history and culture, it would seem evident that a transition to the oft-constitutionalized but never yet realized “constitutional monarchy” is inevitable if Thailand is ever to approach the grail of democratic governance.
One suspects that very few of the folks fulminating furiously for republicanism have even a smidgeon of real personal investment in Thai socio-political development. It’s all about self-presentation and a disturbing tendency to hollow narcissism on the part of people who would like to think of themselves as somehow “liberal” or even “radical”.
You seem unable to grasp a key point namely that if one has an ideological objection to the institution of monarchy, it may be difficult to empathise with Thais who do not wish to abolish their monarchy, just reform it and prevent its exploitation.
Your Spartist critique (“Prince Charles is loathed” etc) on the British monarchy, albeit received wisdom with many Guardianistas, simply lacks traction in current circumstances.
I’m not questioning your point of view simply suggesting it doesn’t make your observations very convincing.Incidentally your summarised points on the monarchy in English history are almost equally wrongheaded – but perhaps that’s not so relevant here.
Thailand is and will remain hopeless unless they can finally get rid of the Lese Majeste law and the horrific royal family and keep the military out of government and establish a real, credible alternative political party such as a Social Democratic Party. Pretty hopeless, obviously !
One point of comparison between British and Thai monarchies is bitterness over tax monies and ritual and government obfuscation therein. Phra Phimonlatham and socialist followers from Isan, influenced by Pridi, one assumes, were openly scornful of the fact that royal largess did not “fall from the sky” as was commonly assumed, but came from the government budget, allotments for which were secret — meaning it came from their tax monies. This was quite disenchanting. The same cynicism prevailed about His Majesty’s selfless contributions towards the “self sufficiency [rural] economy.” Some of the bitterness expressed towards British royals is the searing difficulties faced by ordinary citizens in paying their taxes versus the apparent effortless of royals in paying (or not paying) the same. In the U.S., this kind of bitterness is held by blue collar members of the GOP towards taxes and government in general, while Democrats reserve the same for the taxes paid (or not paid) by corporations and the 1%. Depending on political circumstance, there are intermittent and often ridiculous dances in Thailand about taxation of crown properties, specifically, the classification of various properties as “private” or … I forget … (see Unaldi forthcoming). It’s kind of a moot point if you can be jailed or killed for inquiring or even knowing about same. “Wrong statements” about royalty in Great Britain can get you excluded from a Garden Party, with you and/or your business dying a painful social death, but it probably won’t get you thrown off the roof. If you wait long enough, and are successful enough, you might even get a knighthood. Ilse Hayden’s “Symbol and Privilege” (1987, Univ. of AZ Press) has a lot to say about how the British do or do not think about the institution of monarchy. Parallels with the Thai monarchy are …
Almost having to wish for the anomalous state of affairs that the 2010 polls produced!
The trouble with ethnic parties is they don’t have one party representing each group like the SNP and Plaid Cymru in the UK, not to mention the armed resistance. Why, because in the unique diversity of Burma there are minorities within minorities to start with, microcosms if you like of their position vis-├а-vis the Bamar within the union as well as a mixed population including a good number of Bamar, Indian, Chinese, and mixed race in each ‘enclave’ as Adam Burke pointed out in his excellent piece here in NM.
At this juncture it can only be right that national interests… largely trumped ethnic ties. So was the NLD’s decision to deploy ethnic candidates in most ethnic areas as was the decision to contest by prominent and respected members of ethnic communities under the NLD banner.
You could say the NLD served as a broad church here like its historic predecessor the AFPFL in the fight for independence. ASSK herself had said this was the second struggle for independence. A second Panglong conference which she dropped like a hot potato for obvious reasons (hotter at the time than perhaps the later Rohingya issue) is therefore very likely back on the agenda.
If the fear exists that ethnic voices within the party will be easily ignored it pales in comparison with the token presence in the previous and incumbent administrations and legislatures such as the current Shan VP Sai Mauk Kham. Fear of a recidivist regime also underlies the leadership’s refusal to be drawn into debates on ethnic conflict and religious violence until it diminishes as the commitment to power transfer begins to show some tangible results.
Needless to say Myanmar’s ethnic political parties still have a crucial role to play in shaping its emerging political culture, not least those armed groups being strung along by the regime’s ‘peace process’ and those deemed beyond the pale.
The NLD has to be at worst the lesser of two evils and at best the real deal for an enduring peace we all so badly desire, and not a moment too soon.
There are some really excellent nuggets of information about political economy buried in Riggs. These works are so dense, they take 2-3 readings. One of the strengths of ├Ьnaldi’s book is the grace with which he integrates material from different scholarly fields. Marshall does the same, to different ends. One thing that distinguishes scholarship on Thailand is the really superb effort put forth by the monarchy and political leadership to obfuscate even the most basic aspects of history and economy. Why might that be? Scholars and activists flailing at each other, attempting to negate or obliterate entire fields of inquiry, must please them greatly. Follow the money.
Details for the 2009 Hong Kong print edition in English here:
The Devil’s Discus, [Hong Kong]: 2009, DMP Publications, ISBN-10: 988-97752-5-5,
ISBN-13: 978-988-97752-5-4
Peter: You might be interested to know that your kind of racist nonsense is often indulged in by expats here in Thailand and as often as not they attribute all those aspects of Thai culture to the predominance of greedy Chinese mafia/business types.
Thailand will forever remain a banana republic and at its very core is the Thai mindset and Thai ways and Thai tradition….Backwards people who only know thieving, cheating and lying. This is at the core of the Thai character traits.
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Keeping afloat after the ‘red wave’
ASSK couldn’t have been more explicit than the following statement.
“Our party has won an overwhelming majority of the seats but we won’t take them all,” Suu Kyi said, referring to cabinet seats in an interview with Radio Free Asia’s Myanmar language service broadcast on Thursday.
“We will include ethnic representatives who are not NLD members and others who can benefit the country.”
Still better than Thaksin?
I agree I lived in Thailand for a year and couldn’t count how many times people from foreign countries were so quick to point out the corruption there while insisting their governments were far more altruistic in governing. I would suggest they look at the global arms trade and see how many so called corruption free Western governments are involved in that.
Still better than Thaksin?
This article is a little misleading in the attempts to minimise the corruption in the rice pledging scheme. You state, “The scheme operated at a loss and cost the state several million baht” in an attempt to show how the scheme was relatively minor to the atrocities of the junta.
While I agree that history has shown corruption is worse with military government than in those elected, the rice pledging scheme was a disaster. The estimated losses, on an accounting basis, are estimated to be just under 500 billion baht, far more than the several million you suggest.
I realize there are many ways to calculate the losses, either economically or using accounting principles, but either way, if you are going to compare administrations, you have to use fair comparisons.
Still better than Thaksin?
All very well and good. But the question that haunts this unique country is this:
Who has been at the centre of all and everything for five odd decades?
Since Sarit gave the mutually convenient and mutually reinvented sacred institution the green light to move among the people, its beacon began to realize what power could really be had, and since then any ‘democratic’ process or outcome has simply been a tightly controlled sham.
Thai Air,as an example of the crippling corruption in Thailand, may yet hold the key to a number of these answerable questions.
Keeping afloat after the ‘red wave’
Thanks for an interesting piece. I’m not sure I agree entirely with your implication that ethnic people no long have a voice as a result of the weak showing of ethnic parties. Indeed, to think of it another way – the NLD is now the largest ethnic party in the country! This is true based both on the number of non-Bamar folks elected in constituencies around the country and the fact that many voters clearly see it as a vehicle for minority voices as much as national transformation. It would be impossible for the NLD not to be changed as a result of the influx of a generation of ethnic representatives elected under it’s banner and rearing to support a more perfect union for their ethnic constituencies. Certainly, 12 of 15 members of the NLD Central Executive Committee are currently Bamar – an imbalance which surely isn’t sustainable. But I would be very surprised if we don’t start to see some very strong ethnic sub-committees etc emerge within the NLD at NPD and state level that could serve many of the same functions of pushing for ethnic language instructions etc that ethnic parties have since 2010.
Still better than Thaksin?
No need to show us your disgusting racism. Better to keep it to yourself.
A silent minority
Glad to see this issue getting coverage. One note about names of political parties. SNLD – Shan ‘Nationalities’ League for ‘Democracy’ I think? Or are you referring to the SNDP – Shan National Democratic Party? (Is the ‘development’ reference slipping in from USDP?).
The crisis behind ‘A Kingdom in Crisis’
‘“Wrong statements” about royalty in Great Britain can get you excluded from a Garden Party, with you and/or your business dying a painful social death.’ As a Brit, I don’t recognise even the first of these ideas – even the people invited to garden parties at Buck House are a pretty diverse bunch in terms of their attitudes towards royalty. And it would be considered terribly bad form to ask anyone at a private garden party what they thought of the monarchy – that is a private matter. As for the second, I can’t even imagine a circumstance under which one’s views on the monarchy could have an impact on one’s business fortunes. Unless, I suppose, you were a vendor of royalist memorabilia, and chose to use the execution of Charles I as your logo.
The crisis behind ‘A Kingdom in Crisis’
Cassandra: You are addressing a mindset that usually speaks with a very loud voice on NM: i.e., if it ain’t a republic it can’t be a democracy.
This assertion flies in the face of all the evidence, both contemporary and historical; it depends on the kind of shrill denial that is essential to the ultra-royalist project in Thailand; and it speaks to the same sort of disconnected rage that appears to fuel much of what passes for anti-monarchy sentiment among western observers of Thai politics.
Given the reality of Thai history and culture, it would seem evident that a transition to the oft-constitutionalized but never yet realized “constitutional monarchy” is inevitable if Thailand is ever to approach the grail of democratic governance.
One suspects that very few of the folks fulminating furiously for republicanism have even a smidgeon of real personal investment in Thai socio-political development. It’s all about self-presentation and a disturbing tendency to hollow narcissism on the part of people who would like to think of themselves as somehow “liberal” or even “radical”.
“Loud” is just not the same thing.
The crisis behind ‘A Kingdom in Crisis’
You seem unable to grasp a key point namely that if one has an ideological objection to the institution of monarchy, it may be difficult to empathise with Thais who do not wish to abolish their monarchy, just reform it and prevent its exploitation.
Your Spartist critique (“Prince Charles is loathed” etc) on the British monarchy, albeit received wisdom with many Guardianistas, simply lacks traction in current circumstances.
I’m not questioning your point of view simply suggesting it doesn’t make your observations very convincing.Incidentally your summarised points on the monarchy in English history are almost equally wrongheaded – but perhaps that’s not so relevant here.
The crisis behind ‘A Kingdom in Crisis’
Or rather follow the money even as you examine the ritual and symbolic mechanisms for hiding it.
Still better than Thaksin?
Thailand is and will remain hopeless unless they can finally get rid of the Lese Majeste law and the horrific royal family and keep the military out of government and establish a real, credible alternative political party such as a Social Democratic Party. Pretty hopeless, obviously !
The crisis behind ‘A Kingdom in Crisis’
One point of comparison between British and Thai monarchies is bitterness over tax monies and ritual and government obfuscation therein. Phra Phimonlatham and socialist followers from Isan, influenced by Pridi, one assumes, were openly scornful of the fact that royal largess did not “fall from the sky” as was commonly assumed, but came from the government budget, allotments for which were secret — meaning it came from their tax monies. This was quite disenchanting. The same cynicism prevailed about His Majesty’s selfless contributions towards the “self sufficiency [rural] economy.” Some of the bitterness expressed towards British royals is the searing difficulties faced by ordinary citizens in paying their taxes versus the apparent effortless of royals in paying (or not paying) the same. In the U.S., this kind of bitterness is held by blue collar members of the GOP towards taxes and government in general, while Democrats reserve the same for the taxes paid (or not paid) by corporations and the 1%. Depending on political circumstance, there are intermittent and often ridiculous dances in Thailand about taxation of crown properties, specifically, the classification of various properties as “private” or … I forget … (see Unaldi forthcoming). It’s kind of a moot point if you can be jailed or killed for inquiring or even knowing about same. “Wrong statements” about royalty in Great Britain can get you excluded from a Garden Party, with you and/or your business dying a painful social death, but it probably won’t get you thrown off the roof. If you wait long enough, and are successful enough, you might even get a knighthood. Ilse Hayden’s “Symbol and Privilege” (1987, Univ. of AZ Press) has a lot to say about how the British do or do not think about the institution of monarchy. Parallels with the Thai monarchy are …
Keeping afloat after the ‘red wave’
Almost having to wish for the anomalous state of affairs that the 2010 polls produced!
The trouble with ethnic parties is they don’t have one party representing each group like the SNP and Plaid Cymru in the UK, not to mention the armed resistance. Why, because in the unique diversity of Burma there are minorities within minorities to start with, microcosms if you like of their position vis-├а-vis the Bamar within the union as well as a mixed population including a good number of Bamar, Indian, Chinese, and mixed race in each ‘enclave’ as Adam Burke pointed out in his excellent piece here in NM.
At this juncture it can only be right that national interests… largely trumped ethnic ties. So was the NLD’s decision to deploy ethnic candidates in most ethnic areas as was the decision to contest by prominent and respected members of ethnic communities under the NLD banner.
You could say the NLD served as a broad church here like its historic predecessor the AFPFL in the fight for independence. ASSK herself had said this was the second struggle for independence. A second Panglong conference which she dropped like a hot potato for obvious reasons (hotter at the time than perhaps the later Rohingya issue) is therefore very likely back on the agenda.
If the fear exists that ethnic voices within the party will be easily ignored it pales in comparison with the token presence in the previous and incumbent administrations and legislatures such as the current Shan VP Sai Mauk Kham. Fear of a recidivist regime also underlies the leadership’s refusal to be drawn into debates on ethnic conflict and religious violence until it diminishes as the commitment to power transfer begins to show some tangible results.
Needless to say Myanmar’s ethnic political parties still have a crucial role to play in shaping its emerging political culture, not least those armed groups being strung along by the regime’s ‘peace process’ and those deemed beyond the pale.
The NLD has to be at worst the lesser of two evils and at best the real deal for an enduring peace we all so badly desire, and not a moment too soon.
The crisis behind ‘A Kingdom in Crisis’
There are some really excellent nuggets of information about political economy buried in Riggs. These works are so dense, they take 2-3 readings. One of the strengths of ├Ьnaldi’s book is the grace with which he integrates material from different scholarly fields. Marshall does the same, to different ends. One thing that distinguishes scholarship on Thailand is the really superb effort put forth by the monarchy and political leadership to obfuscate even the most basic aspects of history and economy. Why might that be? Scholars and activists flailing at each other, attempting to negate or obliterate entire fields of inquiry, must please them greatly. Follow the money.
Still better than Thaksin?
[…] article, Still better than Thaksin?, first appeared on New […]
The Devil’s Discus – in Thai
Available on Scribd:
In English – http://www.scribd.com/doc/90328767/The-Devils-Discus-PDF-version#scribd
In Thai – http://www.scribd.com/doc/40950516/р╕Бр╕Зр╕Ир╕▒р╕Бр╕гр╕Ыр╕╡р╕ир╕▓р╕И-The-Devil-s-Discus
Details for the 2009 Hong Kong print edition in English here:
The Devil’s Discus, [Hong Kong]: 2009, DMP Publications, ISBN-10: 988-97752-5-5,
ISBN-13: 978-988-97752-5-4
The print book may be purchased here:
http://www.biblio.com/search.php?stage=1&author=kruger&pageper=20&dealer_id=1405361&omit_product_types=ns&strip_common=1&program=1005&order=priceasc
The crisis behind ‘A Kingdom in Crisis’
Yes, Christine, I did not ask you.
for that I apologize
But just like you, I am delighted with the “happy end”
Still better than Thaksin?
Peter: You might be interested to know that your kind of racist nonsense is often indulged in by expats here in Thailand and as often as not they attribute all those aspects of Thai culture to the predominance of greedy Chinese mafia/business types.
Where do you stand on that issue?
Still better than Thaksin?
Thailand will forever remain a banana republic and at its very core is the Thai mindset and Thai ways and Thai tradition….Backwards people who only know thieving, cheating and lying. This is at the core of the Thai character traits.