For the information of interested New Mandala readers, today I received the following reply from the conference organisers:

“Dear Mr.Farrelly,

The conference is open to the public. Anybody who wishes to participate in the conference must register. The preliminary program and registration information will be available on website soon.

Yours sincerely,
ICTS10 organizer”

Best wishes to all.

I wonder how Republican’s tone (and people’s response to it) if he or she were writing in Thai? Would it come across just as aggressive as certain people feel it is when Republican writes in English, or would the pragmatics of Thai force Republican to use different rhetorical and pragmatic devices? Would there be a vast difference in how native Thai speakers interpret Republican’s tone as compared to non-native speakers?

Perhaps what we are seeing here is merely a case of cross-cultural pragmatic failure; that is, since we are all communicating in the medium of English (for the most part), certain pragmatic nuances are misinterpreted due to 1st language interference.

So many questions, so little time….and even less funding!

Nevertheless, as a liberal of the Lockean, Georgist, and Austrian school traditions (i.e. a Libertarian), I can’t say that I’m too fond of “value pluralism.’ It seems to me that a system of governance that doesn’t protect the basic human rights of its subjects cannot claim a valid mandate to rule that is recognized by its people and the international community at large; as such, free nations are only required to respect the sovereignty of such a nation as suits the free nation’s self-interest.

However, I will admit value pluralism is valuable in that it makes us question just what those basic human rights are.

“1) There was a difference between A. standing behind democracy and the democratic process, and B. standing behind Thaksin-as-the-only-defense-of-democracy.”

The “difference” here is more apparent than real, more rhetorical than actual, and more slippery than many a slope I can think of.

Because when you consider that Thaksin and the TRT were the only democratically elected government in evidence at the time, “standing behind democracy and the democratic process” would have necessarily involved standing behind that government– not as “the-only-defense-of-democracy”, but rather as the only democratically elected government to defend against military-royalist anti-constitutional interference.

That, it appears to me, is a real “difference”. And one that genuine democrats could be expected to discern and act on, albeit holding their noses the whole time.

I actually think it is not so hard to figure out whether Republican is being fair or not, by going and looking at what Thongchai has written. This has nothing to do with what is or isn’t “true in his own heart.”

(Tosakan said: In the final analysis. I don’t know if Republican is being fair to Thongchai or not, because only Thongchai knows what is true in his own heart about his personal political positions, but I think Republican has the right to call Thongchai out if he perceives that Thongchai was being a hypocrite concerning his pre and post-coup positions.)

All that said, it is still edifying to read everyone’s contributions, wherever they stand. except maybe that guy who pops up now and then to take a gratuitous shot at the site’s hosts.

FYI, I belong to neither of those traditions. ‘Value pluralism’ is a familiar word amongst the liberals. And thanks for quoting my senior alumnus, though I don’t know what for….