New Mandala

In some quarters the king is regarded as a key defender of Thai democracy. Which makes me wonder …
Has there been a royal statement urging the protesters from the People’s Alliance for (Sufficiency) Democracy to respect the fact that there was an election held last December and that this government is the result? And any royal [...]

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New Mandala readers who are new (or, perhaps, not so new) to the various online discussions of Thailand’s political future will find this summary page over at Thai Crisis rewards a visit.  It has been updated during 2008 to reflect the changing situation.

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Today New Mandala is not immediately in a position to add much to the analysis of the current standoff in central Bangkok between the PA(S)D and the Royal Thai Police.�
What I can do, of course, is provide links to some of the best “live” coverage.  Bangkok Pundit leads the charge, as usual, with a characteristically well-chosen mix [...]

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Performing Political Identity is an anthropological fieldwork-based study that explores the Democrat Party’s electoral dominance in southern Thailand, or more precisely, in its Buddhist-majority and Thai-speaking provinces. This “Democrat Ascendancy,” as I call it, dates from 1992 but is based on strong foundations established since the mid 1970s.  It is founded on electoral performance and histrionics that [...]

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I was sitting in the house of Jairan, a struggling farmer in Chiang Mai province, when the news came through that the Election Commission had recommended the dissolution of two parties in the governing coalition – Chart Thai and Matchima Thippatai. “It’s just like killing a tree,” Jairan commented. “You don’t just do it all [...]

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The Asian Network for Free Elections (ANFREL) has recently released its report on Thailand’s 23 December 2007 general election.  The full report is available online.  It includes a long list of recommendations for future elections and a great deal of material about how the election was run.
In his foreword to the report ANFREL Chairman General Saiyud [...]

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New Mandala readers scouting for some more substantial weekend reading may want to have a look at these two new papers from one of our regular contributors, Michael H. Nelson.
The two new papers are:

“Thaksin’s 2005 Electoral Triumph:Looking Back From the Election in 2007”, published by the Southeast Asia Research Centre at the City University of Hong [...]

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Update (2 February 2008): A reader-friendly online version of this article is now available here.

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After more than a year of military rule Thailand has a new, democratically-elected Prime Minister.  Previous New Mandala coverage of Samak and his place in Thai politics is available here.
Will Samak’s tenure at the top mark a new stage (and level) of political conflict?  Will his many opponents be able to handle today’s electoral realities?  Has [...]

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More than one month after the election Thailand is edging ever closer to the formation of a democratically elected government. The coup by stealth has not eventuated, perhaps in part due to the realisation that the international credibility of the coup-makers (and their backers) would be strained beyond breaking point.But what does the formation of [...]

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