Thread: Democracy in Thailand

Let’s admit this is not democracy

For decades we have been telling ourselves we are a democracy. We tell our people that elections mean we are a democracy. This is hammered home repeatedly. Consequently, we tell the world we are a democracy. But in reality, we are not. We have never been. We want it, but we don’t have it.

Published: 13/07/2014 at 12:32 AM
Writer: Pichai Chuensuksawadi
Since 1932, we have gone through the same repetitive process of governments being elected and then toppled, charters ripped up and rewritten. It wasn’t about democracy. It was about traditional vested interests.

As we developed economically from the 1980s, demands for a greater say in how we are governed emerged and intensified. The traditional elite, the bureaucracy, politicians and business had to listen. And the only time where there was a determined effort to let the people have their say was in the drafting of the 1997 charter. But that’s as far as it went.

Enter Thaksin Shinawatra and Thai Rak Thai. He made promises to the voters and delivered. And with successive populist policies he endeared himself to voters who repeatedly supported him, no matter how many times he had to change the name of his party and despite the 2006 coup that ousted him. Love him or hate him, the fact is rural Thailand has discovered their voice; that their vote counts.

But make no mistake, Thaksin is no democrat. Like other politicians and parties he used patronage — deeply ingrained in virtually all segments of Thai society — to his advantage. He ran Thailand like a company and took cronyism to a higher level than those before him.

His party’s steadfast adherence to majority rule, completely ignoring the voices of the minority, clearly illustrates the lack of understanding of the democratic process. But Thaksin is not solely to blame for the recent protracted political impasses that prompted the coup.

Over the past decade the Democrats failed dismally to reform themselves as an alternative to Thaksin. After 2010, Pheu Thai and the Democrats played politics of the extreme, virtually pushing the middle to choose sides and further aggravating the political divide.

The Democrats were right to oppose the amnesty bill. But Suthep Thaugsuban strayed from the democratic path in the way and manner in which he attempted to “Restart Thailand”. Worse, the Democrat leadership, especially Abhisit Vejjajiva, failed to provide leadership in telling Mr Suthep: “No, this is not the way.” And like Pheu Thai, the Democrats took the political fight from parliament to the streets. Sadly, we have no political leadership among any of the political parties.

So where do we go from here?

Since the coup, I have heard many comments from a number of people asking whether Thais are ready for democracy and whether Thais (especially those upcountry) truly understand what it means. There have been suggestions, for example, that candidates for elected MPs should only come from the “knowledgeable and educated”. Another is that only taxpayers should be allowed to vote, or that voters should at least be given a test on what democracy means before they are allowed to vote.

These comments reinforce my view that for a start we should be honest with ourselves and admit that we are not yet a democracy. Let’s admit that we will never have a democracy like countries in the West. There’s nothing wrong with that since our history, our culture and our traditions are different.

Can we admit that we are still finding our way towards a form of democratic governance that allows the people, stakeholders, each political group and vested interests to have their space and be involved in the running of the country?

Even if it means adopting, for example, a system where all senators are appointed and seats allocated to the military and bureaucracy in which places are filled by rotation, then so be it. This does not mean that a fully appointed Senate should supersede the elected representatives of the people. This idea may run counter to the democratic principle of elected senators, but past experience has shown that the bureaucracy and the military have and will play a role in governance.

Let’s be honest — is this democratic? No, it is not. But unless we find a political structure that allows all stakeholders their space and say in governance, we will once again be back to where we were before.

Bangkokpost.com

K. Pichai has it about right.

That's good.
Thanks for posting.

Originally Posted by Norton

Let’s admit that we will never have a democracy like countries in the West. There’s nothing wrong with that since our history, our culture and our traditions are different

Total bull. People here are like any other people.

Originally Posted by Exit Strategy

Total bull. People here are like any other people.

Wrong - we are all more or less the products of our environments of when we are growing up through to today.

Originally Posted by Exit Strategy

Total bull. People here are like any other people.

Nonsense.

First mistake is agreeing with an appointed Senate just because that is what will happen .

Followed closely by neglecting to insist that the military are controlled by the government .

Also missing is the founding stone of one man one vote .

In summary the article is simply sucking up to the current gun toting overlords .

Originally Posted by pseudolus

Originally Posted by Exit Strategy

Total bull. People here are like any other people.

Wrong - we are all more or less the products of our environments of when we are growing up through to today.

Your mother was a slave, you must be a slave?

No.

Let’s admit that we will never have a democracy like countries in the West. There’s nothing wrong with that since our history, our culture and our traditions are different.

Good article, reads very much like some of the posts on the political threads a while back made by some of the more enlightened posters who nevertheless were made to feel they were worse than Vlad the Impaler by those judging Thailand by the standards of the West for having the audacity, the sense of superiority and the ignorance to suggest that democracy may not be right for Thailand.


Suthep, by his unorthodox and desperate actions, may very well eventually be credited with starting the revolution that finally restarted Thailand on the road to a functioning government that is more representative of the people it aims to serve.

Total bull. People here are like any other people.

Idealist schoolboy dreamers nonsense.

Well said Tax.

Originally Posted by taxexile

Quote:
Total bull. People here are like any other people.
Idealist schoolboy dreamers nonsense.

See how we are 10 years later.

Originally Posted by taxexile

Suthep, by his unorthodox and desperate actions, may very well eventually be credited with starting the revolution that finally restarted Thailand on the road to a functioning government that is more representative of the people it aims to serve.

Suthep will be forgotten.

Key question not answered: Is each person's vote, equal?

South Africa faced these issues during its period of transition, before the first free election. At that point, the rest of the planet had a lot to say about human rights.

Why does Thailand not face the same scrutiny, as it attempts to reverse its position from one-man-one-vote, universal franchise - to a system tightly controlled by military & entrenched power? In my opinion, it will not work for long & it's merely a delaying tactic for the inevitable.

Originally Posted by VocalNeal

He didn't run the country for the people he ran it for himself. Including dodgy share trading, land deals, Lending #2 money to build a palace etc.

Now years later. Funny there has been no evidence. Things that were done were not illegal. Land deal was of his wife which appears to have been at market price.

If it was Junta - and it is - doing some of the same things - although no one knows because there is no transparency. Regardless, now you approve. I question your values.

Suthep will be forgotten

They will be studying him in history lessons here in 50 years time.

^

oh dear, I think you need some "re programming" at the generals holiday camp.

Originally Posted by Exit Strategy

Originally Posted by Norton

Let’s admit that we will never have a democracy like countries in the West. There’s nothing wrong with that since our history, our culture and our traditions are different

Total bull. People here are like any other people.

You think so? I reckon it was a pretty honest appraisal, Thaksin did run the country like it was a company

How about the telco sell off to Singapore? That was the one that brought him unstuck , he focked up big time there, might of made a motza out of it, but not welcome in his country of birth as a result

& the propaganda is working: "but, Thaksin..." (while closing your eyes to who writes, funds and benefits from these articles...)

Originally Posted by Norton

K. Pichai has it about right.

Yep..
And some have been saying the same thing forever.
Many still aren't getting it.

Originally Posted by Albert Shagnastier

Originally Posted by taxexile

Suthep will be forgotten

They will be studying him in history lessons here in 50 years time.

Yup. He said he would shut up after Thaksin's proxy was ousted and stayed true to that as haven't heard a peep from him since.

However, as much as I want to have faith in the future here - it will never change.

TIT.

....and some will always expect the change to come - as they see change.

Nah...
Same cycles. Same as it ever was.

Originally Posted by beerlaodrinker

Thaksin did run the country like it was a company

Well, that is political issue, but Thailand got richer and more efficient and red tape was cut and new businesses both in BKK and especially up country were given a chance. Like students with student grants, their families could not have afforded that, or health care: mothers with babies who would have died, like it was before khun .

Originally Posted by beerlaodrinker

How about the telco sell off to Singapore?

Companies are sold and bought all over the world all the time. It is called free market economy. You want to make this illegal?

Tax issue you don't mention is also quite clear.

There's no such beast as a free market economy.
Illusion.