Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2020. xv, 253 pp. (Tables, figures.) US$29.95, paper. ISBN 978-0-472-03848-0.
Undeniably, Thailand’s two antidemocratic movements—the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) and the People’s Democratic Reform Council (PDRC)—played a crucial part in redefining Thai politics in the last two decades. Enshrining “democracy” in the names of their organizations, both the PAD and PDRC were in fact anything but democratic. Aim Sinpeng’s book examines the collapse of Thai democracy in the hands of its so-called defenders. Sinpeng ventures further by explicating this phenomenon in the context of the emergence of social media in Thailand.
Theoretically rich and supported by abundant empirical data, this book unravels why the Thai middle class mobilized against democracy and how social media assisted in accelerating this antidemocratic process. Sinpeng argues that the antidemocratic mobilization was strategic, impelled by a perception of being excluded from democratic institutions. A more precise term used in this book is that of transpiring “institutional blockage.” The middle class’s perception of permanent exclusion (117) led to an act of opposing democracy, and eventually of relying on extra-constitutional intervention in the form of a military coup. The PAD was behind the forces that endorsed the 2006 coup overthrowing the Thaksin Shinawatra administration. The PDRC, in 2014, repeated this strategy by spurring on a situation of ungovernability. The government formed by Yingluck, Thaksin’s sister, was toppled in a coup, too.
Sinpeng lays an excellent groundwork for the understanding of Thai politics. Trapped in a critical dilemma, Thai politics has seen the oscillation between a power-sharing model and majority rule—whereas the traditional elites, to which the middle class belongs, preferred the former, the new power favoured the latter. The Thaksin clan represented an emerging power eagerly contesting the old political network. Thaksin’s electoral successes, inherited by Yingluck, served as a catalyst for antidemocratic mobilization. When people feel shut out from access to power, they turn to nondemocratic actors to reopen the political channels (8).The two nondemocratic actors in focus are the monarchy and the military. While the monarchy controls the political game, the military acts as an arbiter. The middle class has long invested its political interests in these institutions. Political stability, in the eyes of the middle class, does not always mean democratic stability (25). In fact, Sinpeng’s book follows my own research on the middle class’s view of democracy, which is apparently conditional. The Thai middle class has been an unreliable partner of democracy, since it only lent its support for democratization on its own conditional terms, thus earning the title, as I call it, of “contingent class” (Pavin Chachavalpongpun, “Thailand’s at the Critical Royal Transition: The Middle Class, Civil Society and Democratisation,” Middle Class, Civil Society and Democracy in Asia, ed. Hsin-Huang Michael Hsiao, Routledge, 2019, 174).
The PAD and the PDRC strove to defy the Shinawatras’ growing authoritarian tendency. Taking the PAD case as an example, the step to unlock the political impasse was the installation of a royally appointed prime minister to replace Thaksin. The antidemocratic movement was organized. To legitimize its course, royal symbols were utilized during the protests, not only to reaffirm the palace’s support of the removal of Thaksin but also to pit the monarchy against the supposedly corrupt politician. When the enemy of the monarchy was identified, the coup became justified. This is because the monarchy has been made the heart and soul of the nation. Both the PAD and the PDRC rode on the two intertwining ideologies of nationalism and royalism to propel their political agendas (120), and they succeeded.
What makes this book different from others in the Thai studies field is the juxtaposition of the Thai conflict with the new narrative on social media. Sinpeng asks: What role did social media play in the antidemocratic mobilization (140)? The social media revolution in the mid-2010s has greatly shaped the political landscape, and not necessarily for the benefit of democracy. Sinpeng argues boldly that social media facilitates the coordination and mobilization of antidemocratic movements, deepens polarization, and amplifies antidemocratic voices. The PDRC lived on the thriving social media culture, transforming its leader, Suthep Taugsuban, a former MP from the Democrat Party, into a popular figure, an alternative democratic symbol of the middle class. His online popularity effectively united the disparate opposition groups. The PDRC made use of social media to mobilize online and offline protest campaigns that resulted in the 2014 coup (167).
The strength of this book lies in its combined studies of the two most current issues in Thailand: social movement and social media. Sinpeng’s extensive fieldwork in Thailand enlivens the reader’s understanding of the way in which Thais, particularly those in the middle class, have defined politics and defended their position of power even at the expense of democracy. Sinpeng, at various points in this book, widens the scope of this understanding to cover other cases in other parts of the world, making her theoretical approach truly inclusive.
However, this book contains some simplifications, in my own interpretation. Often it reads as if Thaksin is equal to nondemocratic evil, that the PAD is equivalent to the PDRC, and as if conservative-royalism is an answer to political stability. Sinpeng is courageous in her presentation of the monarchy, given the fact that discussion on this matter is closely monitored under the draconian lèse-majesté law. But this discussion could be more in-depth. For example, Queen Sirikit’s attendance at the funeral of a member of the PAD in 2008 was a turning point in Thailand’s political polarization. Or indeed, in my view, the royal succession was in part responsible for inspiring the birth of the PDRC in 2013. Another aspect that I found missing in this book is a discussion of the role of the judiciaries. Aside from the monarchy and the military, the Thai court represents a key nondemocratic institution.
Despite these minor flaws, this is an important book for those interested in the current political situation in Thailand and how social media has presented contentious political issues through everyone’s smart phones.
Pavin Chachavalpongpun
Kyoto University, Kyoto