Security, development and political participation in Thailand: Alternative currencies of legitimacy Duncan McCargo 1 April 2002 Contemporary Southeast Asia ICSA 50-67 Volume 24, Issue 1; ISSN: 0129-797X Copyright (c) 2002 ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights reserved. Copyright Institute of Southeast Asian Studies Apr 2002

This article argues that Thailand's political elites have employed three different "currencies" in their quest for legitimacy since 1932. These "currencies" are defined as: security, development, and political accommodation or participation. Different currencies have enjoyed different degrees of salience according to prevailing domestic and international conditions. While security was a crucial legitimating rationale during the Cold War, since the economic crisis and the new constitution of 1997, political participation has loomed largest. The article examines the career of former army commander and prime minister Chavalit Yongchaiyudh, in order to illustrate the changing value of alternative sources of legitimacy from the early 1980s to the late 1990s. It argues that despite the growing importance of political participation, fundamental inequalities of power and resources persist in contemporary Thailand. Introduction In October 1997, faced with a huge economic crisis that had brought Thailand to its knees, elected premier Chavalit Yongchaiyudh sought a meeting with military chiefs in an apparent bid to stage a coup against himself. Chavalit - himself a former army commander - appears to have hoped that the military would support him in declaring a state of emergency.1 Instead, the military chiefs told him to forget it. Chavalit was ousted by parliamentary means shortly afterwards, and replaced as prime minister by Democrat Party leader Chuan Leekpai. A few years earlier, no military commander could have resisted the opportunity to impose a security clampdown on behalf of an ex-military prime minister. This remarkable episode testified to the transformations which Thai politics had undergone during the 1990s: between the coup of 1991 and the non-coup of 1997, the security "card" had been significantly devalued. This article explores the contrasting discourses of security, development, and political participation in Thailand. These three terms will be viewed essentially as constructions by the Thai elite, reflecting the experiences of a state that enjoyed an important strategic position during the Cold War, especially in the context of Vietnam. Elites have successfully traded in these three different "currencies" in order to legitimate their rule and preserve their

power. The most successful elements of the Thai elite are those who have most successfully traded the appropriate currencies at key political junctures. By examining the transformations and adaptations of the three forms of power during the recent decades, the dynamics of social and political change in Thailand are assessed and reviewed. Security Defining security in the Thai context is highly contentious. Despite the powerful role played by the military in the Thai political order since 1932, security (as conventionally understood) has never been the central task of the military in Thailand. The military is first and foremost an armed bureaucracy, which does not fight wars. Unlike other powerful militaries in the region (such as those of Myanmar, Indonesia, or South Korea), it has not fought an independence struggle or defended national sovereignty. As one commentator wrote in 1982: "The army showed that it remains politicized, factionalized, and is of doubtful value as a military force. 112 Ben Anderson memorably described the Thai military as "a cluster of self-absorbed, status conscious, privileged bureaucratic factions".' The Thai military has often appeared to shun potentially dangerous situations. Instead, military officers have preferred to devote their energies to the more interesting and satisfying professions of business and politics. Their core businesses have been smuggling, logging, and profiting from the country's natural resources. In politics, they have consistently claimed for themselves high political office (many of Thailand's prime ministers have had a military background), and a share in the running of the country. The pursuit of security, as understood from the perspective of the Thai military, has sometimes amounted to finding strategies to avoid having to fight anyone. There is no doubt that there were some areas of considerable professionalism within the Thai military during the Indochina conflict. This was especially the case in technical fields such as artillery, where Thai forces benefited from U.S. technology and training. By the 1980s, the Thai military had developed much more effective methods of combating insurgencies than previously. Yet, the most successful anticommunist strategy of the Thai military was its amnesty policy for communist insurgents, which yielded dramatic results in the early 1980s. Rather than fight communism in the jungles, the military decided to wait for the radicals to emerge from the jungle of their own accord. Since many of the so-called communist rebels were never members of the Beijing-backed Communist Party of Thailand (CPT), but actually middle-class students from Bangkok with little appetite for a lifetime of guerrilla warfare, the amnesty strategy proved highly successful. In any case, the Sino-Vietnamese split, which resulted from the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in 1979, led China to cut off aid to the CPT, resulting directly in the decline of the insurgency. Thus, the idea of "security" in the Thai context must be understood partly as a rhetorical device, a mantra recited ritualistically by generations of Thai

military officers in a questionable attempt to justify their over-sized organization and comfortable sinecures. There can be few other militaries in the world where promotion to general is so common. Promotion to majorgeneral is semi-automatic for graduates of the Chulachomklao Military Academy who do not seriously blot their copy books (and usual even for those who do, as in the case of several officers disgraced in the 1 April 1981 coup attempt, but later restored to their former rank). The Thai military has a very large number of senior officers, many of whom have almost literally nothing to do.4 The Thai military used various strategies in order to build up its power and influence. First, the military presented itself as a central player in creating the modern Thai state, thanks to its role in the ending of the absolute monarchy in 1932. This piece of historiography was central to the claim of the armed forces that they were dedicated to the true interests of the people. Secondly, during the Cold War the military represented itself as the central institution involved in combating the communist threat, both externally (primarily from Indochina), and from domestic sources. The military did not hesitate to invoke the Vietnamese communist bogeyman to justify its own demands. Thirdly, the military forged a powerful alliance with the United States during the Vietnam era, and was the beneficiary of substantial American aid and training. These resources helped to bolster the prestige of the armed forces, and also enabled senior military officers to build up their own political and economic power bases. Fourthly, the military did not hesitate to threaten, attempt, or stage coups d'etat on the basis of supposed national interests. All these sources of military influence rest on dubious premises. It can be argued that the Thai military had considerable vested interests in helping to end the absolute monarchy, that the army was not a particularly effective force against communist threats, that the armed forces provided little return for the expensive American aid programmes lavished upon them, and that the real explanations for military coups were invariably challenges to military power and privilege, rather than genuine threats to national security.5 As Muthiah Alagappa has noted: [Since 1932] successive military regimes have used the label of national security to justify the usurpation of political power and their subsequent political actions... Of significance in this connection is the recent attempt to institutionalize the dominant role of the military in Thai politics under the mantle of national security. The military is now not only assigned the traditional role of national defense but is also assigned the custodial role of the traditional institutions, and a leading role in defining and building a democratic framework suitable to Thailand. The lack of consensus over the exercise of state authority makes it exceedingly difficult to differentiate normal political intercourse from activities that may be considered as threats to national security.6 In other words, the concept of national security was manipulated as a means of securing the privileged political standing of the military, and to justify an

extension of the military role into a wide range of political arenas. Alagappa also observes that the Cambodian conflict during the 1980s was an extremely convenient one for the Thai military, a diversionary conflict which tied up potential aggressors, and offered lucrative opportunities for smuggling and arms-dealing. Whilst the levels of communist insurgency in Thailand were doubtless overstated for the purpose of legitimating high levels of military expenditure, the effective end of such insurgency by the early 1980s posed a new set of problems for the military. The old problem of how not to fight the insurgents was replaced by the new problem of how not to fight them any longer. The new position was explored in two important papers: a "Master Plan for Regional Cooperation or the Creation of a New Equilibrium" produced by the National Security Council in 1993, and a White Paper by the Defence Ministry entitled The Defence of Thailand 1994.7 The "Master Plan" argued that Thailand needed to become a regional hub for Indochina, Myanmar, southern China, and ASEAN; and acknowledged that this goal could only be achieved by promoting better political linkages across the region. In other words, cultural and attitudinal changes were crucial to the safeguarding of national security. By contrast, the Defence White Paper of 1994 - while paying lip service to the importance of values such as ethics, dedication, loyalty and responsibility - placed greater emphasis on conventional unilateral military preparedness: During the Cold War, Thailand was in the middle of the conflicts between the communist countries and the free world. After the communists took over Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, the fighting in those countries and the infiltration by the Communist Party of Thailand, made it seem that Thailand was in a state of war. It was therefore necessary to pour all available national resources to safeguard the independence and sovereignty of the nation. After the end of the Cold War, the political situation changed rapidly. Confrontation between superpowers with different ideologies ended, and economic competition took its place. The contest for markets and resources could, however, lead to the use of force in the future. The Armed Forces therefore must change its focus and concentrate more on protecting national economic interests, develop weapons systems and technology to improve capability, and to produce skilled personnel to operate these weapons.8 The lack of logic was stunning: the end of the Cold War meant a need for improved military capabilities, and hence for increased high-tech resources by the military. The confusion seen here between promoting military professionalism and buying expensive toys was deliberately fostered and sustained by the military lobby. Time after time,. it was argued that buying better equipment would lead to a more professional military.9 In fact, there is substantial evidence for the opposite view: the heavy arms buying of the late 1980s was linked to the pursuit of lucrative arms commissions by senior

commanders, and coincided with the politicization of the military, which culminated in the 23 February 1991 coup d'etat. The 1994 White Paper reflected attempts by the military to rehabilitate itself with the Thai public after the bloody events of May 1992, when about 100 people were killed (or went permanently "missing") following a decision by army commanders to open fire on hundreds of thousands of peaceful demonstrators protesting against the unelected prime minister, 1991 coup leader General Suchinda Kraprayoon.11 As in October 1973 and October 1976, Thai security forces demonstrated that they were entirely capable of shooting to kill - as long as the targets were unarmed Thai citizens. Chai-Anan Samudavanija has argued that the military has been increasingly isolated since May 1992, as the private sector sought to undermine its privileges, the public became less tolerant of its politicking, and the international community became more critical of its corrupt relations with the Khmer Rouge and the Myanmar regime." He predicted that the military would be increasingly "bypassed" as a result of globalization and the erosion of state capacity. Whereas in 1991, the coup group known as the National Peace Keeping Council commanded broad-based support in its seizure of power from the elected Chatichai Choonhavan government, May 1992 saw the military discredited as an effective political force. At the same time, as John Girling has noted: "The military is no longer able to impose its own image on Thai society, but it is still a wild card. Even if the top personnel have been displaced, its national security ideology has hardly been affected."12 There seems every reason to assume that military leaders would welcome the opportunity to restore some of their declining power and influence. However, such a restoration would now be difficult to achieve by the traditional method of a coup d'etat, and the tighter fiscal climate produced by the post-July 1997 monetary crisis has made high-prestige arms purchases much more problematic than before. Military thinking may remain essentially the same; but the most immediate question is how best to promote that thinking in a more pluralistic political order. Military officers have been obliged to seek alternative routes to power, making use of the discourses of development and participation rather than the largely obsolete discourse of security. The old threats do not work any more, but the military has not yet lost its appetite for political power. Certainly, many elements in the military were very effective in resisting relatively modest programmes of defence sector reform advocated by the 19972001 Chuan Leekpai government.13 A decade after May 1992, no civilian government has yet gained sufficient leverage substantively to challenge the core of military privilege: the culture of over-promotion, and the remarkable proliferation of generals. Chaiwat Satha-Anand has ingeniously argued that Thai strategic culture reflects "tensions between different layers of culture", giving rise to "the elastic cultural space necessary for radical policy adaptability".14 Alternatively, it might well be suggested that discourses of security in the Thai context are essentially incoherent, serving the immediate interests of the military and defence elite.

Development The idea of "development" in the Thai context gained currency following a 1959 World Bank report which advocated a systematic, state-led programme of economic development using a central agency (the National Economic and Social Development Board) and a series of national development plans. The first such plan took effect in 1961. Ironically, this use of Soviet-style central state planning coincided with a generous U.S. aid programme, designed to make Thailand a bulwark against the much-feared tide of Indochinese communism. One core policy of the planning agencies was to create regional hub cities outside Bangkok, such as Khon Kaen in the Northeast. Infrastructural improvements supported by the U.S. Government performed several functions: they provided the basis for a rapid increase in industrialization and economic development; they were strategically important in making Thailand an effective American base to resist Indochinese communism; they helped the central Thai state to penetrate and control more effectively "peripheral" regions of suspect loyalty (especially the northeast and Muslim parts of the south) and they offered sections of the Thai elite, especially military commanders working in close collaboration with mainly Sino-Thai businessmen, the opportunity to enrich themselves through lucrative construction contracts and commissions. "Development" in the Thai context was far from a neutral and positive term; it was a synonym for enhancing state power, promoting anti-communism, and strengthening the elite. As Demaine argues, "development" was an ideological construct in the Thai context: to challenge the inexorable logic of economic development was practically an act of subversion. 15 The effects of rapid growth were dramatic, and the impact on Thailand's resources often devastating: whereas in 1961, 51 per cent of Thailand was covered by forest, by 1988 only 19 per cent of the country was forested. In 1960, there were 2,118 km of provincial roads in Northeast Thailand; by 1988, the figure had increased more than tenfold, to 27,595 km.'6 "Development" activities, such as deforestation and highway construction, often had a "security" dimension: removing trees meant removing cover for insurgents, and destroying traditional livelihoods for minority groups, thus facilitating the expansion of central state power and control. For the military, such projects brought personal financial gains, whilst making the task of counter-insurgency easier. One important consequence of "development" was the way in which it helped to create and strengthen a burgeoning class of Sino-Thai entrepreneurs, who worked handin-hand with bureaucrats and military officers. Many of these entrepreneurs had arrived in Siam in the 1920s, 1930s, or 1940s with virtually nothing. During the 1960s and 1970s, their banks, construction companies, and trading houses became highly successful enterprises.17 By the 1980s, the character of Thai economic development had changed substantially. No longer driven by Cold War imperatives or backed by largescale American aid, the development process was increasingly dominated by the private sector. Sino-Thai companies invested heavily in manufacturing, often embarking upon joint ventures with Western, Japanese, or Korean

partners. The service sector also blossomed, especially following the hugely successful "Visit Thailand Year" of 1987, which spawned numerous hotel projects. Thailand enjoyed a real estate boom during the late 1980s and early 1990s, and double-digit growth for three consecutive years made the country one of the world's fastest-growing economies.18 Whereas in the 1960s, the business class had been the subordinate partner of military and political elites, the reverse was true by the 1990s. Political elites were increasingly dependent upon backing from the business sector, as parliamentary politics had become more important. Whereas in the past, backing from the military was sufficient for one to become prime minister, by the late 1980s controlling Members of Parliament (MPs) had become the main route to political power, and to ministerial and prime ministerial office. A pervasive feature of Thai development was its unevenness, its unfairness, its lack of guiding principles of social equity, and its persistent failure to redistribute the gains of high growth to more deprived regions of the country.19 There were many notable achievements for Thai development, including near-universal primary schooling, good levels of basic health care, and a model family planning programme. Yet, high growth rates produced an ugly picture of private affluence coupled with public squalor, as an avaricious business class was allowed to squander its new-found wealth through a series of shortsighted and bickering governments which lacked a coherent vision of the need for high-quality public services. In particular, the failure to invest heavily in secondary and technical education during the boom period of 1985-95 left Thailand's work-force ill-equipped to compete with neighbouring countries. As wage levels rose, and Thailand lost its comparative advantage in terms of labour costs, the country lacked the skills base to upgrade its work-force, and move to a more technologically advanced economy. As Girling notes, Thailand's school enrolment figures were 25 years behind those of Taiwan, and far worse than those of less "successful" neighbouring economies, such as Indonesia and the Philippines.20 By the year 2000, 70 per cent of Thailand's work-force had received only primary education.21 This failure resulted directly from the lack of political will, and reflected the short-sightedness of Thailand's political, bureaucratic and business elites, whose failure to plan and to invest for the future was one cause of the severe economic downturn which began in 1997. Nevertheless, the claim that they were successfully promoting the rapid development of the country was central to the legitimating rhetoric of those elites, especially from the mid-1980s to 1997. Political Accommodation, or Political Participation? The military-bureaucratic elite in Thailand has traditionally held participatory politics in contempt. Elected politicians have been viewed as dangerous upstarts who might upset the apple-cart of hierarchies. One early element in this view was a fear that the Chinese could empower themselves politically and financially by corrupting the electoral process. Thai military officers and bureaucrats claimed that they (by implicit contrast) were pure in their

intentions towards the country, and in close touch with the needs and wishes of the people. The Thai elite, supported by sympathetic foreign scholars, sought to present a picture of the mass of the country's people as essentially apolitical, and given to avoiding conflict at all costs. The intellectual stance of American scholarship during the 1950s and 1960s (the heyday of modernization theory) was explicitly laid out in an admirably honest article by Herbert Phillips. Phillips argued that American scholarship on Thailand during this period was a "scholarship of admiration for Thai history, culture, and society".22 He went on to explain that: [I]t is precisely because Thailand has so long represented a situation of simultaneous adaptation and maintenance that American scholars have with comfort, and I think with some measure of success, explained Thailand primarily in terms of an equilibrium, rather than conflict, model of human affairs.23 These words, it should be recalled, were first published in 1973, the year of 14 October, when a student-led popular uprising forced the country's military dictators into exile; the year also saw the beginning of the most turbulent and conflictual period of Thailand's modern political history. The popular political movements of the 1973-76 period put paid to simplistic notions that the Thai elite had an inherently legitimate right to govern. After the shock of 1973, when a military dictatorship collapsed in the face of popular defiance, elite actors were forced to come to terms with the reality of bottom-up pressures, and the need to accommodate demands for participation. Despite the superficially successful repression of student protests in October 1976, and the brief return to an earlier style of crude authoritarianism, the 1976-77 Thanin regime never succeeded in gaining legitimacy, and was toppled by a military coup after only a year. The military had recognized that in order to retain a significant political role, they had to tolerate a far greater degree of pluralism than they had previously been willing to countenance. Surachart Bamrungsuk argues that the military itself initiated a "transition to transaction", giving the green light to an opening up of new terrains of political space.24 A counter-argument is that the military did not jump willingly to such a position, but was pushed there by the logic of economic, social, and political changes which were beyond its understanding, let alone its control. The second argument seems much more persuasive, since the first argument would credit the Thai military with an unusually high degree of critical selfawareness. A third possibility is that a fractured military was split on the issue: in the late 1970s and early 1980s, factionalism was extremely rife in the Thai armed forces. The term "political accommodation" implies that state elites had the upper hand in deciding how much political space would be allowed; in the Thai context, however, this is a highly questionable assumption, given the vigour of popular demands for political participation. Nevertheless, compared to other similar militaries, the Thai military has long had a high degree of

influence on civilian politics (with generals assuming Cabinet posts and even forming parties), and a high degree of business entanglements, which have frequently required them to achieve a modus vivendi with political leaders. Whichever interpretation one prefers, the subsequent political trend has involved increasing popular participation in the political process, the growing importance of elections and parties, and the rise of "professional" politicians. For the first time, politics could offer a vocation, rather than simply a reward for bureaucratic or military services rendered. The changing character of Thai politics during the 1980s and early 1990s was, in certain respects, dynamic and refreshing. As non-state actors gained a growing voice in the land, environmental issues provided a focus for critical perspectives on the development process, non-governmental organizations expanded their activities, the media made use of its relative freedom of expression, an energetic elected local government took control of Bangkok, and new political parties and social movements blossomed. Yet there was a darker side to this flowering of political participation in Thailand. The electoral process was far from open, especially in the provinces. Some 90 per cent of Thai MPs were elected outside Bangkok, where electoral outcomes were often determined by vote-buying, fraud, and the corruption of officials.25 Electoral fraud took on numerous different forms, including voter impersonation and count-rigging. Whilst traditional elites "accommodated" other actors by allowing them to participate in electoral politics, the scope for free and fair electoral contestation was very limited. There is evidence that the distortion and manipulation of the electoral process, which had long existed, grew increasingly rampant during the 1980s and 1990s. As control of parliamentary seats came to translate directly into control of Cabinet posts, and thereby directly into control of lucrative government contracts and crucial regulatory decisions, so the value of electoral outcomes increased. Rival faction bosses, parties, and powerbrokers were able to raise huge cash advances from prospective beneficiaries in order to secure given electoral outcomes. As a play on words in Thai illustrates, "politics" (kanmuang) became a matter of "eating the country" (kinmuang).26 For this reason, the increased pluralism of Thai politics did not necessarily amount to a process of democratization or political liberalization.27 Rather, it illustrated shifts in the character of elite governance in Thailand, as a military-bureaucratic elite was displaced by a new elite with close ties to the business community. The economic growth originally associated with military dominance (justified on "security" grounds), had now developed a momentum of its own. Business actors who had started out as the subordinate partners of generals and senior civilian officials, were now gaining the upper hand. Using the electoral process as a tool, they were gaining access to ministerial positions through their bankrolling of election campaigns, parties, and factions. This was not so much a case of economic development broadening popular political participation as a new rotation of

political elites, facilitated by the highly inequitable proceeds of uneven economic growth (a process famously described by one writer in the 1970s as "modernization without development").28 The Thai economy was growing rapidly, but this economic growth was not shaped by any principles of equitable distribution. Similarly, the scope for political power and influence was increasing, but this "political growth" was entirely ungoverned by notions of political equality.29 In other words, "security", "development", and "political accommodation" (to a large extent, euphemisms for "state violence", "economic growth", and "electoral mobilization") could be seen as three alternative forms of power and influence held by elite actors in Thailand during the 1980s and 1990s. Competing elites sought to trade different forms of power and influence, exchanging the forms they held for those forms which they believed would best enhance their standing. The military traded their security power for development power (by engaging in smuggling, logging, and other criminal activities), which they used in turn to influence the political process (in the form of votes for political parties they owned or controlled). Business people used their development influence to buy security (protection from the military and from organized criminals), and also to buy participation, in the form of influence over Cabinet appointments and decisions. Politicians traded their capacity to mobilize participation for power over the development process, thereby enriching themselves, and strengthening their political bases. They also bought security to buy-off coup threats, and to pacify the military. There was an increasing interpenetration of elites. While the rise of the business sector did increase the size of the middle class - and thereby contribute to the strengthening of civil society - the middle class generally acted primarily from economic self-interest rather than political principle, as seen in the widespread middle class support for the 23 February 1991 military coup. Yet in the wake of the events of May 1992, the rhetoric of security was severely undermined. Given the damage that had been done to the reputation and credibility of the military during the troubled 1991-92 period, politicians and business people began to feel much less need for the "security" offered by the military. Indeed, too close an alliance with the military could actually undermine the security of a government. Increasingly, the key relationship was that between business and politics, rather than between the military and politics or the military and business. Political Adaptation: The Case of Chavalit Yongchaiyudh One of the clearest ways in which the changing significance of security, development and participation in the Thai context can be examined is to study the career of General Chavalit Yongchaiyudh. Chavalit, a career army officer from the Signals Corps, made his reputation in the military by successfully associating himself with the policies of political offensives against the Communist Party of Thailand, and the amnesty for defectors. To what

extent was Chavalit really responsible for these policies is a matter of some debate. One of his key influences was Prasert Sapsunthorn, a former CPT ideologue, who served as an adviser to the "Democratic Soldiers" clique (of which Chavalit was a leading member) and later as a political adviser to the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC).11 Aware of the internal conflicts of the CPT (and of the adverse effects of aggressive counter-ins urgency methods, such as destroying "red" villages), Prasert proposed a "political" solution to the communist problem. When the CPT threat did indeed decline in the early and mid-1980s, Chavalit succeeded in taking much of the credit for something which had actually been initiated by Prime Minister Kriangsak Chomanan in the late 1970s. Chavalit was subsequently promoted to Army Commander-in-Chief in 1986, and later simultaneously held the technically senior but actually more symbolic post of Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces. Yet despite being promoted to these top positions by arch-royalist General Prem Tinsulanonda (who was then Prime Minister), Chavalit was opposed by former Prime Minister and elder statesman Kukrit Pramoj. Kukrit accused Chavalit of harbouring leftist leanings, and of favouring an elected premiership which would undermine the standing of the monarchy. Though in some respects a thorn in Chavalit's side during the late 1980s and early 1990s, Kukrit helped Chavalit to build up a faintly "radical" image, as someone sympathetic to "socialistic" ideas, and to the aspirations of minority groups. One of Chavalit's favourite modus operandi was to build links with trade unions and protest groups. During his tenure as Army chief, he was often called in to resolve mysterious industrial and other disputes that some suspected he had instigated himself. Chavalit sought to portray himself as a supporter of the underdog. This is what Girling has described as the military's "Chavalit option": "influencing or manipulating politics by populist (anticapitalist, anti-politicking) proclamations, and by supporting rural and urban mass organizations as counterweights 11.31 Chavalit successfully marketed this image in the Muslim-dominated border provinces of the south, where he established a militarysponsored programme called "New Hope", and in the Northeast, where he set up a programme known as "Green Isan", which was supposed to promote agricultural and economic rejuvenation in this deprived region. In both cases, Chavalit used substantial chunks of the military budget, channelling the funds through a network of local leaders (village headmen and others) whom he identified by using the ISOC's anticommunist database. In other words, he sought to turn a security network into a development network. At the same time, his real goal was abundantly clear: to mobilize this network for the purposes of winning popular political support. In 1990, he took early retirement from the military, and after a brief and disastrous spell as an unelected Deputy Prime Minister in Chatichai Choonhavan's Cabinet, he set up his own political party, New Aspiration. This party declared an explicit goal of attracting a million members, and sought to establish an elaborate nationwide structure to organize and mobilize this mass of people.

New Aspiration sought to convert the "development" networks of "Green Isan" and other programmes into a mobilizing network for the party. Sensing the shift away from military dominance of the political order and towards greater participation, Chavalit had sought to reinvent himself into a party politician. This kind of make-over was practised by a number of other politicians, including his predecessor as army commander General Arthit Kamlang-ek (who formed his own party after being expelled from the military by Prem, and eventually became Deputy Prime Minister) and former Young Turk leader Major-General Chamlong Srimuang (who retired from the military at 50 to stand successfully for election as Governor of Bangkok in 1985, later forming his own political party and rising to the post of Deputy Prime Minister). Chavalit's political ascendancy was interrupted by the 1991 coup (which can be seen partly as a plot by his formerly loyal Class 5 subordinates to block him from gaining the premiership). The limits of the original Chavalit option were clearly illustrated by the wholesale corruption of the March 1992 electoral process. In order to realize his political ambitions, Chavalit was obliged to adopt all the worst features of party politics which he purported to challenge.32 By transforming the New Aspiration Party into a pure "rural machine" party dedicated to large-scale vote-buying, Chavalit was eventually able to become Prime Minister in November 1996. During his premiership he continued to make populist overtures to farmers' groups and other organizations.33 Yet Chavalit had long sold out his party to the big corporations which provided New Aspiration with most of its financial backing. The November 1997 events referred to at the beginning of this article illustrate that whereas Chavalit's grasp of reality had become more tenuous (ironically, he built his military career and subsequent transition to civilian politics on his insistence that he would never permit a coup to take place on his watch), the military commanders now understood better than the Prime Minister that a crackdown under the watchful gaze of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and international investors would be very costly. Chavalit had been able to use his military background to build up sufficient resources eventually to bankroll his premiership. However, like General Suchinda in 1992, Chavalit discovered the hard way that retaining power in Thailand was rather more difficult than gaining power. Chavalit's career illustrates well that in Thailand security, development, and participation have been alternative legitimating discourses, manipulated by the political elites in their quest to gain and then to retain power. Just as Chavalit had a questionable reputation on security matters, and just as his much-vaunted "Green Isan" programme had no substantial positive development impact, so his New Aspiration Party created a sham of "participation" which delivered little to its supporters. Chavalit subsequently became the first former Thai Prime Minister to accept a formal post under one of his successors, serving as Defence Minister in the administration of Thaksin Shinawatra from February 2001.

Conclusion The usage and prioritization of loaded and highly ambiguous terms such as "development" and "security" gradually changed in Thailand. These changes reflected shifts in the balance of elite power, as the military was forced to cede the high ground to elected politicians working in alliance with business people. One effect was to modify the way in which public policy has been distorted by interest groups, increasing the degree to which distortions reflect rapidly-changing alliances between short-lived ministers and their questionable business associates. The results have been clearly illustrated by numerous cases: an obvious one was the chaotic public transport situation in Bangkok, where various competing infrastructure projects had been initiated by rival agencies, parties and companies, each consortium vying to advance its own project at the expense of others, and resulting in both figurative and literal gridlock. In terms of politics, the subordination of wider political participation to elite interests resulted in widespread distrust of the political process, and strong demands for electoral and other reforms.34 These demands culminated in (but were by no means fully assuaged by) the promulgation of a new constitution in November 1997.35 The "people's constitution" of 1997 effectively marked the ascendancy of political participation as the dominant currency in discourses of Thai power. No government could now assert its legitimacy without reference to popular participation. Yet, without substantial decentralization of the bureaucratic order, and the creation of more effective local government structures (such as might be symbolized by the popular election of all provincial governors), it seems unlikely that popular dissatisfaction with representative politics will decline. At various junctures, such as in May 1992, opposition groups have sought to circumvent the parliamentary process by resorting to rally politics and mass demonstrations; the "rally mode" of politics is always available in Thailand when conventional political processes fail to deliver. Social groups and political forces outside the ruling elite typically engage in a dual process of selectively engaging and collaborating with the orthodox political system, and campaigning outside that system. The Thai elite can no longer justify limits on political participation on the basis of national security criteria. Nor can the benefits of economic development be monopolized by a minority of the country's population without a substantial backlash. The economic crisis of 1997 had created a new imperative for the more equitable distribution of both wealth and power in contemporary Thailand; yet the landslide election of Thaksin Shinawatra - one of Thailand's richest men - to the premiership in January 2001 suggests that old inequalities and contradictions continue to persist. DUNCAN MCCARGO is a Senior Lecturer in the Institute for Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds, United Kingdom. Footnotes:

1. For details of this extraordinary but largely forgotten development, see "PM pulled back from the brink", Bangkok Post (BP), 22 October 1997; and Michael Vatikiotis, "Democracy First", Far Eastern Economic Review, 6 November 1997. 2. Larry A. Niksch, "Thailand in 1981: The Prem Government Feels the Heat", Asian Survey 22, no. 2 (February 1982): 191. 3. Benedict Anderson, "Studies of the Thai State: The State of Thai Studies", in The Study of Thailand:Analyses of Knowledge, Approaches and Prospects in Anthropology; Art History, Economics, History, and Political Science, edited by Eliezer B. Ayal, Southeast Asia Series, no. 54 (Athens, OH.: Ohio University Center for International Studies, 1978), p. 205. 4. In 1998 there were an estimated 1,300 to 1,400 generals in the Thai Army, about half of them in "inactive" posts (BP, 5 March 1998). Chamlong Srimuang, as a colonel attached to the military's Supreme Command from 1981-85, spent most of his time driving around the country, preaching Buddhist sermons in the manner of a wandering monk. Playing golf is a more common way of filling in time. 5. For arguments along these lines, see Duncan McCargo, Chamlong Srimuang and the New Thai Politics (London: Hurst 1997), pp. 19-66. 6. Muthiah Alagappa, The National Security of Developing States: Lessons from Thailand (Dover MA: Auburn House Publishing, 1987), p. 71. 7. For a detailed discussion of these two documents, see Chaiwat SathaAnand, "Thailand: The Layers of a Strategic Culture", in Strategic Cultures in the Asia-Pacific Region, edited by Ken Booth and Russell Trood (Basingstoke: Macmillan 1999), pp. 148-53. 8. The Defence of Thailand 1994 (Bangkok: Ministry of Defence, 1994), pp. 25-26. 9. For one of the most explicit arguments to this effect, see Suchit Bunbongkarn, "The Thai Military in the 1990s: A Declining Political Force?" in The Military in Politics: Southeast Asian Experiences, edited by Wolfgang S. Heinz, Werner Pfennig and Victor T. King (Hull: University of Hull, Centre for South-East Asian Studies, 1990), pp. 106-22. 10. See William A. Callahan, Imagining Democracy: Reading "The Events of May" in Thailand (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1998). 11. Chai-Anan Samudavanija, "Old Soldiers Never Die, They are Just Bypassed: The Military, Bureaucracy, and Globalisation", in Political Change

in Thailand: Democracy and Participation, edited by Kevin Hewison (London: Routledge, 1997), pp. 42-57. 12. John Girling, Interpreting Development: Capitalism, Democracy and the Rise of the Middle Class in Thailand (Ithaca: Cornell University Southeast Asia Program, 1996), p. 22. 13. For information on some of these proposals, and the reactions they elicited, see BP, 24 July 1998; 28 July 1998; 10 October 1998; and 16 March 1999. For an excellent discussion and analysis, see James Ockey, "Thailand: The Struggle to Redefine CivilMilitary Relations", in Coercion and Governance: The Declining Political Role of the Military in Asia, edited by Muthiah Alagappa (Stanford: Stanford University Press 2001), pp. 187-208, 14. Chaiwat, op. cit., p. 161. 15. See Harvey Demaine, "Kanpatthana: Thai Views of Development", in Context, Meaning and Power in Southeast Asia, edited by Mark Hobart and Robert H. Taylor (Ithaca: Cornell University Southeast Asia Program, 1986), pp. 93-114. 16. Figures from Kamala Tiyavanich, Forest Recollections: Wandering Monks in Twentieth-Century Thailand (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1997), p. 244. 17. For a detailed discussion of the interface between money and power, see Money and Power in Provincial Thailand, edited by Ruth McVey (Copenhagen: NIAS 2000). 18. For a good general account of these issues, see Pasuk Phongpaichit and Chris Baker, Thailand's Boom and Bust (Chiang Mai: Silkworm, 1998). 19. For extensive discussion of these issues, see numerous excellent chapters in Uneven Development in Thailand, edited by Michael G. Parnwell (Aldershot: Avebury 1996). 20. Girling, Interpreting Development, p. 23. 21. Pasuk Phongpaichit, "Thailand", in Southeast Asia's Misunderstood Miracle: Industrial Policy and Economic Development in Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, edited by Jomo K.S. et al (Boulder: Westview 1997), p. 83. 22. Herbert Phillips, "Some Premises of American Scholarship on Thailand", in Modern Thai Politics: From Village to Nation, edited by Clark Neher (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Schenkman, 1979), p. 449. 23. Ibid., p. 451.

24. Surachart Bamrungsuk, "The Military-initiated Transition in Thailand: Causes, Conditions and Costs" (Statement delivered to the academic meeting on "Arsom Khamkid", Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University, 29 July 1991). 25. The seminal work on this topic is Sombat Chantornvong, Leuktang Wikrit: Panha lae Thong Ok [Thai Elections in Crisis: Problems and Solutions] (Bangkok: Kopfai Publishing, 1993). For a detailed discussion of illegal electoral practices in one region, see William A. Callahan and Duncan McCargo, "Vote-buying in Thailand's Northeast: The July 1995 General Election", Asian Survey 36, no. 4 (April 1996). For an over-view of problems in the Thai electoral system, see Surin Maisrikrod and Duncan McCargo, "Electoral Politics: Commercialisation and Exclusion", in Political Change in Thailand: Democracy and Participation, edited by Kevin Hewison (London: Routledge 1997), pp. 132-48. 26. For a detailed discussion, see Daniel Arghiros, Democracy, Development and Decentralization in Provincial Thailand (Richmond: Curzon, 2001), especially pp. 166-88. 27. See Duncan McCargo, "Problematising Democratisation: The Thai Case", Working Paper No. 61, Development Research Series (Aalborg, Denmark: DIR, Aalborg University, December 1997). 28. Norman Jacobs, Modernisation Without Development: Thailand as on Asian Case Study (New York: Praeger, 1971). 29. For a theoretical discussion which explores ideas of political equality and popular control, see David Beetham, "Conditions for Democratic Consolidation", Review of African Political Economy, no. 60 (1994): 157-72. 30. Suchit Bunbongkarn, The Military in Thai Politics, 1981-86 (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1987), p. 14. 31. Girling, Interpreting Development, p. 30. 32. On New Aspiration, see Duncan McCargo, "Political parties: Real, authentic and actual Thai parties", in Political Change in Thailand: Democracy and Participation, edited by Kevin Hewison (London: Routledge, 1997), pp. 127-31. 33. For detailed examples, see Somchai Phatharathananunth, "Civil Society in Northeast Thailand: The Struggle of the Small Scale Farmers' Assembly of Isan" (Ph.D. thesis, University of Leeds, 2001), especially chapters 5 and 6. 34. Some of the most influential contributions to this debate came from Dr Prawase Wasi and the Democratic Development Committee. See Khana

Kamakan Pattana Prachathipatai [Democratic Development Committee], Khoseno Kropkhwomkhit nai Kanpathirup Kanmuang Thai [Conceptual Framework for Reforming Thai Politics] (Bangkok: Thailand Research Fund, April 1995); and Prawase Wasi, Pathirup Thang Kanmuang: Thang Ok Khong Prathet Thai [Political Reform: The Way Out for Thailand] (Bangkok: Mo Chao Ban, 1995). 35. For discussions, see Duncan McCargo, "Alternative Meanings of Political Reform in Contemporary Thailand", Copenhagen Journal of Asian Studies, no. 13 (1998): 5-30; and Reforming Thai Politics, edited by Duncan McCargo (Copenhagen: NIAS, forthcoming).