Nationalism and The Radical Intelligentsia in Thailand

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Nationalism and the Radical Intelligentsia in Thailand

Thongchai Winichakul a
a
Department of History, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA
To cite this Article Winichakul, Thongchai(2008) 'Nationalism and the Radical Intelligentsia in Thailand', Third World
Quarterly, 29: 3, 575 — 591
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Third World Quarterly, Vol. 29, No. 3, 2008, pp 575 – 591
Nationalism and the Radical

Intelligentsia in Thailand
THONGCHAI WINICHAKUL
ABSTRACT The prominent Thai scholar, Chatthip Natsupha, has gone from
being a Marxist intellectual in the 1970s to a cultural nationalist advocate of a
genuine Thai essence which, he believes, is an antidote to the dominance of the
Western neoliberal capitalism. His case is not an anomaly. The intellectual path
from the Marxist left to the cultural nationalist right is well-trodden and
Downloaded By: [Thammasat University] At: 08:31 7 March 2010
reflects broader changes in nationalism in the country. The cultural nationalist

Thai ex-left rejected what it called ‘bad’ nationalism and embraced a ‘good’ one.
However, its ideas were significantly drawn from conservative nationalism.
Such nationalism, which is widespread among the Thai intelligentsia, was an
important factor in their support for the military coup which, in 2006, ousted an
elected government on the dubious grounds that it was a proxy for global
capitalism.
In his preface to the book, Prawattisat lao 1779 – 1975 (History of Laos,
1779 – 1975), written by one of his students, Chatthip Natsupha (hereafter
‘Chatthip’ as a Thai is called by his first name), one of the best known
scholars in Thailand, writes:
If it had not been for French imperialism, the whole Lan Sang Kingdom, both
the left and right bank of the Mekong, would have been included in the Thai
Kingdom today.1
He goes on to add:
The ethnic Thai people are strong. In the long term, in making serious efforts to
consolidate the Thai in the Golden Peninsula2 into the same federation, the
Bangkok Thai should admit their past mistakes and establish relationships
with the Lanna3 Thai and the Lan Sang4 Thai, both in Laos and in the
northeastern region [of Thailand] as equals and with respect . . . The consolida-
tion of all the Thai peoples in these three regions would be a highly meaningful
step.5
Thongchai Winichakul is in the Department of History, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 5211 Humanities,

455 N Park Street, Madison, WI 53706, USA. Email: twinicha@wisc.edu.
ISSN 0143-6597 print/ISSN 1360-2241 online/08/030575–17 Ó 2008 Third World Quarterly

DOI: 10.1080/01436590801931520 575
In order to appreciate the import of Chatthip’s remarks, a brief excursus into

ethnic and linguistic labels is necessary. In contemporary Thai, the word that
connotes the Tai/Thai ethnicity is spelled in two ways. With exactly the same
pronunciation—‘thai’—one is spelled with a y at the end and the other
without, respectively as ‘thaiy’ and ‘thai’. When spelled ‘thaiy’ the word
denotes the modern nation-state and its citizens, although in its Romanisa-
tion as ‘Thai(land)’, the letter ‘y’ is dispensed with. When spelled without the
y ending, it is a looser term denoting the ethnic peoples whose languages
belong to the same Tai/Thai linguistic family. This ‘Thai’ (without a y
ending) includes the Shan of Burma, the Lao people on both sides of the
Mekong, and people speaking various Tai/Thai dialects in Thailand today,
including the Muang people of former Lanna (Chiang Mai), the Tai Lue, the
Tai Maung, the Tai Khoen in the border areas between China, Burma and
Laos, the Black and White Tai in Vietnam, and others. In this meaning, the
word has recently come to be commonly written in Thai with the un-
aspirated letter ‘t’. It is Romanised as ‘Tai’, in order to mark it off even more
clearly from Thaiy, both in writing and pronunciation. Thus, in recent
academic writings, ‘Tai’ refers to the larger ethnic and linguistic groups and
‘Thai’ to the modern nation and its citizens. However, many Thai writers still
use ‘Thai’ without the y ending and with the aspirated t, and never use ‘Tai’.
Chatthip is one of them. In the passage quoted above, as in his other writings,
he spells ‘Thai’ without a y ending for the second meaning—Tai (the Tai-
speaking peoples). For reasons which should become clear later in this
article, I suspect that the refusal to use the unaspirated ‘Tai’ is a conscious
choice. Most of Chatthip’s followers do the same. In this article I will follow
the convention when using my own voice. However, in a quote from the
works of Chatthip and others like him, I will use the italicized ‘Thai’, as I
have in the quotations above, to note that the original spelling is ‘Thai’
without the y ending.
Chatthip’s remarks quoted above now become more revealing. The
mistakes to which Chatthip refers are Siamese overlordship over the Tai-
speaking peoples in the region in general and the brutality of Siam (the
Bangkok Thai) towards King Anuwong of Vientiane and towards the Lao
people during the 1826 – 29 conflict in particular. The conflict is remembered
well among the Lao people in the official history of Laos, as well as in folk
literature, as the heroic but tragic failure by Anuwong to liberate the Lao
from the yoke of Siam.6 Today Anuwong remains a Lao national hero,
celebrated by both the pre- and post-1975 regimes. The same episode,
however, is remembered in Thai historiography as a Thai national triumph
over the rebels to preserve the country’s national sovereignty. Here Chatthip
thinks of the Lao and Thai peoples as Tai brothers. The mistake is the
excessive violence among brothers. Chatthip, like most Thais today, blames
French colonialism for preventing Laos from being part of the greater Thai
Kingdom.
Chatthip’s perception of the past is undeniably nationalistic. The rhetoric
of a ‘federation of the Tai people in the Golden Peninsula’ is the rhetoric of a
racial nationalism which in Thailand dates back to the 1940s and 1950s. Such
576
NATIONALISM AND THE RADICAL INTELLIGENTSIA IN THAILAND
a racial fantasy of the nation had faded away long time ago. Is Chatthip an
ideologue of its revival?Prima facie, quite the opposite. He has been a famous
and influential scholar of the Thai left since the late 1970s.7 He was a founder
of the ‘Political Economy’ group that promoted leftist and Marxist
scholarship. His economic history was part of a progressive school of Thai
historiography which opposed the royalist one. He is a champion of ‘peasant
anarchism’, an anti-state ideology. Today his vast network of friends and
disciples includes political and NGO activists, publishers and scholars. He is
highly regarded as a prominent, senior and progressive scholar in Thailand.
Is this, then, just another case of a leftist turned very right, an old story
from every corner of the world? Certainly Chatthip and his followers have
never thought of themselves as turning rightwards at all. Is, then, the racial-
nationalist sentiment expressed above merely a slip of the tongue from a
progressive scholar who happened to grow up in the 1940s? As this paper
will argue, the racial nationalism today evident in the discourse of Chatthip
and his disciples is deeply intertwined with their leftist, specifically left
nationalist, past. The ubiquity of nationalism across the political spectrum in
Thailand, however, makes it harder to discern any move from left to right in
politics.
This article describes the scholarly development of Chatthip and his
ideas—a school of thought which went from its early affiliation to a form of
Marxism to Chatthip’s current endeavours to study the Tai peoples in his
search for the genuine Thai essence. This essence, he has come to believe, is
the crucial element militating against the dominance of the Western
neoliberal capitalism. The article will then show that this intellectual
idiosyncrasy and its political success reflect changes in Thai nationalism
among the Thai intelligentsia. Although Chatthip originated in a liberal-left
nationalism, his current ideas are derived in good part from conservative
nationalism as well.
Moreover, the Chatthip case is not an anomaly among the leftist
intelligentsia in Thailand. It is part of, and reflects, broader Thai leftist
intellectual life. The Thai left never fights nationalism; it is against ‘bad’
nationalism and has fashioned its own acceptable version. The Chatthip case
provides a lens on the broader Thai leftist intelligentsia. At the critical
moment for Thai democracy in 2006 their nationalism led most of them to
support the military dictators who ousted an elected government on the
pretext that it was the proxy of global capitalism.
The Chatthip School in left debates

Chatthip’s ‘leftist’ period, roughly 1972 – 81, has been described well both in
Thai and English.8 Only a brief summary is necessary here.
Historical studies in Thailand changed dramatically after the popular
uprising in 1973 that ousted the military regime. During the early 1970s Thai
Marxist historiography began to proliferate. It had inspired Chatthip and his
colleagues to launch a new style of economic history that challenged the
dominant royal-nationalist history. Under the umbrella of the ‘Political
577
Economy’ group he helped create, and contributed significantly to shaping, a

new landscape emerged in historical studies in Thailand.9
The key question for Chatthip, and for many others on the Thai left at the
time, was why Thailand remained underdeveloped. The answer, they
believed, lay in the obstacles put up by the sakdina or Thai feudalism. In a
neo-Marxist and Maoist analysis of the Thai social formation they asked
questions such as whether Thailand was a semi-colonial/semi-feudal society,
a dependent capitalist or semi-feudal/semi-capitalist society, or an Oriental
society.10 This was not a trivial terminological matter, since the terminology
involved depended on correctly analysing the Thai social formation and
hence its class relations, the nature of the Thai state, the correct strategies
and tactics for class struggle and the prospects for revolution. The
consequences of failure in this analytical task would be more than merely
academic.
The ‘Chatthip School’, which started making an impact early on, proposed
that the feudal socioeconomic formation in Siam changed very little before
1855, when Siam was forced to open up its market to European powers. This
was the result of two main factors. First, the sakdina state hindered
development by its monopoly over major commodities such as rice, by its
control over production through the production tax, and through the
bondage system which imposed bonded labour on all. The second factor was
the cohesiveness of villages characteristic of Asiatic society. They resisted
changes and outside influences and ensured their survival and that of the
huge unfree agrarian economy. The combined result of these two factors was
that no independent bourgeoisie could emerge to be the agent of capitalist
development. When, in 1855, foreign influences were finally forced on this
static social formation, the bourgeoisie which emerged in Siam was Chinese.
Chatthip saw members of this bourgeoisie, however, as either compradors for
the Europeans or functionaries of the feudal state. Without an independent
bourgeoisie in Siam, there was no self-sustaining dynamic of capital
accumulation within Thai society. This was the key to underdevelopment
of Thai capitalism.11 As we shall see below, the tinge of racialism already
present in his discounting of the Chinese bourgeoisie was a clue to his later
political trajectory. It became an important reason why, for Chatthip, the
alternative for underdeveloped Thai society lay not in a more successful
capitalist development but in Thai villages.
In contrast to the royal-nationalist history that dominated historical
scholarship in Thailand, the Thai past as reconstructed by the Chatthip
School emerged, for the first time, as the story of production, economic
classes, tax-farmers, bourgeoisie, capitalists, land tenure systems, and so on,
rather than one of royal battles against foreign enemies or benevolent princes
of prosperity. Royal chronicles gave way to archival materials about rent,
taxes, production and commodities, and dynastic and regnal periodisation to
a social and economic one, as episodes of royal glory were unceremoniously
lumped together as the pre-1855 stagnation. Indeed, the Chatthip School cast
a distinctly unflattering light on the monarchical state: it was mono-
polistic, rent-seeking, parasitic, exploitative and repressive, an obstacle to
578
development and the origin of the social ills of the present. In sum, the
monarchical past was no longer glorious, nothing to celebrate.
Critics of Chatthip’s ‘political economy’ included other Marxists and
historians. The former rejected Chatthip’s idea of a semi-feudal/semi-colonial
Thai economy.12 A leading Thai historian, on the other hand, demonstrated
that a domestic bourgeoisie and a vibrant bourgeois economy had emerged
long before 1855. The coming of the colonial powers affected the course of
the development of the bourgeoisie in Siam, but was not the origin of the
bourgeois economy.13
In a tragic irony (though hardly unique to Thailand) debates among left
and radical intellectuals over the state and social formations grew in inverse
proportion to the political fortunes of their movements, and affected those
fortunes in turn. Given their implications for revolutionary strategies, the
more heated and inconclusive the debates became, the greater grew the
ideological crisis on the left, the more complex issues became, the less
confident the radicals could feel about their ideas and strategy. The Thai
communist movement collapsed in the early 1980s, well before the
global collapse of communism, thanks to its internal conflicts and to the
changed situation in the region after the 1979 Sino-Vietnamese conflict.
Debates over the nature of the Thai social formation faded away without a
conclusion. Nobody cared to answer questions which only yesterday seemed
so pressing. Thailand’s economic ‘miracle’ in the 1980s and 1990s probably
also made the debate about underdevelopment look absurd. Whether it was
the feudal state or the dependent bourgeoisie which had hitherto hindered
development now seemed largely academic and jokes about the earnest and
heated ‘terminological’ disputes of the past proliferated in the halls of
learning. While many former radicals were taking time to heal their wounds,
by the early 1980s Chatthip was already holding up the village as the antidote
to the ills of capitalism.
The Thai village and its primordial essence

Given Chatthip’s conclusion that the bourgeoisie in Siam/Thailand was not
strong enough to counter the power of global capitalism (and by
implication presumably not strong enough to be a worthy target of
opposition itself), he now saw the Thai village—or rather an essentialised,
even orientalised, version of it—as the site of resistance to capitalism—or
rather to the global, Western, consumerist and materialist civilisation which
did not have much of a domestic presence in the villages. Subscribing to the
dubious notions of the ‘Asiatic mode of production’, Chatthip and his
disciples argued that, just as Thai villages were not penetrated by the
parasitic Oriental despotic state to any significant degree in the past,14 they
now stood outside the ambit of neoliberal global capitalism and thus, more
than any other part of Thai society, had the potential to resist it. It was
important, they claimed, to find out what values and elements constituted
village resistance, whether they remained vital, and how one should go
about strengthening them, if they did not. Chatthip’s ideas were no longer
579
about underdevelopment and retarded capitalism. They were about

‘anarchistic’ Thai villages which he saw as Thailand’s last redoubt against
capitalism and the state.
In his highly acclaimed study,15 Chatthip relied heavily on oral interviews
with old people about their lives and villages in the recent past, how they
grew rice, wove cloth, cared for their gardens and fowl, how they sold and
bought things in the markets, and how their largely ‘non-economic’ life was
lived day in and day out. The village subsistence economy here appeared
devoid of domination and exploitation. It was based on forms of community
solidarity which had remained strong throughout history. In addition to his
thesis that the sakdina state did not penetrate deeply into village life,16 he also
attributed such cohesion, solidarity and immunity to the incubus of modern
life to special cultural characteristics (to be explained below). These were also
the reasons why there had been few changes before the country’s economy
was opened to colonial powers. The state and capitalism were, and remained,
outsiders and aliens—contaminants—to village life. Their incursion had
occurred only recently and slowly. There remained many villages that were
relatively untouched by capitalism and they were the true force against
capitalism and the state. They had to be strengthened. The originally anti-
capitalist project had now become an anti-state project too.
The Thai intelligentsia, Chatthip included, was critical of capitalist
development and industrialisation in Thailand since the 1960s and, in
particular, of the economic boom of the 1980s. They saw nothing but
growing social ill and human suffering under global capitalism. Such
concerns only enhanced Chatthip’s romanticisation of the authentic village as
the site of anti-capitalism: this is clear in the depiction of Khiriwong village
by one of his more prominent disciples:
Khiriwong is a real village which is identical to the one imagined by

villagers . . . not penetrated by state and capitalism. We might think that this
kind of community existed only in the peasant millennialism of the past. Or it
might be just a wish of a utopian thinker. But this is real . . . [The research on
Khiriwong] suggests an ‘anarchist’ theory of development, a kind of socialism,
focusing on folk ideology and small organizations . . . to counter the power of
the state and capital cities.17
Those who have romanticised villages in Asia range from Gandhi to those
who subscribe to ideas of ‘Oriental despotism’. Critics of such romanticisa-
tions are also numerous,18 and romantic ideas about Thai villages in
particular have also been criticised.19 Among Chatthip’s many critics on this
point, Kitahara notes that Chatthip substitutes the empirical village for the
‘normative village’ he wants to see.20 Although Chatthip counters this with
his ‘empirical’ research embodied in hundreds of tapes and stacks of field
notes, Anan questions Chatthip’s fieldwork, his handling of interview data
and their interpretation, and his application of theories to the data.21 An even
more devastating criticism is contained in a young graduate student’s work
exposing how Chatthip’s writing, not his empirical data, constructs his ideal
580
Thai village.22 These important criticisms have not, however, prevented

Chatthip’s ideas from becoming very influential among scholars and
‘progressive’ activists.
What made the Thai village, the core of Chatthip’s idea of a progressive—
anti-capitalist and anti-state—politics, strong, autonomous, cohesive, self-
sufficient, and rather anarchistic? Abandoning his prior socioeconomic
approach, he found the answer in the ‘culture’ of the Thai peasantry. The
twin intellectual moves that have propelled his academic enterprise since the
early 1980s are the idea of community culture, and the belief in the pri-
mordial essence or root of the Thai village.
‘Community culture’ refers to the peasant intellect and peasant ways of
living. ‘Community’ here is a social entity identical to a ‘village’23 and
‘culture’, the common cultural and intellectual elements shared by (Thai)
peasants across the country and beyond. Community culture allows Thai
peasants to live self-sufficiently in harmony and peace, and to cope with

challenges from the outside effectively to avoid the perils of the state and
capitalist ‘development’.24 The villagers’ intellect is superior to the modern or
Western and is able to reject Western culture—consumerism, capitalism,
neoliberalism, and the like—as it has done for hundreds of years in dealing
with exploitative states.
In his influential study on the village, Chatthip used the term ‘Thai village’
in two senses: in one it referred not just to any village, but to an essentialised
idea of one, and in the other, to villages of the ethnic Thai.25 The ‘villagers’
intellect’ in subsequent works became interchangeable with the ‘Thai
intellect’ (‘Thai’ with the y ending). The state and capitalism also became
interchangeable with the West and the ‘outsider’. The village’s ‘community
culture’ is rooted in the primordial or authentic cultural essence of all Tai
people (or Thai in Chatthip’s spelling), predating the feudal state and Indic
influences.26 According to the ‘Declaration of the Project for the Cultural
and Social History of the Thai People’, the primordial ‘institution of [Thai]
community’ is trans-historical, predating and surviving all particular
economic and social formations.27
What is such an essence? Chatthip and his school identified a few elements,
although they never elaborated on them. Chatthip emphasised the most
important one: ‘nam jai’, a vague but inclusive notion of care for others,
generosity, kindness, hospitality, and the like.28 The second one is respect for
individuality within the communal harmony. There is also flexibility in
learning and adopting knowledge and technology from the outside without
jeopardising other elements of the Thai essence.29 He also mentions in
passing a number of other characteristics, such as the ‘primitive’
characteristics of villages, respect for elders and the elders’ councils,
traditional means of merriment and gatherings, and the role of women in
community and family.30 Although these characteristics are not elaborated
and it is not clear how they belong to the Thai alone and not to other peoples,
or how they belong to villages and peasants and not others, the important
point Chatthip keeps emphasising is that this authentic essence of Thai
people constitutes the culture of the Thai village.31 This Thai essence needs to
581
be refreshed and revitalised to make the country strong because, we are told,
‘Thai village culture is the natural culture of Thai people’.32 To put it the
other way round, as he also asserts several times, Thai culture is the peasant
culture, it is not the one promoted by the state, which is a combination of the
Indian-ised, feudalistic, high culture and modernist culture favoured by the
urban bourgeoisie, who are mostly Chinese.33
Chatthip is well aware of the multi-ethnic nature of Thailand and its
adjacent regions beyond the borders. Villages, whether in Thailand or the
Tai-speaking region, whether in the past or the present, were rarely inhabited
by the Thai alone but usually contained a mix, including Khmer, Mon, Lao,
Lua, Lue, Karen and other people. Chatthip argues, however, that ‘upper
Southeast Asia is naturally the land of Thai peoples’, that peoples in this area
including Yunnan and Assam share the Thai culture and language. Non-Thai
inhabitants of these lands live under two cultures, one of their own and an
accepted Thai language and culture.34 From the view that authentic Thai
culture is found among the Tai peoples untouched by development,
capitalism, modernity and Western influences, Chatthip then moves on to
the true Thai communities outside the country.
Authentic Thai culture outside Thailand

Chatthip’s search for the authentic culture of the Tai/Thai people began in
the late 1980s with his studies of the ‘Tai-Ahom’ peoples of India’s Assam
state, interest in which was stimulated by his encounter with the work of
Ahom scholars there.35 Around the same time another group of Thai
scholars who were strongly interested in the Tai people in southern China
established connections with the Yunnan Academy. The study of the Tai
peoples soon became a larger national and even international scholarly and
cultural enterprise—indeed, a veritable academic industry studying the Tai
speaking peoples beyond the borders of Thailand. It became multi-faceted—
including studies not only of languages and customs but also handicrafts—
and also began to interest various branches of the Thai state. There were a
great many projects which involved hundreds of academics and drew on
many research centres in most major public universities, including
Chulalongkorn, Thammasat, Mahidol, Chiang Mai and Khonkaen. These
efforts enjoyed substantial financial backing from key Thai funding agencies
such as the Thailand Research Fund, the National Culture Commission, the
Ministry of Education, several foundations including one associated with the
Queen (who was particularly interested in varieties of Tai textiles), as well as
public and private foreign funders such as the Japan Foundation and the
Toyota Foundation. Naturally these endeavours resulted in a large number
of publications. Among their authors, Chatthip was not the only one caught
up in a search for the authenticity of Tai/Thai ethnicity.
Strictly ethno-linguistic studies of the Tai-speaking peoples outside
Thailand, which have been ongoing for a long time, imply no primordial
cultural characteristics, race, essence or authenticity of the Tai people and
may even question such notions. By contrast, the works by Chatthip and his
582
followers construct trans-historical characteristics or elements of an un-

changing, primordial and authentic Thai culture (ways of living, values,
traditions, belief systems). They also assume that peoples in southwestern
and southern China, eastern Burma, northern Laos, northwestern Vietnam,
and the Ahom in Assam are all on the peripheries of nation-states and thus
less penetrated by either state or capital. The Thai culture of these peoples
has been, in his own words, ‘frozen’ in its original condition,36 and is thus
more authentic than that in the villages of Thailand. These people allow us to
‘look back’ to true Thai characteristics.37
The strongest criticism by Thai scholars of this endeavour rejects outright
the assumption that there is an authentic Thai essence to be found. Such an
essence is a fantasy that cannot be substantiated by any methodology.38 Any
particular culture is the outcome of cultural exchange and mixture over a
long time.39 Chatthip counters that these critics are trapped by state
boundaries, unable to see the common culture among Thai villages across
their boundaries, modern and historical. They also pay too much attention to
the Mon, Khmer, and Indic influences in the elite culture of the past or to the
modern Chinese elite.40 His is clearly a certain type of avowedly anti-elitist
nationalism, opposed to other nationalist conceptions.
Equally seriously other critics point to the similarity of Chatthip’s
advocacy of the dominant Thai of mainland Southeast Asia to the 1940s
racial nationalism and its Pan-Thai project (to be discussed below). Chatthip
and his disciples vehemently deny any similarity. They claim, first, that the
Thai culture they advocate is a peasant and anarchist one, while the 1940s
nationalism was that of a fascist regime. Theirs, they claim, is a people’s
nationalism. Second, their authentic Thai culture is pitted against the state,
whereas that of the 1940s was statist as well as fascist. They are interested in
reenergising resistance to the state and capitalism, not in any form of political
arrangement. Nor are they interested in Pan-Thai-ism.41
In practically any other country this sort of essentialisation of ‘national’
characteristics would be dubbed nationalist. However, and this is a remarkable
fact of intellectual life in Thailand, I have not found in writing a criticism that
Chatthip’s ideas are nationalist. Anan’s comprehensive evaluation and critique
of Chatthip’s scholarship does not criticise his nationalism at all.42 To
Chatthip and his followers, including the most important sources of his
research funding,43 the search for the essence of the Thai people is about a race
but it is not racist. Nor is it generally considered nationalist.
A brief outline of the broader history of nationalism in Thailand will help
put this curiosity, as well as Chatthip’s school and ideas, in historical and
intellectual context, including that of nationalism on the Left.
Nationalisms in Thailand
If Chatthip’s works are very well received among ‘progressive’ intellectuals
and activists, this is not least because of his nationalist ideas and tendencies.
The success of the Chatthip School is inseparable from the wider nationalist
intellectual milieu in Thailand.
583
As it emerged in the 19th century, nationalism in Siam was, as in most

other countries, the ideology of the formation of a modern imagined
community and, as in most colonial societies, it was a response to European
colonialism. The ruling elites as well as their critics and opponents shared the
nationalist aspiration for modernisation and development, and anxiety in the
face of colonialism. The chief differences among them were about how they
‘imagined’ the country, about modernity and about the correct strategy
against colonialism and for modernisation. From the beginning then,
nationalism was seen in a positive light, not as either discriminatory or
dangerous.44
Although Siam was not formally colonised, it was nevertheless in a ‘semi-
colonial’ condition, with the inevitable collaboration with the Siamese ruling
elite. However, whereas in many colonies the arrival of nationalism and the
anti-colonial struggle weakened the power of such elites, in Siam the power of
the ruling elite was strengthened to an unprecedented level. As a semi-

colonial absolute monarchy, Siam expanded and became more centralised
than ever. State apparatuses were modernised without a serious break with
monarchical rule, royal hegemony or its culture.45 Thai nationalism, when it
emerged, reflected this history: Siam was an imagined community neither of a
people—whether politically or ethnically defined—nor of a ‘race’, but of a
monarchy. The first form of nationalism in early 20th century Siam was what
I call royal nationalism,46 a nationalism defined by loyalty to the monarchy.
It remains a strong force today and forms the foundation of the dominant
nationalist discourse. To this day, if someone expresses any dislike or
criticism of the King, he or she will be asked ‘Are you Thai?’, since being Thai
is equated with being royalist.
Building upon but also contesting royalist nationalism, the second wave of
nationalism in Siam/Thailand was the work of the political forces that
toppled the absolute monarchy in 1932. In this form Thai nationalism
became even stronger in the 1940s, when it was influenced by fascism and
Japanese nationalism. Although this did not eliminate royalist nationalism,
its emphasis shifted to the ‘Thai race’. Among other things, it aimed at the
solidarity of all the Tai-speaking peoples inside and outside Thailand, ie at
‘Pan-Thai-ism’. Despite the short life of the regime, this racially nationalist
ideology and its political implications have never been confronted
adequately, let alone criticised in any significant measure in the Thai public
sphere. Its legacies remain vibrant and visible even today. Luang
Wichitwathakan, the ideologue of the regime during World War II, remains
a famous figure among Thais in general, and his works (songs, plays, books)
are still widely and positively received.47
Anti-fascist, ‘liberal’ intellectuals have considered the racial nationalism of
the 1940s dangerous from the beginning. They do not consider nationalism
itself unacceptable, and even favour a ‘good’ nationalism: ‘bad’ nationalism
or ‘chauvinism’ (khlang chat, literally mad/crazy about the nation) is
understood as an extreme manifestation of acceptable nationalism (chat
niyom, literally nation-ism). It is only the racial/racist content of khlang chat
which makes it extreme and bad. However, the Thai general public has never
584
rejected even so-called chauvinism. The distinctions between chauvinism and

acceptable nationalism are never clear, whether in Thailand or elsewhere.
Even today most intellectuals and the general public embrace the notion of
Thai-ness as a quality that Thais must guard and promote because it is a
good nationalism.
The Thai left, both communist and radical, rejected racial nationalism but,
like the liberal intellectuals, not nationalism itself. Although left nationalism
is distinct in emphasising the Thai people as the source and legitimacy of their
nationalism, the political and social activists of the 1980s also felt royal-
nationalist influences: indeed, these resurged in the 1960s and 1970s. The
intelligentsia of the popular movement today, including Chatthip and many
advocates of community culture, also insist on the centrality of the people.48
But they cannot escape the lure of royal-nationalism entirely, so pervasive is
it. The current leadership of the popular movement against capitalism
includes quite a few royalists.

A self-proclaimed radical conservatism has also been influential among
Thai intellectuals and activists since the 1980s. Based on liberal and radical
interpretations of religious ideas, mostly Buddhist ones, in opposition to the
perils of capitalism, consumerism, and the destructive impact of Western
culture,49 it fills the ideological void created by the collapse of the leftist
radicals. It promotes popular movements and democracy, as it sees the state
as a destructive agent of modern capitalism. Indeed, the radical conservatives
are chief among the main forces behind the notion of community culture and
its potential to counter capitalism.50 They are not considered nationalist
despite the fact that their anti-capitalism has often become quite anti-
Western and anti-modern.
While the monarchy, the Thai race and the people are the main bases for
the various currents of Thai nationalism, the varying ‘Others’ of Thai
nationalism have changed over time. During the Cold War the threatening
Other was the communist, often identified as China and Vietnam. Thai
communists were those who were deceived, because a Thai was not supposed
to be a communist. The communist Other was an exception, however: for
most of the history of Thai nationalism, the Other was the ‘West’: European
colonial powers in the late 19th and the first half of the 20th century, and
neo-imperialism, undesirable Western culture, consumerism, neo-liberalism
and global capitalism in recent times. For the Thai left, colonialism and
imperialism have always defined their nationalism. After the end of the Cold
War, therefore, all Thai nationalisms—from the conservative to the left—
now shared a common Other—the West, although it meant different things
to each.
But the West has always been considered desirable and threatening at the
same time.51 Siam was known for its openness to foreigners and alien
influences and its cosmopolitanism. Since the early 19th century ideas and
technologies from the West were welcomed, although there were also
anxieties about losing identity and independence. The strong reactions by
Thai intellectuals across ideological camps against threats from the West
were evident once again in the face of globalisation and particularly the 1997
585
economic crisis. As Reynolds has reported,52 Thai intellectuals were wary of

globalisation. They saw a great opportunity to take a place among the rising
economic stars in Asia, but they worried about losing the distinctiveness that
makes Thai identity.
Unlike the colonial threats of 100 years ago, the danger this time is not to
political sovereignty but to ‘Thai-ness’ although an ‘us versus them’
mentality, argues Reynolds, is common to both. Since the 1980s ethnic
nostalgia has risen amid perceptions of diminishing Thai-ness. Efforts to
rescue fading local identities are also on the rise. This is the context in which
academic enterprises in search of the authentic Thai, including ideas about
community culture, acquire their significance. Indeed, Reynolds has
commented on how Chatthip’s idea of the Thai essence is similar to that of
royal-nationalism.53 These are the main strands of Thailand’s version of
cultural nationalism.
Given the centrality of anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist and kindred themes

in the discourse of contemporary Thai cultural nationalism, one should note
that it is especially popular among precisely the westernised, consumerist,
materialistic and even capitalist sectors of society. Indeed, it practically seems
to be their spontaneous ideology. This is less paradoxical than it may seem.
Whatever the original intellectual impulses behind Chatthip’s and his
colleagues’ work, the various themes which they wove together in their
discourse about Thai-ness have resonated because they fulfil critical
ideological needs of neoliberal times. Their anti-capitalism is at the same
time a longing to assert their Thai-ness, or at least their appreciation of it, at
the very moment when they seem to have lost it completely. The anti-
imperialism can be convenient when one does not wish to identify causes of
problems closer to home such as the domestic capitalist class. The anti-
statism is, of course, particularly useful in neoliberal times: the poor Thai
peasant can conveniently be portrayed as too upstanding to need state
handouts (and those who do need them can conveniently be portrayed as not
authentically Thai). Finally, of course, like all discourses of the national
character, they can always be deployed against alien influences and ideas—
whether about democracy and human rights, socialism or feminism.
The economic crisis that hit Thailand in 1997 was widely believed to be a
conspiracy by George Soros, who represented Western powers’ attempts to
derail rising Asian competitors. The term ‘Washington Consensus’ connoted,
in Thailand, an actual conspiracy among Western powers.54 Nationalism
resurged and in this resurgence the various strands of left nationalists merged
and mingled. In this context the new conservative cultural nationalism of the
former Leftists acquired a new prominence and significance. The series of
publications under the rubric of the Withithat (Vision) Project by some of
these formerly left cultural nationalists is a good illustration. Funded by the
Thailand Research Fund (TRF), a quasi-government agency and one of the
most powerful research funding agencies in the country, it has published
more than 20 books in the ‘Lokaphiwat’ (Globalisation) series on anti-
imperialist, anti-neoliberal, anti-American and anti-Western themes. Globa-
lisation is merely an updated name for neo-colonialism. A dozen more have
586
been published in the ‘Phumpanya’ (Intellect) series of schools of thought

which are supposed to constitute alternatives to knowledge from the West.
These includes strong advocacy of the village community culture and of
Chatthip’s ideas. Thai cultural nationalists of all kinds have now found new
institutional forms of unity!
The left populist nationalism in perspective

Chatthip’s romanticisation of the village and the Thai essence shares a great
deal with the wider nationalist milieu of which it is a part: anti-capitalism and
anti-US views with leftist radicals; anti-globalisation views with the radical
conservatives and the conservative nationalists; occasional derogatory anti-
Western nationalism with all of them. There are also notable differences
among these currents. Chatthip and his sort of cultural nationalists share
their distrust of the state—seeing it as an agency of capitalism and the West

that threatens the essence of being Thai—with other radical currents, and this
sets them apart from the conservatives. However, while the people are, for
Chatthip and most other nationalists, where the hope for the future is,
Chatthip’s romanticism about ‘the people’ is different from that of the leftist
radicals. Unlike the latter’s ‘people’, whose potential has yet to be realised,
the utopian essence of the people in Chatthip’s view is primordial and trans-
historical. Originating and posited in the past, this people can still be found in
the present, although it needs be revived and revitalised now. Such a
romantic view of ‘the people’ is akin to that of the radicals and other
conservatives. Royal-nationalism also sees ‘the people’ as loyal subjects who,
in their transcendental Thai-ness, are loyal to the unique nation and the
monarchy. Racial nationalism believes that a trans-historical Thai-ness can
be found among the Tai/Thai race everywhere. The opening quote on the
possible political ties among the Tai/Thai Brotherhood is less surprising as
we understand the genealogy of Chatthip’s nationalism. Only Chatthip’s
claims of anti-statism or anarchism really set him apart from Thailand’s
conservative nationalisms.
Chatthip’s nationalism is generally seen to be a blend of various elements
of nationalisms and it is very well received in all quarters, including among
‘progressive’ intelligentsia. It is not considered a nationalism of a bad kind,
indeed hardly a nationalism at all. Critics have pointed to his simplistic
concepts, his flawed methodology and especially his handling of oral
information, but the racial, nationalist and conservative character of his ideas
has not been challenged. For to challenge this as a nationalism would break a
taboo: nationalism is not bad and it cannot be criticised. So criticism may be
aimed at everything about Chatthip’s thinking but his nationalism. In effect,
the inability of Thai public and intellectual discourse to recognise the rise of
pernicious forms of cultural nationalism merely ensures that they will be even
stronger.
As I explain elsewhere,55 in the history of Thai democracy the Thai
intelligentsia and popular movements against the military dictatorship have
overlooked the dominance of the monarchists and their royal-nationalism,
587
except between late 1970s and early 1980s, when the Marxist radical
movement was strong. After the collapse of that movement and its ideology
in the early 1980s, the intelligentsia took refuge in their romanticised view of
‘the people’ but retained their mixture of fear, awe and disdain for capitalism
and the West. But the leftist view of the people was replaced by a
romanticised one in which the people were considered an anti-capitalist force
not because they had the potential to go beyond capitalism but because of
their pre-capitalist character. The anti-capitalist force can be found in the
past, before the penetration by capitalism. This historical spirit is shared by
the conservatives both radical and royalist.
On the other hand, although the left collapsed, it left a lasting legacy of
opposition to capitalism and imperialism which remained strong in discourse
at least, even as it turned more conservative. In historical perspective distrust
of Western powers has defined Thai nationalism for most of the time since
the late 19th century. As the economy strengthened in the 1980s, particularly
as a local bourgeoisie emerged, the contest with and animosity towards the
West has acquired a new significance and articulation. In Thailand
globalisation is a suspicious new round of threats from the West that the
country cannot wish away and must guard against.
In 2005 – 06 I conducted research on how former rightwing leaders who
had taken part in the massacre of radical students in 1976 viewed the tragedy
then. I had hours of conversations with about 20 of them, many of whom
were no longer politically active but all of whom insisted that they did the
right thing in 1976. Their rightwing ideology, including racial and royal
nationalism, remained strong. Since all memories are tainted by the present,
parts of the conversations were about the present. I asked them what they
considered the most important danger or threat to Thailand in the present.
Without exception they said capitalism and the USA. One of them said,
ironically of course, that he should have listened to the left 30 years ago.
The original paper from which this article is drawn was written as a
cautionary tale about the political twists and turns in the discourse of leftists
who have embraced conservative nationalism. The Chatthip case was
supposed to be an illustration of the broader shift on the left. The political
crisis in Thailand in 2006 proved that it was too late for warnings. Animosity
to global capitalism and the distrust of the state found its enemy in the
elected government, which had at its helm the richest man in the land at the
time, Thaksin Shinawatra. Apparently corruption scandals and abuses of
power doomed the government. But the popular movement that ousted
Thaksin was overtly royalist, with overwhelming support from the former
leftwing and conservative intelligentsia who considered the fight against
Thaksin a battle against a dictatorship that was a proxy of global capitalism
and its designs on Thailand.56 Leftist rhetoric worked side by side with the
royalists in the mass media and at the demonstrations. Radical songs against
capitalism and imperialism were sung next to the royal anthem. The
royalist-military coup in 2006 ended the democratisation that had been going
on for 15 years and pushed the country’s democracy back at least to the
period of an obedient government under royal-military dominance last seen
588
in the 1980s. Many former leftist intellectuals endorsed the ‘Thai-style

democracy’ that would keep an elected regime in check, and justify the
constitutional right of the monarchy and the military to guide and steer the
country’s democracy. Those who opposed the coup and called for democracy
were lambasted as the dogmatists of ‘Western democracy’.
While the Chatthip case may not illustrate or explain the leftist – royalist
anti-democratic alliance in all its details, it does address the broader
tendencies which explain its making in historical perspective. The elements of
conservative and racial nationalism in Chatthip’s ideas have not caused any
harm yet. Or perhaps they already have. Perhaps we can study the seismic
activities but we cannot predict an earthquake. We can only feel regret after
the harm is done.
Notes
This article was originally written for a workshop on developmental and cultural nationalisms held at the
University of Victoria in 2004. At the time I was only too conscious that, in dealing with the Thai
intelligentsia, it should have had greater historical depth than it did. It took me many years to be able to
correct the deficiency. In the meantime the Thai intelligentsia went into crisis with the anti-democracy
movement in 2005 and the coup in 2006. These events also derailed my academic interests. The intellectual
crisis, however, gave me the historical perspective on the Thai intelligentsia that I needed to finish this
article. Throughout the long delay Radhika Desai and Michael Bodden have never lost trust in me, always
encouraging me to think about the article and to get through this difficult time.
1 S Theerasasawat, Prawattisat lao 1779 – 1975 (History of Laos, 1779 – 1975), Bangkok: Sangsan
Publishing, 2000, p 12.
2 ‘Suwannabhumi’ (literally, golden land) is the ancient Indic name for mainland Southeast Asia. In Thai
the Sanskrit word is translated as ‘laem thong’ (literally, golden peninsula).
3 Lanna was an ancient kingdom covering the upper Chao Phraya valleys in northern Thailand, with its
centre today at Chiang Mai. It used to be a separate and independent kingdom between the 13th and
16th centuries, was a vassal of Burmese kingdoms between the 16th and 18th centuries and a vassal of
Bangkok after that until the late 19th century, when Bangkok integrated it into the modern Thai state.
4 The name of the Lao kingdom before becoming part of French Indochina in 1893.
5 Theerasasawat, Prawattisat lao, p 13.
6 M Ngaosyvathn & P Ngaosyvathn, Paths to Conflagration, Ithaca, NY: Cornell Southeast Asia
Program Publications, 1998.
7 Chatthip’s high status in the Thai academy, and the superlatives which tend to be heaped on him, can
be seen in the two Festschrifts marking his retirement: Political Economy Center, 60 pi chatthip
natsupha (Chatthip Natsupha—60 years), Bangkok, 2001; and S Sampatchalit & S Yodkamolsat Khue
khwam phum jai (With Pride), a Festschrift for Chatthip Natsupha, Bangkok: Sangsan Publishing,
2002. See also the tribute to his academic career in C Maneepruksa, ‘Chatthip natsupha chiwit lae
ngan’ (Chatthip Natsupha: life and works) and his intellectual biography in A Ganjanaphan,
‘Sangkhom thai tam khwamkit lae khwamfaifan nai ngan khong chatthip natsupha’ (Thai society
according to the ideas and ideals in the works by Chatthip Natsupha), both in Political Economy
Center, 60 pi chatthip natsupha.
8 For Thai descriptions, see N Ativanichayaphong, Phatthanakan khwamkhit setthasat kanmuang thai
tangtae 2475-patchuban (The development of the Thai political economy ideas from 1932 to the
present), Bangkok: Political Economy Group, 1988. For English descriptions, see C Reynolds &
L Hong, ‘Marxism in Thai historical studies’, Journal of Asian Studies, 43 (1), pp 77 – 104; and L Hong,
‘Warasan Setthasat Kanmuang: critical scholarship in post-1976 Thailand’, in A Turton &
M Chitakasem (eds), Thai Constructions of Knowledge, London: School of Oriental and African
Studies, University of London, pp 99 – 118.
9 Hong, ‘Warasan Setthasat Kanmuang’; and T Winichakul, ‘The changing landscape of the past: Thai
histories after 1973’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 25 (1), 1995, pp 99 – 120.
10 Among the leading scholars engaging in this question in the 1970s were Marxists/Maoists such as Jit
Phoumisak. See C Reynolds, Thai Radical Discourse: the Real Face of Thai Feudalism Today, Ithaca,
NY: Cornell Southeast Asia Program Publications, 1987, ch 2; Ativanichayaphong, Phatthanakan
khwamkhit setthasat kanmuang thai tangtae 2475-patchuban, pp 20 – 35; C Natsupha,
589
Watthanatham thai kap khabuankan plianplaeng sangkhom (Thai culture and the movement for social
change), Bangkok: Chulalongkorn University Press, 1991; and C Samudavanija, Sakdina kap phatthana-
kan sangkhom thai (Thai feudalism and the development of Thai society), Bangkok: Nam-akson kanphim,
1976, esp Introduction. Chatthip’s Political Economy Group spent their early years on this question. See
Ativanichayaphong, Phatthanakan khwamkhit setthasat kanmuang thai tangtae 2475-patchuban.
11 C Natsupha, ‘Panha phatthanakan setthakit thai’ (Problem of Thai economic development), in
Natsupha, Setthasat kap prawattisat thai (Economics and Thai history), Bangkok: Sangsan Publishing,
1981, pp 312 – 323; and C Natsupha & S Prasartset, The Political Economy of Siam, 1910 – 1932,
Bangkok: Social Science Association of Thailand, 1981. Compare this view with Seksan Prasertkul,
‘The transformation of the Thai state and economic change (1845 – 1945)’, unpublished PhD
dissertation, Cornell University, 1989, which clearly identifies a (predominantly Chinese) bourgeoisie
which fosters and shapes capitalism in Siam rather than hindering it.
12 S Yala, ‘Panha kan suksa withi kanphalit khong thai an-nuang machak thritsadi kung muangkhun
kung sakdina’ (Problems in the studies of modes of production in Thailand as a result of semi-colonial,
semi-feudal theory), Warasan Setthsatkanmuang (Journal of Political Economy), 1 (2), 1981, pp 8 – 98.
13 N Eoseewong, Pakkai lae bairua (Pen and Sail), Bangkok: Amarain Printing, 1984; and Eoseewong,
Pen and Sail: Literature and History in Early Bangkok, trans C Reynolds, L Hong, P Phongpaichit,
P Jory & R McVey, ed C Baker & B Anderson, Chiangmai: Silkworm Books, 2005.
14 P Thippayapraphai, Naewkit withikanphakit baep e-sia kap kan-athibai muban thai (The Asiatic mode
of production concept and explanations of Thai villages), Bangkok: Thailand Research Fund, 1997.
15 C Natsupha, Setthakit muban thai nai adit (Thai village economy in the past), Bangkok: Sangsan
Publishing, 1984. This was translated into English as The Thai Village Economy in the Past by C Baker,
Chiangmai: Silkworm Books, 2001.
16 C Natsupha, Ban kap muang (Village and city), Bangkok: Sangsan Publishing, 1986.
17 P Lertwicha, Khiriwong (the Khiriwong village), Bangkok: Muban Publications, 1989.
18 See J Breman, The Shattered Image: Construction and Deconstruction of the Village in Colonial Asia,
Amsterdam: Centre for Asian Studies, 1987; and J Kemp, Seductive Mirage: The Search for the Village
Community in Southeast Asia, Amsterdam: Centre for Asian Studies, 1987.
19 See K Bowie, ‘Unravelling the myth of the subsistence economy: textile production in nineteenth-
century northern Thailand’, Journal of Asian Studies, 51 (4), 1992, pp 797 – 823; J Rigg, ‘Redefining the
village and rural life: lessons from South East Asia’, Geographical Journal, 160, 1994, pp 123 – 135; and
Kemp, Seductive Mirage.
20 A Kitahara, The Thai Rural Community Reconsidered, Bangkok: Political Economy Center,
Chulalongkorn University, 1996.
21 Ganjanaphan, ‘Sangkhom thai tam khwamkit lae khwamfaifan nai ngan khong chatthip natsupha’, pp
154 – 159, 183 – 188.
22 Y Mukdawichitra, Aan ‘watthanatham chumchon’ (Reading the ‘community culture’ ethnography),
Bangkok: Fa Dieo Kan, 2005. This study follows the ideas and methodology of J Clifford & G Marcus,
Writing Culture, Berkely, CA: University of California Press, 1986.
23 Ganjanaphan, ‘Sangkhom thai tam khwamkit lae khwamfaifan nai ngan khong chatthip natsupha’,
p 171.
24 Chatthip elaborates the concept by explaining the ideas of four thinkers on ‘community culture’ in
‘Naewkit watthanatham chumchon’ (The ‘community culture’ concept), in C Chumwatthana &
U Pattamanand (eds), Saithan haeng khwamkit (Streams of thoughts), Bangkok: the Academic
Committee for the 60th Anniversary of Khun Warunyapha Sanidwongse Na Ayutthaya, 1989, pp 47 –
72; and ‘The community culture school of thought’, in Turton & Chitakasem, Thai Constructions of
Knowledge, pp 118 – 141. Although some of these thinkers work among the urban poor, Chatthip
adopts this concept, modifies and applies it to his idea of the Thai village in subsequent works.
25 Natsupha, The Thai Village Economy.
26 C Natsupha, ‘Naewkhit khrongkan suksa watthanatham chonchat thai’ (Concepts for the cultural
studies of the Tai ethnic peoples project), paper prepared for the seminar, ‘The State and Directions of
the Tai Cultural Studies’ by the Office of the National Culture Commission, Bangkok, 10 – 13
September 1993; and Natsupha, Prawattisat watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai (History of the
culture of community and of Thai ethnicity), Bangkok: Chulalongkorn University Press, 1997.
27 The declaration appears at the front of practically all the books by members of Chatthip’s group. See
the preface to several books in Chatthip’s project, such as C Satyawatthana, Suepsan prawattisat
sangkhom lae watthanatham pai ywe (The social and cultural history of the Pai Ywe people), Bangkok:
Sangsan Publishing, 2001. The declaration is unsigned, but undoubtedly approved, and probably
written by, Chatthip himself.
28 See Natsupha, Watthanatham thai kap khabuankan plianplaeng sangkhom, pp 195 – 198; Natsupha,
Prawattisat watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai; and K Leelalai, Prawattisat chonchat thai
(History of the Thai peoples), Bangkok: Withithat Project, 2001, p 14.
590
29 Natsupha, Prawattisat watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai, pp 102 – 103.

30 Satyawatthana, Suepsan prawattisat sangkhom lae watthanatham pai ywe, pp 15 – 16.
31 In an interview with a Japanese scholar he suggests that they are the Oriental characteristics as well.
Natsupha, Prawattisat watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai, p 54. In another place he writes that
the indigenous Mon – Khmer culture that pervaded the area of Thailand long before the Thai, also
shares values with it because it shares the same root from the same source in southern China. See
Satyawatthana, Suepsan prawattisat sangkhom lae watthanatham pai ywe, p. [15]. I am not aware of a
single discussion or research work on these Thai primordial characteristics.
32 See the Chatthip group’s declaration referred to in footnote 27.
33 Natsupha, Prawattisat watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai, p 52; and Natsupha, Watthanatham
thai kap khabuankan plianplaeng sangkhom, p 8.
34 See the declaration referred to in footnote 27.
35 See Y Saikia, Fragmented Memories: Struggling to be Tai-Ahom in India, Durham, NC: Duke
University Press, 2004, pp 215 – 223.
36 Natsupha, Watthanatham thai kap khabuankan plianplaeng sangkhom, pp 66, 83.
37 Natsupha, Prawattisat watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai, pp 90 – 91.
38 Ganjanaphan, ‘Sangkhom thai tam khwamkit lae khwamfaifan nai ngan khong chatthip natsupha’,
pp 229 – 246; and Nidhi Eoseewong’s introduction, in Leelalai, Prawattisat chonchat thai.
39 W Pongsripian, ‘Sathanaphap kansuksa prawattisat thai’ (History of the Tai peoples: a critical review),
in S Ongsakul & Y Masuhara (eds), Kansuksa prawattisat lae wannakam khong klum chatphan thai
(Studies of history and literature of Tai ethnic groups), Bangkok: Amarin Printing, 2002, pp 30 – 55.
40 Natsupha, Watthanatham thai kap khabuankan plianplaeng sangkhom, p 83; and Natsupha, Prawattisat
watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai, pp 81, 91.
41 See one of the most engaging reactions to the criticism that Chatthip is nationalist in the introduction
to Natsupha, Prawattisat watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai. The quote at the beginning of this
article is undeniable evidence of his ‘pan-Thai’ nationalism. I have not seen a single discussion of it yet.
42 Ganjanaphan , ‘Sangkhom thai tam khwamkit lae khwamfaifan nai ngan khong chatthip natsupha’.
43 Chatthip was among the first three scholars to be named a Distinguished Senior Researcher by the
Thailand Research Fund (TRF) in 1991, with an award of three million baht for research. Later he and
his group of 15 researchers got some tens of millions of baht of support from the TRF in the mid-1990s.
44 M Copeland, ‘Contested nationalism and the 1932 overthrow of the absolute monarchy in Siam’,
unpublished PhD thesis, Australian National University, 1994.
45 It is impossible to discuss this important subject adequately here. See K Kesbunchoo-Mead, The Rise
and Decline of Thai Absolutism, London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2004; C Rajchagool, The Rise and Fall of
the Thai Absolute Monarchy, Bangkok: White Lotus, 1994; L Hong, ‘Extraterritoriality in Bangkok in
the reign of King Chulalongkorn, 1868 – 1910: the cacophonies of semi-colonial cosmopolitanism’,
Itinerario, 27 (2), pp 125 – 146; Hong, ‘Stranger within the gates: knowing semi-colonial Siam as
extraterritorials’, Modern Asian Studies, 38 (2), pp 327 – 354; T Winichakul, Siam Mapped: A History
of the Geo-body of a Nation, Honolulul, HI: University of Hawai’i Press, 1994; and Winichakul, ‘The
quest for ‘‘Siwilai’’: a geographical discourse of civilizational thinking in the late 19th and early 20th
century Siam’, Journal of Asian Studies, 59 (3), 2000, pp 528 – 549.
46 WF Vella, Chaiyo!King Vajiravudh and the Development of Thai Nationalism, Honolulu, HI: University
of Hawai’i Press, 1978.
47 S Barme, Luang Wichit Wathakan and the Creation of a Thai Identity, Singapore: Institute of Southeast
Asian Studies, 1993.
48 This article cannot do justice to the ideas of these people. Suffice to note that, apart from Chatthip,
influential thinkers among them are Nidhi Eoseewong and Kasian Tejapira.
49 See Radical Conservatism: Buddhism in the Contemporary World, Bangkok: Sathirakoset-Nakhapra-
teep Foundation, 1990; and D Swearer, ‘Sulak Sivaraksa’s Buddhist vision for renewing society’,
Crossroads, 6 (2), 1991, pp 17 – 57.
50 Natsupha, ‘Naewkit watthanathoam chumchon’.
51 Winichakul, ‘The quest for ‘Siwilai’.
52 C Reynolds, ‘Globalization and cultural nationalism in modern Thailand’, in J Khan (ed), Southeast
Asian Identities, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1998, pp 115 – 145.
53 Ibid, p 139.
54 This belief was widespread and can easily be found in mainstream journalism. The propagator of this
view is Phuchatkan (The Manager), a daily newspaper. More sophisticated and academic literature in
this vein has also become abundant since the 1997 crisis.
55 T Winichakul, ‘Toppling democracy’, Journal of Contemporary Asia, 38(1), 2008, pp 11 – 37.
56 K Tejapira, ‘Toppling Thaksin’, New Left Review, 39 (New Series), 2006, pp 5 – 37.
591

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reﬂects broader changes in nationalism in the country. The cultural nationalist

Thongchai Winichakul is in the Department of History, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 5211 Humanities,

ISSN 0143-6597 print/ISSN 1360-2241 online/08/030575–17 Ó 2008 Third World Quarterly

In order to appreciate the import of Chatthip’s remarks, a brief excursus into

The Chatthip School in left debates

Economy’ group he helped create, and contributed signiﬁcantly to shaping, a

The Thai village and its primordial essence

about underdevelopment and retarded capitalism. They were about

Khiriwong is a real village which is identical to the one imagined by

Thai village.22 These important criticisms have not, however, prevented

peasants to live self-suﬃciently in harmony and peace, and to cope with

Authentic Thai culture outside Thailand

followers construct trans-historical characteristics or elements of an un-

As it emerged in the 19th century, nationalism in Siam was, as in most

the ruling elite was strengthened to an unprecedented level. As a semi-

rejected even so-called chauvinism. The distinctions between chauvinism and

includes quite a few royalists.

economic crisis. As Reynolds has reported,52 Thai intellectuals were wary of

Given the centrality of anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist and kindred themes

been published in the ‘Phumpanya’ (Intellect) series of schools of thought

The left populist nationalism in perspective

their distrust of the state—seeing it as an agency of capitalism and the West

in the 1980s. Many former leftist intellectuals endorsed the ‘Thai-style

29 Natsupha, Prawattisat watthanatham chumchon lae chonchat thai, pp 102 – 103.

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