Thailand

Earlier this month, the retired general who led a military coup in Thailand five years ago, Prayuth Chan-ocha, was formally confirmed as prime minister by King Vajiralongkorn, after parliament unsurprisingly voted to hand the position to the former coup leader. Of course, Prayuth, who did not even run in Thailand’s elections in March, was in the position to win the parliamentary vote because, since the coup, the junta he led had essentially hand-picked the upper house of parliament, after rewriting the constitution to make the Senate appointed, and overseen other constitutional changes that weakened large and anti-military parties. Then, after the long-delayed and controlled elections in March, Thailand’s Election Commission offered a highly unusual interpretation of the results. It seemed to arbitrarily reduce the number of seats won in the lower house of parliament by a coalition of anti-military parties, giving just enough seats to a collection of tiny parties that then joined Prayuth’s coalition. Before the parliamentary vote last week, Prayuth declined to offer a vision to the legislature for how he would govern. Given the way he became prime minister, which infuriated many opposition parties, part of the new government’s agenda will likely include further measures to repress activists. But repression will not be Prayuth’s only card. For an analysis of Prayuth’s agenda, see my new piece for World Politics Review, from which this excerpt is taken.

In March, Thai voters cast their ballots in the country’s first election since a military coup in 2014. After months of waiting, a prime minister was finally chosen on Wednesday—Prayuth Chan-ocha, the retired general who led Thailand’s coup five years ago. His victory was all but guaranteed, even though anti-junta forces together got the most votes in the election, after the military and its allies launched criminal charges against top opposition leaders, and oversaw an unusual reading of electoral laws to help the pro-military party gain the most seats possible.  What will Prayuth as a civilian prime minister look like? And how will he handle a very different Thai politics? For more, see my new Q&A on the Thai prime minister.

Prayuth Chan-ocha led the 2014 military coup and will now lead the country as civilian prime minister after this week’s parliamentary vote. But the military will still dominate politics.

By Pavin Chachavalpongpun and Joshua Kurlantzick General Prem Tinsulanonda, the former army chief, long-time prime minister (1980–1988), and head of the palace’s Privy Council, passed away on May 26, at the age of ninety-eight. Prem outlived former King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who died in October 2016. The two men had cultivated a special relationship that had shaped Thai politics for decades. Prem played a major role in the re-ascendance of the monarchy’s power, and also created a template of an unelected but relatively effective prime minister during his long time on the job in the 1980s. Unfortunately, few could replicate that template, yet Thailand’s generals and archroyalists have continued to dream of—and regularly put into place—unelected prime ministers, or prime ministers serving without a real popular mandate. Today, junta leader Prayuth Chan-ocha, who was the pro-military party’s candidate for prime minister in March elections, appears set to become civilian prime minister. The military had positioned Prayuth to serve as civilian prime minister, whether or not he got a real popular mandate. And in the March election, which reportedly was unfair in the run-up to election day, Prayuth’s party did not win the majority of seats, although to be sure it did perform well in the popular vote. But, after the election, what appeared to be a dubious reading of electoral laws by the country’s election commission created an allocation of seats that favoured the pro-military party and its allies. Now Prayuth’s party apparently has made a coalition with two midsize parties, including the Democrat Party, which did poorly in the election but now is a kingmaker in the lower house of parliament. This coalition should be enough to make Prayuth prime minister, although he will command a very slim majority in the lower house. If Field Marshal Sarit Thanarat, a dictator and prime minister, was the key figure who mentored King Bhumibol in the late 1950s and early 1960s when the monarchy remained relatively weak—weaker than the armed forces—Prem was the individual who most influenced the king in the 1980s and afterwards. Prem’s influence, moreover, came in a time when, with Prem’s help, the monarchy shifted the balance of power. By the 1980s and 1990s, the palace was no longer subservient to the armed forces; increasingly, they were equal powers, and today the palace has come to dominate the army in many respects. Sarit was responsible for constructing the ideology of neo-royalism, which resurrected the powerful position of the monarchy in politics after the end of the absolute monarchy in the 1930s, the diminution of the Thai monarchy in the 1940s, and the end of many monarchies globally in the post–World War II era. Sarit revived the ritual of prostration before monarchs, a ritual once abolished by King Chulalongkorn, who ruled what was then Siam between 1868 and 1910. The revival of prostration was one part of a broader campaign of rituals, media promotion, and other tactics designed to lift Bhumibol to the status of demigod. King Bhumibol also genuinely boosted his popularity in Thailand through extensive travel and charity work in the kingdom, earning subjects’ respect and love. For Sarit and other Thai military rulers, the revival of the monarchy also helped support the role of the military in politics. The security of the monarchy was made equivalent to the security of the nation. As the defender of national security, then, the military claimed the need to remain in politics so as to defend the security of the monarchy as well. The United States, which became Thailand’s key ally and patron in the Cold War, strongly supported the revival of the monarchy. Washington saw the king as a key ally in the battle against communism in Thailand and in Southeast Asia more broadly. Prem took on what Sarit left behind, promoting the position of Bhumibol in politics and ultimately making the palace the central actor in the country, around which even the military revolved. (Of course, Thailand is technically a constitutional monarchy, but in reality it is far from one.) The central political network in Thailand in recent decades has been what Duncan McCargo named the “network monarchy,” a network of royalists surrounding the palace, and pursuing policies supported by the king—with the royalists spread among the military, political parties, business, the bureaucracy and other power centers. In the 1980s Prem strengthened the network monarchy while ensuring that Bhumibol commanded the top of the political structure, and that other powerful actors understood the king’s role. Prem also oversaw a kind of managed democracy in which power still remained in his hands, the army’s hands, and the hands of the palace. However, since Bhumibhol died, the network monarchy has broken down; Prem and the current king, Vajiralongkorn, reportedly detested each other, and Vajiralongkorn has been more clearly amassing power himself, doing away with the idea of a network around the palace. Prem was handpicked by Bhumibol to serve as prime minister in 1980, and his time as prime minister was a period of relative stability (albeit not real democracy) and extremely high economic growth rates. The current Thai junta, while trying to ensure Prayuth becomes civilian prime minister, seemingly sees the Prem era of managed democracy as a model to emulate. However, Thai society has changed significantly since the 1980s, after decades of real democratic contests. Despite the five years of repression since the 2014 coup, it is hard to imagine such managed democracy surviving for long, and Prayuth and his allies also have shown little of the management skills of Prem and his circle of technocrats. After Prem stepped down from the premiership, he was appointed as the president of the Privy Council, the circle of advisors to the monarchy. As the head of the Privy Council, Prem positioned himself as maintaining the continuity and power of the network monarchy. He continued working with powerful institutions, including the armed forces, the judiciary, the Crown Property Bureau, and large companies, to control politics from behind the scenes. At times, when Thai elected governments became strong, threatening the power of the network monarchy, the network would push back. In the case of the Chatichai Choonhavan government, in 1991, the network resorted to a military coup to overthrow Chatichai. But the real challenge to the network monarchy and Prem arrived with the emergence of Thaksin Shinawatra on the political scene. Thaksin, who built an effective party apparatus and a sophisticated populist platform, posed a serious challenge to network monarchy. Winning multiple elections, he diminished the power of Prem and the network, until he openly challenged the authority of Bhumibol—an act that, in 2005 and 2006, sparked a coup in 2006 and Thailand’s seemingly never-ending political crisis, one that continues on today. When Bhumibol was hospitalized, beginning essentially in 2009, Prem’s position in Thai politics became weaker. Another military faction, the Queen’s Guard, which was not aligned with Prem, gained more power following the newly active role of Queen Sirikit as her husband was bedridden. The new reign of Vajiralongkorn commenced in 2016. Prem had long questioned Vajiralongkorn’s abilities as a monarch. In private, Prem had told American diplomats of his disapproval of Vajiralongkorn and wish that someone else would have been placed in the line of succession. His worries, captured in diplomatic cables that were ultimately leaked by WikiLeaks, likely infuriated Vajiralongkorn, given how the new king then treated Prem. As king, Vajiralongkorn reorganized the Privy Council, replacing old councillors picked by his father with his own trusted men. However, Prem was not kicked out, and still served as head of the Privy Council. But it was a powerless position. Vajiralongkorn essentially amended the constitution to allow himself to rule without a regent when out of the country, and generally emasculated the power of the Privy Council. He is now relying on a few personal advisors, rather than the Privy Council. The king apparently no longer wishes to depend on his proxies, working through the Privy Council as his father in the past. Instead, he appears to be taking action in areas from politics to the military to the Crown Property Bureau, largely on his own. The death of Prem, and the increasing power of the new king, could signal the end of the network monarchy era. Prem left a legacy in which the palace built up and maintained its power, through multiple eras, and even into the Shinawatra age. In this light, Prem left behind a legacy of royal dominance, to be further consolidated by Vajiralongkorn, even as the new king diminishes the network and takes more power for himself. Pavin Chachavalpongpun is associate professor at Kyoto University’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies.

By Petra Desatova Anand Panyarachun, the former prime minister of Thailand and a long-time central figure in Thai politics, belongs to an old generation of Thai technocrats, who shaped Thailand’s economic and political developments between the 1960s and 1990s. This was an era of mostly military rule, but many of the military governments delegated significant authority over the economy, and to some extent politics, to the technocratic elite. Educated almost exclusively in Europe and the United States, these technocrats had stellar careers and many, like Anand, who is now eighty-six years old, continue to command immense social respect to this day, even as Thailand’s political system has broken down, with little consensus left. The technocrats’ careers were characterized by a strong sense of public service and willingness to work with whatever government was in power. Their dealings with the military were often more pragmatic than principled—but not all Thai technocrats pandered to military interests. Anand, for one, despite generally conservative leanings, had thorny personal relations with many generals over the course of his technocratic career. This tension, however did not prevent him from accepting General Suchinda Kraprayoon’s offer to be appointed Thailand’s prime minister following the 1991 military coup. Anand’s achievements in office earned him a reputation, among many Thais, of the best prime minister Thais have never elected—injecting some legitimacy to the narrative of traditional elites (the monarchy, military, and senior bureaucracy) that you do not necessarily need to win an election to be a wise leader, a point hammered home by the current military junta’s creation of an upper house of parliament full only of appointed senators, for instance. Dominic Faulder’s new biography provides many fascinating insights into Anand’s life as well as some of the major political developments in modern Thai history, in which Anand often played a central role. Faulder is a veteran journalist and foreign correspondent, who has been based in Thailand since the early 1980s. Particularly well documented in Faulder’s Anand biography are the politically turbulent mid-1970s, which were marked by the end of the Vietnam War and withdrawal of all combat U.S. military forces from Thailand, which had been a primary staging ground for the war. The decade also was marked by the rise of ultra-conservative right-wing political forces—a rise that culminated in the infamous 1976 Thammasat University massacre. Another well-documented period in the book is the early 1990s, when Anand was appointed Thailand’s prime minister twice within nineteen months, amidst another period of extreme political turbulence that included Suchinda’s coup and Anand’s service as his prime minister, mass antimilitary protests in Bangkok, a brutal crackdown on the protestors by the Royal Thai Army, an intervention by the late king Bhumibol Adulyadej, and then a return to civilian government with Anand as prime minister again. Born in 1932 into a family of Chinese and Mon descent that was part of the Siamese non-royal titled elite (the country had not yet changed its name to Thailand), Anand’s life was comfortable and full of privileged opportunities. At the age of sixteen, he was sent to England to study at Dulwich College followed by a degree in economics and law at Trinity College, Cambridge. Upon his return to Thailand in 1955, Anand joined the foreign service, which was one of the most prestigious career paths for aspiring young technocrats at the time. He quickly rose up the ranks due to his excellent command of English and his no-nonsense attitude and forthrightness. These traits are not normally associated with Thai culture, and have earned Anand a reputation as being “un-Thai” among some co-workers. At the age of twenty-six, he was made a secretary to the then powerful foreign minister, Thanat Koman. This was a significant career leap that helped to develop Anand’s skills and experience. In 1964, Thanat posted Anand to New York to join the Permanent Mission of Thailand to the United Nations. By the age of forty, Anand had become an ambassador to Washington—the most prestigious diplomatic posting at the time in the Thai foreign service. Anand’s approach to diplomacy was very hands-on. He believed that the role of a diplomat was to “have your own mind and make [policy] inputs.” This approach did not always sit well with some deep-seated Thai cultural norms, such as valuing seniority and deference. His approach landed him in trouble when he returned to Thailand in 1975 to become a permanent secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. His uncompromising stance on the lingering U.S. military presence in the kingdom made him particularly unpopular with Thailand’s generals, who charged him with communist tendencies following the 1976 military coup and the Thammasat University massacre. Although exonerated within a few months, this experience had a profound impact on Anand and his family—it led to his decision to exit the foreign service in 1978 and start a second career in business. Anand’s rise to premiership in 1991 was unexpected. Readers might find it surprising that he was not General Suchinda Kraprayoon’s first choice for the post. In fact, his name had to be suggested to Suchinda. Although Anand considered the coup a “national catastrophe,” he agreed to take the job. Saying no and leaving the generals to drown in the political malaise they had created would, theoretically, be the principled option, but Anand believed it was not a good decision for Thailand. He formed a government full of capable technocrats and pushed through many impressive policies, such as trade liberalization and a highly effective anti-HIV/AIDS campaign that made Thailand a model for other developing countries, with staggering speed and efficiency. This has had a lasting political effect on Thailand as Anand essentially demonstrated what capable, civilian, and incorruptible leaders can theoretically achieve if they are not constrained by electoral politics. Every time there is a political crisis in Thailand, some Thais hope for another unelected leader with Anand-like qualities. What they usually get, however, is an ineffective military general with a narrow, pro-armed forces, and regressive agenda. Anand’s second term as Thailand’s prime minister followed General Suchinda’s short-lived elected government and the bloody crackdown on anti-government protesters in May 1992. Anand’s second term was only 104 days long and had no legislative agenda. Anand chose not to launch a criminal investigation into the May 1992 events. Instead he secretly drafted a transfer plan to remove the military generals responsible for the violent crackdown from positions of power. This was a missed opportunity to hold the Royal Thai Army accountable for the May 1992 events, but Anand maintains to this day that any formal investigation was the responsibility of the elected governments that came to power after him. Following his two premierships, Anand returned to work in the private sector. He also became involved in many activities with public-service elements, both in Thailand and abroad. Some of his most notable contributions include chairing the constitution drafting committee that delivered Thailand’s widely-praised and progressive 1997 constitution, presiding over a United Nation’s panel on global peace and security, chairing the commission on Southern Thailand, and chairing the National Reform Commission on Thailand’s deep political and societal divides. Faulder’s book shows that Anand is by no means a typical Thai technocrat, but readers might be left with mixed feelings about Anand. Although Anand holds some fairly progressive views, within the context of Thai politics and society—Anand supports the devolution of power to Thailand’s outer regions, and Faulder quotes Anand as saying that the draconian lèse-majesté law, which has stifled discourse, should be decriminalized and replaced with a system of fines—Anand is still very conservative. He donated fifty-thousand Thai baht to the ultra-royalist and conservative People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) movement, part of the broader royalist “yellow shirt movement.” The PAD played a role in ousting the elected government of Thaksin Shinawatra and paving the way for the 2006 military coup. Anand also attended a funeral of a yellow shirt protester in 2008. He does not regret either action. Described as “pale yellow”—sympathetic to the arch-royalist yellow shirt movement in Thailand—by a close friend, Anand is an unapologetic royalist. Five hundred fifty-six pages long, the book can seem quite daunting, but Faulder’s narrative style is highly readable. Many of his insights stem from his long personal relationship with Anand, and he provides a lot of rich detail on Anand’s life and career, drawing on more than two hundred interviews with Anand and interviews with many other sources. His account of Anand is set within wider discussions of Thailand’s political developments, regional and international affairs. However, readers expecting a highly-critical assessment of Anand’s role in these developments or explorations of the many controversies surrounding Thai politics might be disappointed. This is an authorized biography that presents a largely positive account of Anand and treads carefully around many of the controversial topics in Thai politics, including the country’s multiple military interventions, and the role of the monarchy, often leaving it to the reader to join the dots in the narrative about these topics. Nevertheless, this is a very informative and absorbing book, which will be of great interest to Thailand experts as well as anyone interested in the politics and diplomacy of a long-time, critical U.S. treaty ally. Petra Desatova, PhD, is a researcher on the United States Institute of Peace project into Thailand’s 2019 elections, at the School of Politics and International Studies, University of Leeds.

By Pavin Chachavalpongpun and Joshua Kurlantzick The coronation of King Vajiralongkorn of Thailand, held last weekend, was the first crowning of a Thai sovereign since that of his father, the late King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who was enthroned in May 1950. A few days before the coronation, King Vajiralongkorn surprised the public by announcing his marriage, the king’s fourth, with Suthida Vajiralongkorn na Ayutthaya, a former flight attendant who is now Thailand’s queen consort. The crowning of Vajiralongkorn last weekend was a formal ceremony; in reality, he has already been acting as king for two and a half years. Bhumibol reigned for seventy years until he passed away in October 2016, and generally amassed enormous goodwill among Thais, as well as substantial moral capital that he could use at times of great crisis in the kingdom. The long, authoritative reign of Bhumibol started when he was quite young, and Thais’ images of him were mostly a blank slate, allowing the king and his allies in the military and the Cold War-era United States, for whom Thailand was a critical partner, to shape a benign, caring image of Bhumibol to the Thai public. However, the relatively advanced age that his son ascends to the throne (he is sixty-six, while his father was enthroned at age twenty-two, and some Thai citizens’ concerns about the new king’s suitability for the throne and how he plans to utilize his powers, raise critical questions about whether Vajiralongkorn could ever enjoy the popularity of his father. It will be much harder for the new king to win the public trust, and repeat his father’s success as a respected mediator. Yet Thailand’s prospects in the post-coronation period rest, in good part, on the ability of King Vajiralongkorn to build a new consensus with the country’s major political stakeholders—some of whom are the same as they have been for decades, while others are emerging onto the scene. To be sure, Thailand is technically a constitutional monarchy, with the monarch supposedly above politics, but since the end of Thailand’s absolute monarchy in the 1930s the monarch has long competed with, and allied himself with, politicians in wielding of political power. During the Bhumibol period, the king built a political network, known in Thailand scholar Duncan McCargo’s phrase, as the “network monarchy,” as a vehicle to wield power. Today, Vajiralongkorn is more open in his political ambition, and in how he involves himself in politics. Thailand has fallen into a protracted crisis over the past twenty years, starting from the early period of Thaksin Shinawatra’s government, when he governed as an illiberal democrat—and getting worse in 2006, the year the Thaksin government was overthrown in a coup. The growing crisis at that time coincided with the decline of the Bhumibol era; as any Thai political consensus that existed unraveled, Bhumibol stood aside and then became increasingly physically incapacitated and unable to play a role as a mediator, as he had done at some points in the past in Thai history. Thai political stability had been sustained in many of the previous decades in part because Bhumibol was able to negotiate a consensus among various political actors, such as the military and various pro-democracy movements. (However, Bhumibol certainly had conservative leanings, and sometimes abandoned his mediating role to more clearly back the military and its allies, thereby defying the idea that the monarchy remains above politics; but, the former king rarely openly delved into politics.) The former king was able to serve as this mediator because of his wide public popularity. It was also possible because he earned a great degree of legitimacy through his moral authority, which was partly created by a sophisticated public relations campaign overseen by the palace, but also depended on the former king traveling throughout Thailand and seeming to really care about the lives of most Thais. But King Vajiralongkorn does not come to the throne with those advantages. The achievements of Bhumibol were individualistic and not institutional, meaning the royal transition fails to automatically bring security to the monarchy, although Bhumibol’s legacy, and the palace’s intense publicity campaigns, do offer some initial goodwill for the new king. Still, Vajiralongkorn faces several challenges in becoming a respected figure who could foster stability. For one, he has shown an intention to intervene more directly in politics than his father, such as by initially refusing to approve Thailand’s new constitution, until parts of the constitution were changed, and by taking more direct control of the wealthy Crown Property Bureau. Second, the early days of his era as king have not led to a reduction in political tensions. The elections held on March 24, the first in Thailand since the coup of May 2014, were held in an unfair pre-election environment. Even so, a coalition of anti-junta parties initially appeared to have won a slim majority of seats in the lower house of Parliament, as well as the largest combined share of the popular vote. But the official results for all seats appear to have been interpreted, by Thailand’s election commission, in a questionable way that favors a coalition of pro-military parties, further deepening political uncertainties. The military is further using various avenues to try to destroy the anti-junta coalition of parties, and possibly put one of its key leaders in jail. The king has been, at best, mute on these developments. Vajiralongkorn does not seem interested in brokering any consensus between the military and anti-junta parties. The country seems headed for continued instability, with a military-backed prime minister and seething anger among supporters of anti-junta parties. The current army chief General Apirat Kongsompong, handpicked by Vajiralongkorn, has several times intervened in politics. He has openly threatened and tried to intimidate the leadership of a new anti-junta party, Future Forward, which did extremely well for a first-time party in the March elections. On the contrary, the new king turned down his best opportunity to broker a potentially lasting consensus in Thailand before the election was held—when he scotched a plan to have his sister, Princess Ubolratana, run as a prime minister candidate at the head of Thai Raksa Chart. Had she been allowed to run, and won, she could have possibly created a political compromise in which the powerful military was defanged, and tensions between groups of Thais on different sides of the political, regional, and social spectrums cooled. (She also might have caused other problems, as a royal-turned-prime minister who could have stifled dissent because of her position.) But as it turned out, when former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra nominated the princess as prime ministerial candidate for the Thaksin-linked Thai Raksa Chart, Vajiralongkorn issued a royal command: he did not only prevent the princess from running but castigated Thaksin for politicizing the monarchy. Vajiralongkorn’s response was seen as a move to calm the yellow-shirt royalists who were enraged by a potential alliance between Thaksin and Ubolratana, but it did nothing to position the new king as an honest broker in Thai politics. More recently, King Vajiralongkorn continued to penalize Thaksin by stripping the former prime minister of royal decorations. This move will further thwart any attempt in bringing about consensus in the new reign. Combined with a seeming desire to intervene more openly in politics—in some ways harkening back to the era of the absolute monarchy—and a disinterest in brokering between political actors, the new king does not have a reservoir of public trust that might sustain him even if he made controversial decisions. The Thai public, despite strict lèse majesté laws, has for years found ways to access stories of the new king, published in the foreign press, about his eccentric lifestyle and playboy reputation. Forging political consensus is key to a successful reign. Consensus may not lead to democracy in Thailand, but stability can be achieved through political compromises. Bhumibol’s rule was characterized by the predominance of consensus over coercion, even though he tended to side with the military at most key moments. In contrast, only a few years into the Vajiralongkorn reign, it is unclear whether the new king has an interest in fostering political consensus at all. Pavin Chachavalpongpun is associate professor at Kyoto University’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies.

Although it has been more than a month since Thailand’s elections, the actual outcome remains uncertain. The final count of seats in the lower house of parliament is still unclear, since the election commission has not decided how to allocate party list seats, and since some of the winning candidates, particularly in the group of anti-junta parties, could be disqualified. Of course, the upper house was not elected, and is essentially packed with supporters of the military and probable prime minister Prayuth Chan-ocha. The group of anti-junta parties, which joined in a coalition after the election, still claim to have more than half of the seats in the lower house of parliament. Although half the lower house would not be a big enough haul to stop Prayuth from becoming prime minister, since he could draw on total support in the senate and enough support in the lower house to be named prime minister, holding more than half the seats in the lower house would in theory allow the anti-junta coalition to block legislation proposed by Prayuth and his allies. This showing by the anti-junta parties also, in theory, reflects the public will—and a desire by many Thais to embrace new, reformist parties. But the anti-junta coalition’s position remains perilously weak; in reality, they have few cards to play. Some articles, like a recent piece in the Nikkei Asian Review, suggest that the anti-junta coalition is in a modestly strong position to challenge the military, and eventually pave the way toward real liberal democracy in Thailand. And indeed, it is true that in the elections, Future Forward, the biggest new party in the anti-junta coalition, won a strikingly large share of seats for a party that had not existed before the 2019 vote, and one that was not linked to the red-yellow splits of the past. It also demonstrated a popular appetite for a party that eschewed traditional political machinery and Thai money politics, called for cuts to the bloated military budget, brought many new faces into politics, and relied on social media to get out its talking points. But a future where Future Forward, or another reformist party, has real power, is far off. The junta has shown, in the weeks since the election, that they intend to crush Future Forward, and that a political compromise, one that might end post-election squabbling over the lower house and pave the way for real reform far down the road, is almost surely not going to happen. This time around, unlike, say, in the mid-2000s, the armed forces appear determined not to allow a situation in which their power could be undercut. The leader of Future Forward, Thanathorn Juangroongruamgkit, and other top members of Future Forward, face a wide range of charges, including some related to election law, some related to sedition, and some related to share sales. Most likely, Thanathorn will be disqualified from politics, and some of his allies in the party will be coerced or co-opted to join the pro-military coalition in the lower house. Meanwhile, other members of the anti-junta coalition will be arm-twisted to join the pro-military coalition in the lower house, defanging the anti-junta group’s power. The anti-junta coalition will have little recourse. Indeed, the military, which already oversaw the harshest coup era in Thailand in decade, has little interest in compromise. They also face little external pressure; foreign diplomats may pay visits to Thanathorn, but foreign governments are not going to turn the screws on Thailand. Major powers are eager to fully restore all relations with Bangkok, no matter how the election results ultimately wind up. The tactics being utilized against Thanathorn are tried and true measures in Thai politics. Will they provoke an angry, violent response, as has occurred at times in Thailand when the military, and its proxies attempted to subvert the results of an election? Probably not now—there is unlikely to be massive unrest, of the kind that paralyzed Bangkok in 1992 or 2010. The junta took tough measures, in the past five years, to minimize the possibility of a popular uprising; the groups with the greatest recent abilities to turn out large numbers of protestors, those linked to Puea Thai party, have mostly been shattered in recent years.

By Nicholas Borroz The Last Days of the Mighty Mekong, by Brian Eyler, director of the Southeast Asia program at the Stimson Center, takes the reader on a journey from glaciers in China to rice fields in Vietnam, stopping along the way in Cambodia, Laos, and Thailand. The book describes how unsustainable human society’s current relationship is with the Mekong, which he defines not just as a river but as a complex ecological system that includes glaciers, lakes, deltas, and other smaller rivers in the region. The Mekong is important globally in terms of biodiversity—thirteen times more fish are caught annually from the Mekong than from all of North America’s lakes and rivers combined. It is also important strategically—the Mekong starts in China and flows through mainland Southeast Asia, an economically dynamic region where Beijing is increasingly the dominant external power. The Mekong has become increasingly important to trade as well, as the river has been made more navigable (controversially) through efforts by China to dredge rapids and remove rocks, among other strategies. Eyler demonstrates, through a mix of anecdotes and analysis, how economic development projects that fail to consider ecological consequences are, ultimately, unsustainable—such projects increasingly threaten the long-term health of the river and its basin. In the context of the Mekong, he shows, the impact on the river can occur locally, when a Cambodian fishing community for instance overfishes and depletes fish stocks, thus destroying its livelihood. It can happen on a national scale—for instance, when the Vietnamese government builds water management infrastructure that interrupts sedimentation distribution cycles, thus undermining the national agricultural sector the infrastructure is supposed to support. This damage also can happen on a regional scale. Thailand’s energy demands, for instance, are one reason for dam-building in Laos, and these dams ultimately damage biodiversity both in Laos and Thailand. Eyler shows that unsustainable economic development is destroying both the Mekong’s biodiversity and also the ways of life of communities along and near the river. Eyler cites numerous indicators that biodiversity is on the wane, such as declining Mekong Giant Catfish populations and the changing compositions of cyprinid harvests. To explain the community destruction threat, he provides numerous sobering examples, particularly in China and Cambodia, of ill-designed relocation programs that have hurt displaced communities’ societies and economies. Although all of the countries in the Mekong basin have, in various ways, undermined the river’s long-term viability, Eyler places the most blame on China for the Mekong’s dire future. As he notes early in the book, the Chinese model of economic development “is defined by top-down, investment-led capitalism at the expense of protecting communities and natural biodiversity.” At the end of the book, he circles back to his core claim, after reviewing a mountain of evidence, and reaffirms that China’s model of development is the Mekong’s biggest threat. Not only does dam-building in China (where the river is called the Lancang) disrupt the Mekong further downstream, but Chinese outbound investment and tourism to Southeast Asia potentially lead to harmful economic development projects in other countries. Eyler implies that economic development projects—which often proceed in the Mekong basin after weak or nonexistent environmental impact studies—must do much more to consider potential ecological and societal consequences before they are approved by regional governments. Only in this way, he notes, will the region’s states avoid catastrophe for the river basin. He provides a few examples of relatively sustainable economic development in the river basin. He does not, however, propose a clear, concrete plan for how states—either upstream China or downstream less powerful states—can enforce this shift. Nor does he explain how the region could more broadly avoid greater long-term damage to the health of the river and the people who depend on it. Perhaps he does not offer further recommendations because he sees little reason to believe China will reconsider the ecological and societal consequences of its dam-building activities, or seriously consult other stakeholders in the Mekong basin. Nicholas Borroz is an international business doctoral candidate at the University of Auckland.

Three events this week served as a reminder that, in a world where democracy is buffeted on many fronts—the rise of populists who often undermine the rule of law, a growing disinterest in democracy promotion from leaders of the United States and other states, and the influence of major authoritarian powers—armed forces remain political actors in many countries, despite an overall reduction in coups since the days of the Cold War. In Thailand, ruled by a military junta since 2014, the military’s favored party won the largest share of the popular vote in elections last month, but a group of anti-junta parties appear, overall, to have garnered the biggest number of seats in the lower house of parliament. So, the Thai military appears to be maneuvering to ensure that the second-biggest party in the anti-junta alliance is defanged, and to use a range of inducements to convince smaller political parties to join the pro-military alliance in parliament. No matter what happens, it is almost certain that Thailand’s military will remain in control of government, resisting attempts at real civilian oversight of the armed forces. Meanwhile, in Indonesia, which holds presidential elections next week, the military is steadily regaining much of the power it lost in the period after the fall of Suharto, as Indonesian democracy emerged. As Evan Laksmana notes in the New York Times, both candidates in the Indonesian elections, incumbent Joko Widodo (known as Jokowi) and challenger Prabowo Subianto, have helped the military regain power, or will likely do so if elected. If Prabowo, a retired former lieutenant general, were to win (which still seems unlikely given polls of the race) there is a possibility that he would reduce limits on the central government and undermine democratic checks and norms—and potentially allow the military and other security forces far greater rein domestically. Jokowi, though not as openly disdainful of democratic norms and institutions as Prabowo, has surrounded himself with military men. He has allowed the armed forces to reassert their influence over domestic issues including counterterrorism and counternarcotics, among other areas. This is a worrying trend in a country where, for decades, the armed forces were known for dominating politics and committing rights abuses. In other parts of Southeast Asia, militaries retain significant political leverage, though outright coups have declined since the Cold War, as they have in regions like Africa as well. In Myanmar, the military, still by far the most powerful actor in the country despite a technically civilian government, appear to be extending their new battle in Rakhine State. There, fighting has intensified in recent weeks between the military and the insurgent Arakan Army. The military retains near-total control over internal security, and it is unclear whether operations, like the one ramping up against the Arakan Army, are taken solely on the military’s initiative, or whether the armed forces even really consult with the civilian government before acting. But Southeast Asia is not unique. In Sudan this week, the armed forces indeed launched a coup, removing longtime leader Omar al-Bashir. To be sure, Bashir was one of the most repressive rulers in the world, and came to power three decades ago in a coup as well. But the military takeover could neuter the massive protest movement in Sudan, prevent a real transition to a freer form of government, and install just as repressive a regime in Khartoum as Bashir’s government. Just as other types of autocratic regimes have freer rein today than they did in the 1990s and early 2000s, militaries also face fewer constraints on their power. Democratic powers are distracted by their own deep political problems, populations in some states have soured on democracy and looked to other alternatives, and the U.S. government views regions like Southeast Asia as places home to a growing contest for influence with China—and thus requiring closer ties with almost any government willing to align with Washington. The U.S. government appeared ready to completely normalize military-to-military relations with Bangkok, before the election last month, even though the election process was unfair. With Egypt, the White House has lavished fulsome praise on autocratic leader Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, a military man who took power in a coup six years ago and now has indicated he wants to stay in office another fifteen years. The Indonesian military’s creeping re-emergence in Indonesian domestic politics has had little impact on U.S.-Indonesia security ties, or Indonesia’s security links with other regional democracies. Meanwhile, in a world increasingly looking for strongman rule as an alternative to democracy, to solve crises of graft and a lack of political accountability by elected leaders, military men have become more attractive. In some countries, like Thailand, where populists already have ruled, populations have looked to the military as means of ousting populist leaders—though in reality military governments only further erode democratic norms and institutions. In places like Egypt, Indonesia, Myanmar, Thailand, or even Brazil, armed forces, too, are again embedding within their military cultures a resistance to civilian oversight—or refusing to change their cultures to embrace civilian oversight. For a time in Thailand in the late 1990s and early 2000s, for instance, it appeared that the Thai armed forces were beginning to shift, with younger officers at least considering an end to the kingdom’s cycle of coups and military meddling in politics. Whatever glimmer of hope there was for a civilianization of the Thai military now has vanished. The country has had two coups in the past fifteen years, and both older and younger generations of Thai officers seem committed to the continuation of the Royal Thai Army as the dominant political actor.

In Thailand’s elections on March 24, the military’s proxy party, Palang Pracharat, did better than pre-election surveys had indicated. Palang Pracharat appears to have enough seats combined in the elected lower house and the unelected upper house, which is stacked with pro-junta allies, to likely ensure that Prayuth Chan-ocha, who has led a junta government since 2014, will become prime minister again. And the election, despite the unfair run-up to Election Day, relatively low turnout, and obstacles placed in the way of anti-junta parties, did offer some indications of Thailand’s future politics. For more on the meaning of Thailand’s national elections, see my new World Politics Review column.

With a week left before Thailand’s first national elections in eight years, the kingdom looks unlikely to resolve its political tensions, no matter the result of the vote. Instead, Thailand seems destined for continued political instability, although that instability could come in different forms, depending on the results of the election. Scenario 1: Prayuth Chan-ocha remains prime minister, cobbling together a modest coalition in the lower house, and combining that support with support from the upper house’s pro-military senators, who were all essentially installed by the junta. With anti-junta party Thai Raksa Chart disqualified from the election, pressure being applied on other anti-junta parties, and Prayuth’s advantages—he can become prime minister with only the support of 126 MPs in the lower house, because of the junta-created advantage in the upper house, where all the senators were appointed by the military government—the possibility of Prayuth staying on as prime minister is looking more likely. To be sure, Prayuth’s victory is by no means assured. Prayuth has been on a national tour, trying to soften his image as an intolerant and repressive leader, but there is not much evidence his strategy is working and that his party, Palang Prachart, has significant support. Still, Palang Prachart and potential allies in the lower house could eke out enough votes to make Prayuth prime minister. As prime minister, however, would Prayuth be effective in a civilian government? Unlikely. Prayuth has shown, during five years of army rule, to be intolerant of dissent and criticism, to have few ideas about how to bridge Thailand’s deep regional economic gaps, and to be supportive of policies that seem to bolster both the military and increase widening income inequality in the kingdom. During five years of junta rule under Prayuth, Thailand made little headway in upgrading its infrastructure, addressing the serious challenges in its education system, solving the southern insurgency, or making any progress toward ending its years of political chaos. And that was during a period in which the military governed in a highly repressive manner; after the election, Prayuth would have to lead in a freer environment, with opposition politicians, a freer press, and more open public protest. There seems little reason to believe that, as a civilian prime minister in a more hotly contested political environment, Prayuth would prove more effective at leadership, or more capable of focusing Bangkok on Thailand’s deep divides and serious long-term challenges. Scenario 2: Anti-junta parties, working in a coalition, manage to win 376 out of 500 seats in the lower house, and thus have the right to appoint a prime minister. Although this scenario looks increasingly unlikely, given the heightened environment of repression leading up to Election Day and the procedural and constitutional obstacles to an anti-junta coalition winning 376 seats, it is still possible. In this scenario, a combination of Puea Thai, Future Forward, and other parties like the Democrat Party, which has not ruled out joining such a coalition, though it seems unlikely, could win enough seats to select a prime minister. But after the initial triumph, there would likely be major, politically fatal roadblocks. The military will not allow an anti-junta coalition to take power and remain in power, creating the possibility of a civilian government working to reform the armed forces, reduce its budget, and establish greater civilian control. The Election Commission could begin disqualifying candidates from the anti-junta coalition and ordering re-runs of specific constituencies, until the anti-junta coalition lost control of the lower house. Thailand’s top court could dissolve the Future Forward Party. The military and its allies in parliament could twist arms to get the Democrat Party to instead join a coalition with Palang Prachart, a possibility that cannot be ruled out. In this scenario, some Palang Prachart-led coalition would eventually take power, following a period of instability—and voters who backed an anti-junta coalition would be furious. Either way, the outlook cannot be optimistic.

In the run-up to Thailand’s elections, to be held on March 24, there was an initial burst of media attention around the possibility that Princess Ubolratana, the older sister of Thailand’s King Rama X, briefly put her name forward as a candidate for the pro-Thaksin Shinawatra Thai Raksa Chart Party. She would have been Thai Raksa Chart’s prime minister candidate, but her brother, the king, essentially quashed her candidacy. In the weeks since the furor over Princess Ubolratana’s surprise appearance, and almost immediate disappearance, from the election, the ruling junta—most likely with the accession of the palace—has reverted to tactics it has used for decades now to undermine and destroy anti-junta and/or pro-Thaksin parties. For one, the army and its allies in the judiciary and bureaucracy are working to ban or otherwise neuter key parties within an emerging anti-junta coalition that, although it has many differences among its members, could encompass Puea Thai, Thai Raksa Chart, and the Future Forward party, a new party that hopes to pick up significant support from younger Thais dissatisfied with military rule and Thailand’s continue scourge of coups. Future Forward expects to be especially strong in urban areas, and one poll showed it actually had the most support of any party running in the election. Together, despite running in a clearly unfair political environment, this anti-junta coalition appears to remain popular, and could potentially pick up enough seats to win control of Thailand’s lower house of parliament. So, the military and its allies are trying to prevent some of these anti-junta parties from even being on the ballot on March 24, while also warning other anti-junta parties that, even if they win on March 24, their triumphs could be short-lived. Bans on anti-military parties and party leaders, often on charges so minute it seems hard to believe they could bring down a political career, are tried and true strategies for the military and its allies in Thai politics. In this case, Thai Raksa Chart could well be disbanded by Thailand’s top court later this week, destroying it before the election and leaving uncertain whether its supporters will migrate to Puea Thai, Future Forward, or other parties. Future Forward, meanwhile, is facing dissolution allegedly over comments about the Thai monarchy, and Thai prosecutors could bring a criminal case against Future Forward leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, a dynamic young politician, allegedly for offering criticism of the military in a speech in 2018. If prosecutors charge Thanathorn after the election, and proceed with a case, they could strip Future Forward of its key actor; in announcing the possible charges before the election, the Thai judiciary—usually now aligned with the armed forces—is also signaling to potential Future Forward voters that their party may be dismantled or crippled, just a few days after elections. To make matters worse for Future Forward, the junta now appears to be pursuing criminal charges against Future Forward’s deputy leader, utilizing what is essentially Thailand’s anti-“fake news” law for sharing an article that was incorrect but that he quickly deleted. He could be slapped with five years in jail. The junta also appears to be pursuing charges against another person running for prime minister in the election, claiming that he defamed the army chief. The junta’s hope, most likely, with all these traditional pre-election dirty tricks, is to reduce the voter turnout for pro-Thaksin parties and Future Forward enough that the anti-junta coalition will not win control of the lower house of parliament. This would allow the main pro-military parties and its allies to try to cobble together a coalition, with junta leader Prayuth Chan-ocha as prime minister. Alternatively, even if the anti-junta coalition wins control of the lower house on March 24, the army—likely with support of the palace—will probably use these looming charges, against people like Thanathorn and possibly other leaders of the anti-junta coalition, to bar them from politics for long periods of time and possibly put them in jail as well. Thanathorn’s alleged offense, for instance, carries a twenty year ban from politics if he is found guilty. In so doing, the military would quickly defang an anti-junta coalition that won control of the lower house of parliament, rendering it unable to function—unable to deliver on promises like cutting military spending, creating more effective oversight of the armed forces, boosting social welfare spending, and bringing Thaksin and Yingluck Shinawawtra back to Thailand, albeit to face new trials. An anti-junta coalition losing key players, fighting constant threats of bans or other actions from the judiciary, and likely with a slim majority even if it wins control of the lower house—the scenario would be ripe for a repeat of the late 2000s, when the military allegedly maneuvered behind the scenes to bring down a pro-Thaksin government, and reportedly strong-armed politicians into forming a new coalition, in the lower house, led by parties far more amenable to the Royal Thai Army.

After nearly five years under a junta, Thailand will hold national elections on March 24. They could be a turning point for a country that has been considered one of the most stable states in Southeast Asia despite weathering nearly two decades of political strife. It is more likely, though, that the elections will further entrench rule by the military and an increasingly assertive monarchy at a time when many Southeast Asian democracies are failing. For more on why the elections could lead to further instability—or even outright conflict again—see my new CFR article.