All quiet on the Thai-Cambodian front: Drivers, dynamics, directions

Abstract

That Thai-Cambodian relations are stable and peaceful after Thailand’s most recent military coup in 2014 is counterintuitive and inconsistent with recent trends and dynamics. When governments loyal to Thaksin Shinawatra took power over the past decade, bilateral relations were cordial and constructive. Conversely, when anti-Thaksin governments were in office, Thai-Cambodian relations became unstable and adversarial. But this has not been the case after the military regime under General Prayut Chan-ocha seized power and overthrew the Thaksin-aligned government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra. The dominant strand of scholarly explanations attributes the volatile bilateral relationship to Thai historical forces interacting with domestic politics, underpinned by a ‘national humiliation’ discourse dating to French imperialism. But such an informed understanding is unable to pinpoint the timing and extent of the bilateral conflict when it flared up. Synthesising overlapping streams of literature and drawing on select interviews, this article sets out to demonstrate that the post-coup Thai government’s commitment and resolve to prevail at all costs ahead of the royal succession and the incumbent Cambodian government’s weakened political legitimacy at home have combined to situate and normalise bilateral relations on a new plateau.