Thailand. Performing political identity: The Democrat party in southern Thailand By Marc Askew Chiang Mai: Silkworm, 2008, Pp. 391. Bibliography, Index, Notes.

Abstract

Performing political identity: The Democrat party in southern Thailand By MARC ASKEW Chiang Mai: Silkworm, 2008, Pp. 391. Bibliography, Index, Notes. doi: 10.1017/S0022463409990191 This is a very informative book on an enormously important topic in contemporary Thai politics: the virtual hegemony of the ruling Democrat Party in southern Thailand. The party's stronghold is so firm that even the mighty Thai Rak Thai Party (led by Thaksin Shinawatra) could win only two of the region's 54 parliamentary seats in the 2005 election. Based on his extensive fieldwork in Songkhla Province, Marc Askew presents the first comprehensive analysis of this party and its following. The fieldwork specifically targets four multi-level elections held in Songldala in 2004-05. In doing so, Askew provides a blow-by-blow, first-hand account of these elections to unravel the mechanisms underlying the Democrat's domination. The account is further enlivened by his interviews with candidates and their supporters, both Democrat and non-Democrat. Askew makes two essential claims in regard to the party's significant position in Thailand's political arena. First, that the Democrat Party has made effective use of its organisational resources; in particular the reliance upon its tightly knit informal groupings called phuak. He argues that despite regarding themselves as the 'cleanest' party in Thailand, the Democrat Party has resorted to vote buying, although he points out that it has done so with restraint and on a limited scale. Thus, at one level, he grounds his explanation in the less-than-savoury practicalities of Machiavellian politics. If Askew had stopped here, his book would be little different from much of the literature on rural Thai politics. Instead, he gives a second and far more interesting answer: that the Democrat's dominance hinges on the politics of culture--the invention and manipulation of 'southern Thai culture' for political purposes. This notion refers to the romanticised, essentialising myth that 'southern Thailand' constitutes a distinctive community that has always upheld the noble values of integrity and loyalty. At election time, the Democrat mobilises a range of symbolic and rhetorical instruments to project itself as a party that embodies and champions such putatively timeless political principles. Those instruments include election slogans and posters; the dissemination of rmnours; and well-attended campaign rallies, where candidates adept in oratory skills evoke and appeal to the image of 'virtuous southerners' and simultaneously demonise their opponents as endangering the 'morality' of southern Thailand. A diverse mix of people who comprise this imagined political community--old and young, rich and poor--has been socialised into believing that they must support the Democrat Party as a matter of principle and loyalty. Thus, their voting behaviour is based on their deep emotional attachment to the Democrats. Southerners reaffirm their regional identity and pride by supporting Democrat candidates. One might categorise this as a case of ideological domination in a Marxist sense. Askew, however, avoids using such a label, presumably because 'ideology' carries the connotation that ordinary people are passive and gullible. He assigns more agency or autonomy to the southerners' decisions to behave and express their politics in the manner that they do. The question of whether southern Thailand is unique or not is unimportant to Askew. Rather, the book focuses on how these images about southern Thailand represent particular ideas about the Thai nation and its future. Askew's rich analysis raises several questions, however. According to him, many southerners are dissatisfied with the Democrats' poor performance on specific issues (e. …