As panic-stricken legislators and government ministers clambered up walls and were airlifted by military helicopters out of the national parliament besieged by protesters, Thailand?s political system once again wobbled on the brink this week. Since March, mostly rural and working class supporters of the military-ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra have stormed Bangkok with regime change demands. Every inch and block of strategic space is being contested for occupation or evacuation between thousands of Red Shirts and confused security forces that have been ordered to refrain from using force against the mobs.
The latest round of confrontation between the impoverished Reds from Thailand?s northern hinterland and the sophisticates of Bangkok has had so much impact that there is a discernible shift in the country?s political culture itself. The rustic prai (plain commoners who lack social stature in the traditional aristocratic hierarchy) are mocking the meek political participation model of the past that was based on polite representatives exercising Buddhist restraint and hewing to a code of gentility.
The in-your-face gall of the Red Shirts to invade the metropolis and threaten Thailand?s long-entrenched bureaucratic-authoritarian elites has unleashed a new genre of political participation at a delicate moment. The reigning monarch and head of state, King Bhumibol Adulyadej, is 82 years old and frail in health. Before senility crept in, Bhumibol had acted as a solid defender of the establishment and a skilful puppeteer in Thai politics and law. He used to sway the prai by playing on their Buddhist devotion and simultaneously ensured total control over all levers of power and resources by a narrow military and civilian class loyal to the throne.
Now, however, it is no longer certain that Bhumibol has the physical and mental capacity to keep pulling the strings, orchestrating coups, and practising patronage politics. The incumbent government, led by a palace-anointed Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, is rudderless in the face of the Red Shirts? provocations. It lacks the assured father figure of a fit Bhumibol who can meddle for the umpteenth time to maintain the status quo.
Infested with palace intriguers and bereft of democratic credentials, Vejjajiva?s regime faces a huge legitimacy deficit. What compounds the crisis for him is that there seems to be a breach in the hitherto staunch backing extended by the Thai security apparatus to elitist governments. Incidents where police and military personnel have smiled and winked at Red Shirts, allowing them to enter prohibited zones and gain vantage points in Bangkok, are becoming talking points.
When Bhumibol was at his peak, anti-government protests getting out of hand used to be crushed Tiananmen Square-style, deterring long standoffs and speedily restoring order. Today, Vejjajiva may be making a virtue out of necessity by claiming that he will not employ violence to scatter the Red Shirts. Whether he is in control of the Thai military, or if the phenomenon of ?watermelon soldiers? (green outside, but sympathetic to the ?Reds? inside) is proliferating, remains a crucial question for those who seek to save the existing order in the name of the king and Thai traditions.
A coup d?etat by Thaksin?s followers is unlikely to be countenanced, but as long as the Red Shirts do not resort to arson and keep insisting on immediate announcement of fresh elections, the chaos of hordes bringing financial activity and life to a standstill in Bangkok may continue indefinitely.
Economic losses from shutdowns of the city?s banking district, plush hotels and shopping malls since the ?Red? takeover last week are estimated to be $10 million-a-day and mounting. Foreign investors, prime engines of Thailand?s rise as a ?Tiger Cub? economy with high export-driven economic growth since the 1980s, are watching warily and mulling a pullout of capital in the face of a dogged, resentful opposition and a clueless government. Their main hope rests on the frustration of Bangkok?s residents, whose routines have been severely disrupted since pro-Thaksin ?Reds? commandeered roads and blocked access to workplaces. Vejjajiva, too, is counting on a tire-out strategy that would pit Bangkok?s daily wage-dependent urban poor against their rural counterparts, who are currently blocking the former?s livelihood sources.
Urban-rural inequalities are the underlying socio-economic foundations of the Red Shirt movement. Waves of industrialisation and financialisation of the Thai economy reduced overall poverty levels and raised per capita incomes, but also fostered high gaps in wealth and access to services between the agrarian north-eastern provinces on one hand and Bangkok and surrounding areas on the other. With two-thirds of the country?s poor hailing from the rural north, Thaksin?s populist redistributive politics has a huge electoral base that can overwhelm the Bangkok cosmopolitans in a fair vote.
Thailand?s failure to promote balanced economic growth and the charismatic mobilising mettle of Thaksin?s party machine make a combustible mix. Unlike China, where urban-rural disparities are even starker, Thailand has tasted competitive democratic politics and is hence not susceptible to a purely authoritarian, top-down dismissal or subdual of the prai?s accumulated grievances.
The mantra of inclusive growth, which many fast-growing emerging economies are familiar with, is harder to achieve in a polarised polity like Thailand?s which has lost the shepherding genius of the king. Yet, to remain a Tiger Cub and an Asian star economy, a country must not only offer high returns to investors but also a stable polity to contain excessive strife.
Two decades ago, Thai academic Prasert Yamklinfung warned of a budding ?dual economy? with a depressed, unproductive and rural agrarian sector and a prosperous urban commercial sector booming with finance and trade. The long-term prospects for a peaceful Thailand still lie in bridging these virtually opposite worlds that have no choice but to coexist within the same nation-state.
The author is associate professor of world politics at the OP Jindal Global University