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The Thaksinization of Thailand Duncan McCargo and Ukrist Pathmanand (Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2005)
Thaksin Shinawatra's and his Thai Rak Thai (TRT) party's election to government in January 2001 was arguably the most significant political event to have occurred in Thailand since the twin coups of 1957 and 1958 brought Field-Marshal Sarit Thanarat to power.
Representing the public face of a new coalition of social and political interests, it was Sarit and his Revolutionary Council that launched Thailand along new developmental paths through an emphasis on social order, anti-communism, rapid capitalist development, targeted state intervention in the economy and the demobilisation of society-based forces.
During its first four year term Thaksin's government pursued a similarly ambitious attempt to restructure Thailand's political economy. To this end, Thaksin entrenched his party's control over parliament, bureaucrats and the state apparatus, limited the political space of civil society, imposed greater discipline on society, developed new strategies for capital accumulation and negotiated a new social contract with subordinate classes. A second landslide electoral victory in January 2005 consolidated Thaksin and TRT's grip over the levers of state power and buttressed the government's legitimacy.
Thaksin's rise to political prominence has been the subject of a burgeoning academic literature. This excellent book, the product of a joint effort between a political scientist (McCargo) and a political economist (Ukrist), considerably deepens and extends our knowledge of the Thaksin phenomenon. Ukrist is responsible for three chapters that examine Thaksin's emergence as a dominant force in Thailand's telecommunications industry, his use of the military as a basis of political support and his construction of new social, economic and political networks. McCargo...