New Mandala

Anyone planning to join the queue to get a visa to Burma in the coming weeks will want to read this article from over at The Irrawaddy.  In the run up to the referendum the reported clampdown on granting visas (particularly to anyone who looks like a journalist) isn’t all that surprising.  This is especially so after [...]

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Performing Political Identity is an anthropological fieldwork-based study that explores the Democrat Party’s electoral dominance in southern Thailand, or more precisely, in its Buddhist-majority and Thai-speaking provinces. This “Democrat Ascendancy,” as I call it, dates from 1992 but is based on strong foundations established since the mid 1970s.  It is founded on electoral performance and histrionics that [...]

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Billboards saying: To approve the State Constitution is a national duty of the entire people today; Let’s cast “Yes” vote in the interest of the nation; Let’s approve constitution to shape our future by ourselves; Let us all who are equipped with ardent patriotism, who cherish genuine independence, who aspire perpetuation of sovereignty, who loathe [...]

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One of common themes in new year rituals in northern Thailand is the expulsion of the misfortune and bad luck that has accumulated over the previous year. One of the ways this is done in Baan Tiam, in Chiang Mai province, is by burning khi saay (ขี้สาย) - cotton threads soaked in fragrant olive oil. Cotton thread is commonly [...]

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Kantaengngan kham watthanatham: kansuksa sathanaphap ong khwamru (Cross-cultural marriage: a review of current knowledge) (2007) by Phatcharin Laphanan, Dararat Mettarikanon and Yaowalak Aphichatwanlop (ISBN: 9789747707281). Published by the Center for Research on the Plurality in the Mekong Region (CERP). Although the text is not extensive it contains numerous references to archival and original materials for [...]

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In the next day or so the world’s most famous pro-Thaksin website is shutting down (it even has a countdown timer!).  This site, hi-thaksin.net, has, regular readers might recall, been discussed from time-to-time here.  In its last 48 hours online it is broadcasting a video presentation of the past couple of years of Thai politics.  This video provides a [...]

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The Solidarity Center in the United States (Wikipedia has some interesting background) has issued a disturbing report on labour exploitation in the shrimp industry in Thailand and Bangladesh [true-cost-of-shrimp.pdf]. The report has received some good international coverage (here, here and here). In relation to Thailand many of the charges of abuse focus on one particular factory: Ranya Paew [...]

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The world says we are wicked when our people grow opium. But when we stop it, the Burmese military government, although it has done nothing to stop in areas under its control, is praised for doing a good job.
- A Wa official from Shan State Special Region - 2 quoted in “Wa farmers demand return [...]

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The Somerset County Gazette - not, I might add, a regular source here on New Mandala - has a handy article profiling a British civil servant, Richard Butterworth, who is currently based in Yangon.  His perspective, from the ranks of the British aid bureaucracy, is one we don’t tend to get to read all that often.  The [...]

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Over at Asia Sentinel their anonymous correspondent has an excellent article on Thai activist Chotisak Onsoong.  He has been formally charged with lèse majesté for failing, last September, to stand during the royal anthem at a Bangkok cinema.  This is one story that I expect every New Mandala reader will want to follow. Â
According to the article “…as far as [...]

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