Thailand : : The Modernization of a Bureaucratic Polity / / Fred W. Riggs.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter University of Hawaii Press Archive eBook-Package Pre-2000
• VerfasserIn: Riggs, Fred W.,
• Place / Publishing House: Honolulu : : University of Hawaii Press, , [2021]; ©1966
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Series: East-West Center Press
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (484 p.)

Thailand, unique among the nations of Southeast Asia, has no colonial history. The Thai government, unlike those of neighboring counties, has not evolved under imposed foreign systems. While counties all around her were experiencing domination by foreign governments, Thailand, free of such domination, was developing its own bureaucratic form of government. The incendiary conditions surrounding the Indo-chinese section of the world, especially Viet-Nam, Laos, and Thailand, make mandatory an attempt to understand the baffling political milieu in which these conditions occur.The author carefully traces the processes of change that have taken place in Thai politics and administration from the mid-nineteenth to the mid twentieth century, then takes a close look at contemporary Thai government as a bureaucratic polity. The final chapters are devoted to a more microscopic view of the bureaucratic life in Thailand. Taking the administration of the rice program as a focus, the author probes and dissects the cultural and social changes now taking place.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS -- CONTENTS -- LIST OF TEXT ILLUSTRATIONS -- LIST OF TABLES -- Introduction -- PART ONE: THE TRADITIONAL POLITY -- CHAPTER I The Modernization of Siam and Burma -- CHAPTER II The Traditional Polity in Siam -- PART TWO: PATTERNS OF MODERNIZATION -- CHAPTER III The Transformation of the Monarchy -- CHAPTER IV The Functionalization of the Bureaucracy -- CHAPTER V The Consolidation of Bureaucratic Rule -- CHAPTER VI The Effort to Impose Accountability: Central Government -- CHAPTER VII The Effort to Impose Accountability: Local Government -- PART THREE: THE MODERNIZED POLITY -- CHAPTER VIII Cliques and Factions in the Thai Cabinet -- CHAPTER IX Politics, Administration, and High Finance -- CHAPTER X The Bureaucratic Polity as a Working System -- CHAPTER XI Conclusion: The Theory of Modernization -- APPENDIXES, NOTES, AND INDEX -- APPENDIX A THAI CABINET MEMBERS -- APPENDIX B: Chronology of Thai Political History, 1932-63 -- APPENDIX C: Promoters in Thai Cabinets -- NOTES -- INDEX