Political Science

ภัยก่อการร้ายที่ผูกติดกับความมั่นคงของชาติดูเหมือนจะเป็นปัจจัยสำคัญที่ทำให้ความศักดิ์สิทธิ์ของสิทธิเสรีภาพในความเชื่อของสังคมอเมริกันตั้งแต่ระดับบุคคลเป็นต้นไปนั้นลดลง ข้ออ้างการเสียสละเสรีภาพส่วนตัวเพื่อความมั่นคงของชาติดูเหมือนจะเป็นการเปิดพื้นที่ให้อำนาจรัฐบาลกลางหรือสหพันธรัฐอยู่เหนืออำนาจประชาชน กระแสอเมริกันชนในปัจจุบันเมื่อเทียบกับผลสำรวจข้างต้นที่หันไปสยบยอมต่ออำนาจรัฐบาลกลางเพื่อให้ขจัดความกลัวจากภัยการก่อการร้ายภายใต้มาตรการเฝ้าระวังการก่อการร้าย โดยหวังพึ่งให้อำนาจฝ่ายบริหารที่ดูแลเรื่องความมั่นคงของชาติสามารถเข้ามาแทรกแซง ดูแล ควบคุมตั้งกฎระเบียบในการใช้ชีวิตประจำวันของคนอเมริกันถึงขั้นระดับครัวเรือน ห้องนอน ห้องน้ำ เช้าถึงเย็น แม้กระทั้งโลกอินเตอร์เน็ตที่ถือเป็นพื้นที่ส่วนตัวสมัยใหม่ซึ่งยากแก่การเข้าถึง (มือพิมพ์สัมผัสผ่านความคิดที่คนภายนอกมองไม่เห็น) ยังกลายเป็นพื้นที่ที่ง่ายต่อการล้วงความลับส่วนตัวที่ยิ่งใหญ่ที่สุด

ในปัจจุบันพื้นที่สาธารณะอย่างสื่อออนไลน์ เช่น เพซบุ๊ค (Facebook) ที่กระจายและได้รับความสนใจจากคนทุกพื้นที่ทั่วโลกได้กลายเป็นอีกช่องทางหนึ่งในการให้เหล่าคนข้ามเพศ (Cross – Gender) หรือ “กะเทยอีสาน” ในเพจ (Sexy Pancake) ได้แสดงออกทางอัตลักษณ์และตัวตนของพวกเขา โดยจะเน้นการนำเสนอจุดขายคือการแต่งกาย เสื้อผ้าที่เน้นใส่ชุดที่วับ ๆ แวม ๆ ค่อนข้างเซ็กซี่  แสดงพฤติกรรมท่าทางที่ตลก พิสดาร ซึ่งแตกต่างจากภาพของ “กะเทยในเมือง” ที่เน้นการแต่งชุดที่สวยงาม น่าตาดี เป็นต้น จึงเป็นการต่อสู้เชิงอำนาจทางการเมืองในเรื่องพื้นที่ทางสังคมที่เหล่า “กะเทยอีสาน” ถูกสังคมมองว่า บ้านนอก ไม่มีความสามรถ ไม่สวยเหมือนกะเทยในเมือง ฯลฯ และสังคมอาจจะให้ค่า “กะเทยชนบท” ต่ำกว่า “กะเทยในเมือง”ก็เป็นได้  และที่สำคัญในสังคมชนบทอีสานพื้นที่การแสดงออกของบุคคลคนข้ามเพศ อย่างกะเทยยังมีน้อย จึงอาจจะต้องอาศัยช่องทางอื่นในการนำเสนอตัวตนของพวกเขา ไม่เพียงแต่ เพจ “sexy pancake” แต่ยังรวมไปถึงเพจสังคมกะเทยอีกมากมาย เช่น  เพจกะเทยสวยแห่งประเทศไทย,  สมาคมนิยมกะเทย สมาคมกะเทยสวย สมาคมคนรักกะเทย สมาคมนิยมสาวประเภทสอง - กะเทย แห่งประเทศไทย เป็นต้น

หมายเหตุ* ร่างแรกของรายงานเจาะประเด็นเรื่องโครงการสำรวจและทำเหมืองแร่โพแทชฯ สกลนครกับความกังวลผลกระทบด้านสิ่งแวดล้อมและสุขภาพต่อชุมชนในพื้นที่รอบเหมืองที่ผู้เขียนยศพนธ์ เกิดวิบูลย์ผลิตร่วมกับช่างภาพวิศรุต แสนคำ และสำนักข่าว chinadialogue.net และ The Isaan Record ช่วงต้นเดือนกุมภาพันธ์ ปี 2562

*รายงานนี้เป็นร่างแรกของก่อนที่จะถูกแก้ไขและนำไปเผยแพร่ในช่วงเดือนกรกฏาคม - สิงหาคม ปี 2562

สำนักข่าว chinadialogue.net China’s potash demand stirs resistance in rural Thailand
สำนักข่าว The Isaan Record (ภาษาอังกฤษ) China’s hunger for minerals stirs resistance in rural Thailand
สำนักข่าว The Isaan Record (ภาษาไทย)
ค้านเหมืองแร่โพแทชเมืองสกลฯ ชัยชนะที่รอวันสิ้นสุด (1)
ค้านเหมืองแร่โพแทชเมืองสกลฯ ชัยชนะที่รอวันสิ้นสุด (2)

**เผยแพร่ร่างแรกเพื่อคนที่สนใจอยากติดตามประเด็นนี้ต่อ หากมีข้อผิดพลาดหรือขอสงสัยติดต่อผู้เขียนได้โดยตรง yodsapon32@gmail.com

Thailand has faced a continuous increase in municipal waste, only a small amount of which has been managed by proper disposal techniques. To respond to this problem, the government has implemented public policies that encourage collaboration between local administrative organizations (LAOs) and other sectors in the management of waste. This article aims to increase the understanding of collaborative capacities, a theory developed by Lodge and Wegerich (2014) and Thomson and Perry (2006), consisting of administrative capacity and social capacity. The article draws upon data from three case studies of best practices in LAOs' waste management collaboration. The data led to identification of two new sub-types of collaborative capacities: policy capacity, which is a new sub-type of administrative capacity; and innovation capacity, which is a new sub-type of social capacity.

This article argues that International Relations as a discipline has a strong interrelationship with geopolitics. The geopolitical characteristics are the self-claim for objectivity, Western supremacy, separation of space and people’s assumption, and the expectation for nationalistic advice. The four characteristics, this article argues, lead to the territorial trap of the political geographer John Agnew (1994). The traps are the dichotomous understanding of inside/outside space of the state, the myth of self-contained state and the border reification monopolized by the elites. This article uses the Thai–Lao border as an example of how scholars in International Relations have been caught in the traps since the year of Laos’ independence in 1954. Despite International Relations’ literature often not being aware of the solutions to escape from the territorial trap as proposed by Agnew and Corbridge (1995), the historical awareness of the states involved, broader social and economic structure of a hegemon, and changes in geopolitical order were taken into theoretical consideration by a number of scholars. However, the three territorial traps mentioned have remained. This was because the geopolitical characteristics have never disappeared. As a result, to escape from the territorial trap, a more people-oriented framework in the Borderland Studies needs to be embraced in International Relations. The Borderland Studies is interdisciplinary in nature, focusing on people’s mobility and has a centripetal approach, meaning the borderland is taken as the centre of analysis.

This thesis reconceptualises the Thai-Lao border in International Relations and proposes that anti-geopolitics is able to reveal a human dimension in the discipline. The spatial conceptualisation of traditional geopolitics which facilitated colonisation in the past influenced mainstream International Relations, especially political realism. The four geopolitical characteristics of the self-claim for objectivity, separation of space and peoples, white man supremacy, and provision for nationalistic policy found in traditional geopolitics has significantly influenced International Relations, especially political realism. The space management presupposed to be Westphalian-based in the discipline remained Eurocentric because European imaginative geography has been insufficiently examined. Peoples on the ground whose movements did not conform to the Westphalian presupposition have been downgraded in the theory from the Cold War to the present day. The Thai-Lao border is a good example of the continuation of colonial legacy regarding spatial conceptualisation in International Relations and raised these questions. Firstly, it questioned the extent to which the concept of territorial borders in traditional geopolitics influenced discussion of the Thai-Lao border from 1954 to 1975 in International Relations theory. This thesis also uses Agnew and Corbridge’s concept of the territorial trap to criticise existing literature in International Relations regarding Thai-Lao border issues after 1975. It proposes that such a critical point of view be enriched further by incorporating anti-geopolitics framework especially anthropology and history. This thesis argues that the human dimension can be revealed by anti-geopolitics. The voice of the peoples on the ground, regarding the border issue, is not rejected, while the voice of the state is not ignored. This is not only a possible but also desirable situation that will enrich International Relations as a discipline.

By weaving the concepts of power, people, and space, this paper analyzes the ways in which nationality discourse is produced. The Acts of Nationality of 1961, 1966, 1992/1, 1992/2, and 2008, and the Revolutionary Council Announcement of 1972 will be approached by discourse analysis. The language used in the five Acts and the Revolutionary Council Announcement of 1972 will be analyzed to detect how significance and identity are produced and reproduced. By reviewing literature, this article further examines the ways in which the nationality discourse constitutes the lives of transnational peoples in the Thai-Lao border of Ubon Ratchathani province.

This paper examines the daily practices of the Thai Ban, the non-elite mainly reliant on subsistence economy, on the Thai-Lao river/land border at Khong Chiam-Sanasomboun. Fieldwork was completed from the end of March to the end of August 2016 using an ethnographic approach that involved interviews, participant observations, essay readings, and discourse analysis of state documents. This presentation argues that the territorial border, established to control space and people based on an assumption of a sedentary lifestyle, is not in accord with what actually happens in the lives of people who live along the Mekong River between Thailand and Lao People’s Democratic Republic (PDR). This presentation is made up of three sections to support the core argument of the paper. The first section reports the ethnography conducted on the Thai-Lao river/land border at Khong Chiam-Sanasomboun during the dry and wet seasons – these different seasons shape the everyday lives of the locals. The second section shows that the Thai Ban, including local teenagers, business entrepreneurs, and state officers, negotiate different interpretations of the Mekong River as life space and the international border. The third section examines the locals’ different rhythms of life as they lead their lives on a major water course that forms an integral part of their daily practices and acts as a border between two states. It concludes by stating that the concept of a sedentary world imposed by the state is not in agreement with the reality of the movements of people who conduct their lives at the meeting point of these two nation-states.

This presentation argues that International Relations as a discipline has a strong interrelationship with geopolitics. The geopolitical characteristics are the self-claim for objectivity, Western supremacy, separation of space and peoples assumption, and the expectation for nationalistic advice. The four characteristics, this research argues, lead to the territorial trap of the political geographer John Agnew (1994). The traps are the dichotomous understanding of inside/outside space of the state, the myth of self-contained state and the border reification monopolized by the elites. This research uses the Thai-Lao border as an example of how scholars in International Relations, especially
in Anglo-Saxon world, have been caught in the traps from the year of Laos’ independence in 1954 to 1975 that Laos became a communist state. Despite International Relations’ literature often not being aware of the solutions to escape from the territorial trap as proposed by Agnew and Corbridge (1995), the historical awareness of the states involved, broader social and economic structure of a hegemon, and changes in geopolitical order – were taken
into theoretical consideration by a number of scholars. However, the three territorial traps mentioned have remained. This was because the geopolitical characteristics have never disappeared. In conclusion, this research demonstrates how spatial conceptualisation in international politics was portrayed among academia and state practitioners at the peak of the Cold War. It shows that very often, academia and state practitioners are caught in the territorial trap as it benefit the US policy concerning the Thai-Lao border.

By weaving the concepts of power, people, and space, this research analyzes the ways in which statelessness discourse is produced. The Acts of Nationality of 1961, 1966, 1992/1, 1992/2, and 2008, and the Revolutionary Council Announcement of 1972 will be approached by discourse analysis. Also, the language used International Relations academic writing by Thai scholars will be analyzed to detect how significance, identity and politics of meaning are produced and reproduced.  Meaning of nationality and statelessness changes overtime according to the policy of different government. As the ways in which the meaning of nationality changes constitute the definition of ‘other-selves’ and ‘we-selves’ of the Thai state, the ways in which transnational movements along the Thai-Lao border are constituted by such discourse change overtime. Even though modern boundary was established during the colonial era, peoples living in the Thai-Lao border still had transnational contacts. However, after the fall of Lao monarchy in 1975, there were thousands of Laotians crossing the boundary to stay on the Thai soil. This research, thus, examines the ways in which the statelessness discourse constitutes the foreign policy on transnational Laotians are worth examining especially after the fall of Lao monarchy. The lives of transnational peoples and violence along the Thai-Lao border from 1975 to the present constituted by such discourse will be also examined.

Pluralities of people’s crossings of the Mekong Thai-Lao border occur as locals subvert, reject, ignore, and embrace the logic of the national border. From a state-centric point of view, the everyday movements of these people, who rely mainly on a subsistence economy and have their own modes of crossing, are undocumented. I argue that people’s mobility co-exists with the practice of sedentary assumption. The aim of this thesis is to promote theory related to the Third Space in Borderland Studies by the presentation and analysis of people’s pluralities in border-crossings. The borderland area of Khong Chiam (Thailand)-Sanasomboun (Lao PDR) is the location of an in-between state in which spatial negotiations, temporal negotiations, and negotiations of political subjectivities contribute to the nature of mobility in the Third Space. To achieve the objective of this thesis, ethnographic methodology was used over six months of fieldwork from March to September 2016, and included participant observations, interviews and essay-readings that involved 110 participants in the borderland site. People’s movements across the Mekong River border occur daily without formal state approval. From the perspective of the Thai Ban, the river is a lived space in which they catch food and use for transport. However, their interpretation of the Mekong as the state boundary does not completely disappear. This thesis examines the everyday banal pluralities of the Thai Ban’s border-crossings by weaving together the three concepts of space, temporality, and negotiations of political subjectivities. The spatial and temporal negotiations involved in the border-crossings shape and are shaped by this other interpretation of the Mekong as a lived space, and different political subjectivities contribute to the pluralities of the crossings. The presentation of these pluralities of border-crossings adds to Borderland Studies specifically and the social sciences in general in the development of an understanding of the Third Space. As this thesis focuses on people’s mobility at quasi-state checkpoints and in areas along the Mekong Thai-Lao border with no border checkpoints, it is suggested that future research examines the everyday practices of border-crossings at land borders.

This article explores how various Orientalist perspectives and their eventual hybridisation have shaped different conceptualisations of space along the Thai-Lao border. In this case, the original Orientalist spatial conceptualisation of borders was passed on from French during the colonial days to local academia and state practitioners along the Mekong basins. It held that the western spatial conceptualisation was objective and superior to others. It privileged the assumption that space and people should be separated according to their own state. Also, such conceptualisation was used in nationalistic policy formulation on space management by the states. However, such spatial conceptualisation became hybridised when the Westphalian border was embraced by the local elites, especially in Bangkok. This has become known as second order Orientalism. Since the independence of Laos in 1954, academic discussions on the Thai-Lao border, especially in International Relations, have been divided into three phases, each with different Orientalist perspectives. Yet, all were accompanied by a sense of Western superiority. From 1954 to 1975, the Westphalian border was not strictly applied by the then Thai and Lao governments due to American intervention in the region. After 1975, the territorial integrity concept was strictly applied, accompanied by an increase in nationalism. After 1989, nationalism waned and trade along the border was promoted. This article argues that while this awareness is post-Orientalist, it is diff icult to distinguish the Oriental from the non-Oriental. Indeed, the hybrid spatial conceptualisation among different political actors, local peoples, business entrepreneurs, state off icers and academia has been more prevalent.

This lecture deals with the ways in which the temporal aspects of the Ubon Ratchathani and Champassak borderlands relate to relations between Thailand and the Lao People's Democratic Republic (PDR), how they are interpreted and the ways in which these interpretations can advance the temporal dimensions of Thai-Lao relations. Funded by the Faculty of Political Science, Ubon Ratchathani University, the research consisted largely of extensive document analysis, taking two fiscal years (2018-2019) to complete. This work revealed the border-centric temporal interpretation of Ubon Ratchathani (Thailand) and Champassak (Lao PDR) which has provided different ways of explaining Thai-Lao relations. Additionally, assessing a border-centric temporal dimensionality offers a novel aspect to International Relations for myriad reasons. With this perspective, the pluralities of the temporal dimension in international relations can be found, namely, as a synthesis of state-centric and border-centric concepts of temporality. The borderlands between Ubon Ratchathani and Champassak are a Third Space. Once these components are parsed, the features of a post-Orientalist temporal dimension can be witnessed. This research argues that spatial and temporal interpretations are interrelated. The state-centric temporality is thus interrelated with the concept of Westphalian state space as introduced to the region in 1893 after the arrival of the French. Said (1977) described the effects of neatly separated state space as defined by the Westphalian concept when introduced to the colonial areas as Orientalism. The findings of this research stand that there is a combination between state-centric and border-centric interpretations. The Orientalist perspective of temporality is mixed with the local; this situation is called post-Orientalist temporality. Thus, the temporal dimension, as it relates to the borderlands of Ubon Ratchathani and Champassak, is post-Orientalist.

In regard to the Thai-Lao border, the spatial conceptualisation of Orientalism characterised by western superiority, claim for objectivity, separation of places and peoples, and recommendations for nationalistic policies was passed on the academia and state practitioners. Hybridised spatial conceptualisation occurred when the Westphalian border concept was embraced by the local elites and academia and this has become the second order Orientalism. Since Lao independence in 1954, academic discussions, especially in International Relations about the Thai-Lao border have been grouped into three phases, each having a different Orientalist characteristic but all accompanied by western superiority. From 1954 to 1975, the concept of a Westphalian border was not strictly applied due to American intervention in the region. After 1975, territorial integrity was strictly applied, accompanied by an increase in nationalism. After the end of the Cold War in 1989, nationalism decreased and trade along the border was promoted under the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS) scheme. The issues of the Thai-Lao border have not been focused by scholars from one single discipline which is International Relations and political theory but extended to history, sociology and anthropology. The awareness of the Orientalist perspective embedded in the Thai-Lao border conceptualisation has been noted. This article argued that the post-Cold War phase is the era of the post-Orientalism. More scholars from different disciplines have carefully problematised the established Westphalian attachment of the Thai and Lao state. It is difficult to conceptualise the Orientalist spatial ideas as completely different from that of Non-Orientalist. Hybridised spatial conceptualisation among different political actors such as local peoples, business entrepreneurs and state officers has been more noted and academically recognised. This stage of hybridization is therefore post-Orientalism.