The Thai political conflict is often described in terms of an urban-rural class divide. Using an emic, ethnographic approach, I problematise this analysis by examining Bangkokian notions of class and status differentiation. These have their bases in the feudal sakdina era as well as notions of Buddhist hierarchy, and privilege cosmopolitanism, foreignness and wealth, as encapsulated by such hybrid concepts as ‘inter’ and ‘hi-so’ — both of which are adopted from the English language phrases ‘international’ and ‘high society’, respectively. Such notions cannot adequately be explained in terms of Western-centric concepts of class, yet are nevertheless shaped by Thailand’s historical engagement with Western powers as well as subsequent processes of globalization. Furthermore, status appraisal in Bangkok includes nuanced distinctions of consumption, education, ethnicity, and occupation, amongst other things, while simultaneously having a situational characteristic. This compels us to examine a variety of factors beyond the urban-rural divide in the discussion of the ongoing crisis.
Despite Bangkok's current incarnation as a globalized city of shopping malls and skyscrapers, indigenous concepts of power and space emphasizing center and hierarchy continue to pervade status differentiation in everyday social life. This is evident in tensions in the spatial‐symbolic relations between Bangkok's politico‐religious “old city” in Rattanakosin and the newer downtown consumption hub which emerged around the locales of Siam and Ratchaprasong, and highlights how urban and social transformations engendered by neoliberal market forces and embodied in downtown Bangkok's modern, consumerist milieu have mapped onto and exacerbated cultural logics of hierarchy drawn from much older notions of urban power and privilege in Southeast Asia. This produced modes of inscribing socio‐economic inequality into space and a striking culture of status display uniquely shaped by the intersection of modern capitalism and Bangkok's distinctive culture and history of indigenous urbanism and suggests that understandings of space, power, and consumption in today's cities may benefit from a less Western‐centric and more regionally sensitive conceptual framework.
Introduction: Division and Discontent 1 1. Class and Status in Thailand 21 2. Indigenous Space, Hierarchy, and Kalathesa 37 3. Hi-So Discourse and Middle-Class Aspirations 59 4. City Above Countryside 5. The Value of a Person Conclusion Bibliography Index vi 1. Please note that earlier versions of parts of this book have been published as the following articles: 'Bangkok's two centres: Status, space, and consumption in a millennial Southeast Asian city', in City and Society, Vol. 23(S1); 'Beyond the urbanrural divide: Complexities of class, status and hierarchy in Bangkok', in The Asian
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