Dynastic Democracy
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A01=Yoshinori Nishizaki
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Author_Yoshinori Nishizaki
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Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=HBJF
Category=JBSA
Category=JFSC
Category=JPF
Category=JPHV
Category=NHF
COP=United States
coup
coups
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dynasty
elites
elitism
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eq_history
eq_isMigrated=0
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eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
Language_English
monarchy
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parliamentary government
Price_€20 to €50
PS=Forthcoming
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Thai politics
Thailand
Product details
- ISBN 9780299338343
- Weight: 567g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 11 Feb 2025
- Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
- Language: English
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Since the overthrow of absolute monarchy in 1932, Thailand’s political history has conventionally been interpreted as a long series of popular struggles for representative democracy and against authoritarian military rule. Yoshinori Nishizaki proposes that this history be understood as a continual struggle by elite political families for and against “dynastic democracy”—characterized by the transmission of power between members of select ruling families. Thailand has experienced no fewer than twenty-two coups over the past century, and Nishizaki shows that family-based contests for power underlie that tumultuous politics.
Drawing extensively on Thai-language primary sources, Nishizaki traces the intricate blood and marriage connections among Thailand’s political families. These families fall into two categories: influential commoners who have held parliamentary seats since 1932 and form the core of Thailand’s dynastic democracy; and upper-class citizens who are related to the royal family either by kin or by ideological alignment, and who have repeatedly challenged political transitions with coups and constitutional changes, among other maneuvers. Nishizaki illustrates how a broader democracy in Thailand has been consistently stifled, to the detriment of ordinary citizens. Dynastic Democracy fleshes out a widely acknowledged yet heretofore empirically unsubstantiated facet of Thai political history—that in Thai politics, family matters.
Drawing extensively on Thai-language primary sources, Nishizaki traces the intricate blood and marriage connections among Thailand’s political families. These families fall into two categories: influential commoners who have held parliamentary seats since 1932 and form the core of Thailand’s dynastic democracy; and upper-class citizens who are related to the royal family either by kin or by ideological alignment, and who have repeatedly challenged political transitions with coups and constitutional changes, among other maneuvers. Nishizaki illustrates how a broader democracy in Thailand has been consistently stifled, to the detriment of ordinary citizens. Dynastic Democracy fleshes out a widely acknowledged yet heretofore empirically unsubstantiated facet of Thai political history—that in Thai politics, family matters.
Yoshinori Nishizaki is an associate professor in the Department of Southeast Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore. He is the author of Political Authority and Provincial Identity in Thailand.
