[Some Thoughts on Democracy] In 1939 Field Marshal Phibun Phibunsongkram declared 24 June of every year to be celebrated as the National Day and ordered the construction of the Democracy Monument along with the nearby National Celebration Bridge. It was in that year that the country regained full independence in the international society in large part due to the hard work of Pridi Banomyong. Efforts to bring an end to extraterritoriality and treaty constraints that hindered the country’s legal autonomy had been underway since the time of absolutism. But it was Pridi who made the successful breakthrough. And he was awarded with medals of the highest order for this great feat. His wife was also awarded the aristocratic title of “thanpuying.” The government thus placed great importance on 24 June. It even came up with the “National Day” song. According to this song, which was popular at the time, the revolution was a great event that marked the advent of modern constitutional democracy in the country. Thai people have freedom and rights along with happiness because the country now enjoys full independence. 24 June became a national holiday along with 10 December, the Constitution Day. However, after Field Marshal Sarit Thanarat overthrew Phibun in a military coup he changed the National Day to be observed on 5 December, the King’s birthday. Eventually, Sarit suspended the Constitution, but 10 December was still a public holiday. The field marshals were long dead and gone, but General Prayuth Chan-ocha has taken full control of the country no less than they had. To what extent will the present military junta be faithful to the spirit and potentials of the 1932 Revolution, which was carried out by the People’s Party whose leader was General Phraya Phahonphon Phayuhasena (Phot Phahonyothin)? The country’s first constitution was promulgated on 27 June 1932. Clause 1 of the constitution explicitly states, “The supreme power in the country belongs to the people.” King Rama VII found this idea too ‘progressive’ but since he lost all royal powers he had to accept it grudgingly. However, the king managed to ask the People’s Party for a compromise to label the new constitution “provisional.” The country’s “permanent” constitution later came into effect on 10 December 1932. Despite its subsequent turn to dictatorship, the government acted in accordance with this constitution—even during WWII when the country was under Japanese occupation. When WWII ended, the Allied powers didn’t treat the country as an enemy state because the Free Thai Movement had opposed the Japanese during the war. Pridi declared the end of the war on 16 August (which was later observed as “Peace Day”), and the Allies recognized the country’s independence and sovereignty (despite initial British objection). In the early postwar years, the country experienced a brief democratic interlude. The military dictatorship was overthrown. The People’s Party embarked on the drafting of a new constitution, which was more inclusive in the sense of being less harsh on the royals and sought to put a limit on its own power. For instance, it would no longer have the power to appoint half of the members of parliament. The new constitution received royal endorsement by King Rama VIII in 1946. It was fully democratic by any standard. All MPs now had to come from national elections. The Lower House would elect members of the Upper House, which would act as a checks and balances toward the former. The 1946 Constitution was quickly ripped apart and replaced by another one in the following year. MR Seni Pramoj played an important role in the drafting of the 1947 Constitution. To cut a long story short, the Democratic Party collaborated with a number of military leaders to tear apart the previous constitution and eradicate real democratic movements from the country. The country re-tilted toward royalism and absolutism in spirit as well as substance. A Supreme Council was established, and it became the basis of the Privy Council at present. In short, is the Privy Council a symbol or remnant of absolutism? Simply put, every successful military putsch after 1947 was generally followed by the drafting of a new constitution. And the constitution drafters were all legal experts who had kowtowed to the powers that be, depriving the people of any real and meaningful power. As such, they could only come up with fake democracy. The signs are on the wall. We cannot expect much from the post-2014-coup constitution. Furthermore, as long as we fail to recognize Pridi’s role in constitution-drafting it will be difficult to reclaim the emancipatory potentials of democracy. Turning to India, the independence movement asked Ambedkar to head the drafting of the constitution. Ambedkar was a Dalit and was not even a member of the dominant Indian National Congress party (which was like the People’s Party of India at the time). The two leading figures of the Congress were Gandhi and Nehru. Both felt that Ambedkar was more suitable for this task than they were, and therefore Ambedkar became the father of the Indian Constitution. It must be pointed out that the Indian Constitution has never been torn apart. Nor has there been any military coup in that country. After converting to Buddhism, Ambedkar claimed that the Buddhist Sangha is a true model of democracy or more precisely the first democratic community in the world. It is egalitarian and non-exclusionary. It is open to everyone and anyone regardless of caste. The Buddha created the Sangha as a community of equals, and equality is important for democracy. Bhikkhus and bhikkhunis are individuals who are in search of a noble life—a sublime, celibate and chaste life. They have rejected lay life, which entails compromises with violence and exploitation on a daily level, to live in a noble community based on equality, solidarity and freedom from greed, hatred and delusion. Ambedkar argued that the motto of the French Revolution or “Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity” was not universal enough. He pointed to the violence of the French Revolution and contended that Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity cannot flourish in the absence of peace. Ambedkar also insisted that the Sangha the Buddha established was democratic because he did not teach his followers to blindly believe or obey him. The Sangha served as a forum to raise questions and doubts, to talk and debate, and to arrive at any decision based on majority or consensus voting, depending on the context of the circumstance. My simple question is this: do our constitutional drafters understand this basic message despite claiming to be (devout) Buddhists? And NCPO justified the seizure of power under the pretext of protecting Nation, Religion, Monarchy and People. How do the junta figures plan to cope with the decaying condition of Buddhism in the country? Since our ruling elites have long been attracted to the West, they surely know that Athens was the birthplace of democracy in the Occident. But Plato, the city state’s foremost philosopher, had objections for democracy. The Republic by Plato is a classic, and it is a must-read for any student of Western philosophy—no matter one agrees with it or not. His ideas on politics and government have long been influential in Europe to this day. On the other hand, members of the American ruling class, who trailblazed in democracy in the modern world, looked more toward Rome than Athens for inspiration. For instance, this can be easily seen in the neoclassical architectural style of the United States Capitol. Cicero was greatly influenced by ancient Greek philosophy and adapted it to his Roman society. He argued that there are “three basic systems of government: monarchy, aristocracy and democracy. Each has its strengths and weaknesses and it is the unique distinction of Rome to have devised a constitution which combines elements of all three. Scipio’s personal preference is for the good king, father to his subjects, but the tendency towards tyranny is hard to eradicate. So a moderate and well-balanced form of government is a combination of the three-simple good forms is preferable even to monarchy.” Through Scipio’s mouth Cicero concluded, “The government was so administered by the Senate that, though the People were free, few political acts were performed by them, practically everything being done by the authority of the Senate and in accordance with its established customs, and the Consuls held a power which, though only of one year’s duration, was truly regal in general character and in legal sanction. Another principle that was most important to the retention of the power by the aristocracy was also strictly maintained––namely, that no act of a popular assembly should be valid unless ordered by the Senate.” If we replace “Senate” in the quote above with “Army” we will have a good description of Thai politics in the wake of the coup. In his biography of Cicero Anthony Everitt writes, “This theory of the mixed constitution had a great influence on the development of European political thought during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. It retained its appeal until the eighteenth century and the emergence of modern democracy.” Ages ago when I was studying political philosophy in the UK, my professor affirmed to me that England had been successful in government because it had cleverly combined the three systems of government of monarchy, aristocracy and democracy. However, we can see that as democracy took the better of monarchy and aristocracy, it mutated into something increasingly authoritarian and inegalitarian. We can see this in Thatcher’s neoliberal revolution in the UK. And although Blair was from the Labour Party, he was essentially a Thatcher in pants. Turning to America, Emmanuel Saez writes, “In the US, the richest 10 percent increased their share of total pretax income from about 33 percent in the late 1970s to 50 percent by 2012. The top one percent alone now captures more than 20 percent of total income, double the share they received before the Reagan years.” And here we have still to look at the other indicators of inequality in the US. Since our ruling elites like to refer to the US and UK as models of democracy, let me conclude this short article with the words of the late Tony Judt. Judt was a leading intellectual who grew up in the UK and passed away in the US. I hold him in the greatest esteem as a socially responsible intellectual. Judt stated, “Democracy is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for a good, open society. I dont want to come across as excessively skeptical about democracy: as someone having a preference for the aristocratic, liberal societies of the nineteenth century. But I do want to make an (Isaiah) Berlinian point. We simply have to acknowledge that some earlier non-democratic societies were in certain respects better than later democracies.” And “The tendency of mass democracy to produce mediocre politicians is what worries me. The vast majority of the politicians of the free societies of the world today are substandard. Whether you start with Britain and make your way to Israel, or you start with France and make your way to anywhere in Eastern Europe, or you start in America and make your way even to Australia. Politics is not a place where people of autonomy of spirit and breadth of vision tend to go.” Sulak Sivaraksa
Posted on: Mon, 23 Jun 2014 11:55:18 +0000
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