Mapping National Anxieties. Thailand's Southern Conflict

Cover Type: Softcover
Book Condition: Fine
Jacket Condition: None Issued
Publisher: Nordic Institute Of Asian Studies
Publisher Place: Denmark
Publisher Year: 2012
Edition: First Edition

Description: 213 pages. Book appears to have hardly been read and is in Fine condition throughout.

Publishers Description: This latest book by award-winning researcher Duncan McCargo, one of the worlds leading specialists on contemporary Thailand, builds on previous projects to elucidate new aspects of the intractable Southern conflict that has claimed more than 4500 lives since 2004. Mapping National Anxieties locates the insurgency in the context of Thailands wider political conflicts, exploring the ambiguous relationships between the Thai state and organised religion, along with the recent resurgence of Buddhist chauvinism and nationalism. McCargo examines the way Islamic provincial councils have been drawn into the conflict, and scrutinises the special challenges the conflict has created for Thailands media. Journalists have struggled to communicate a confusing story to an increasingly indifferent wider public.The book then moves beyond the crisis itself to look at ways forward, starting with the controversial National Reconciliation Commission that was established by the Thaksin Shinawatra government to propose peaceful options for reducing the violence. Another chapter explores how far Malay Muslims in Thailands southern border provinces think of themselves as ‘Thai, arguing that there is an important distinction between legal citizenship and informal understandings of what citizenship means and entails. Finally, McCargo invites readers to ‘think the unthinkable by imagining the possibility of autonomy for Thailands deep South, and the implications for the country as a whole.

ISBN: 9788776940867