Review of Divided Over Thaksin: Thailand's Coup and Problematic Transition

摘要

Recently, a group of affluent Thai students in Britain boycotted classes of a visiting Thai lecturer at a university in London. They accused him of taking a pro-red-shirts stance. Meanwhile, the lecturer complained that the Thai students' view on politics was strictly elitist and this could further deepen the country's political polarization. Back in Thailand, James, a 60-year-old American residing in Khon Kaen with his Isan wife, expressed his anger over the state's crackdowns on the red-shirted demonstrators in May 2010. James believes that the Abhisit Vejjajiva government only aimed at preserving the power of the old establishment. In Bangkok, Brian, 45, an Australian expat working in a private bank on Silom Road, applauded the government for not giving in to the red-shirts' demand for an early election. Brian thought that most of the red-shirted protesters were uneducated and manipulated by an evil man, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra (2001-2006), and that they simply did not understand democracy.