Special autonomy as a long term objective for ending the violence in Southern Thailand

Abstract

Pattani, Yala, and Narathiwat at one time comprised an autonomous Islamic Sultanate which entered into a tributary relationship with a centrist Ayutthaya in the early 16th century. Since then, these states moved through various stages of dependence and autonomy, based upon the political strength of the Siamese court. By 1909, they had been formally annexed by Siam, and with the administrative restructuring of the Siamese government the tribute system came to an end and traditional local leaders were replaced with Thai civil servants. Subsequent centrist and assimilationist policies by the Siamese, and later Thai government resulted in a Buddhist and Muslim society coexisting with virtually no contact, economic stagnation, and ultimately the emergence of ethnic and religious separatism based upon the question of political legitimacy. In the 1980s, it was the military leadership that recognized the political nature of the insurgency and implemented various political solutions to address the grievances, mostly by way of professionalizing the centrist, Buddhist dominated bureaucracy. In recent years, especially after the resurgence of violence since 2004, members of Thai civil society have again begun to explore the possibility of a political solution to the insurgency, many advocating a greater degree of decentralization and even special autonomy. The challenge is to redefine the Thai concept of democracy, and prove that political concessions will not necessarily lead to the breakup of the nation.