CrazyExpat Posted June 1, 2014 Report Share Posted June 1, 2014 Since 1932, when the absolute monarchy was abolished, Thailand has had 25 general elections and 19 coups d'état, 12 of them successful. In terms of regime changes, I suppose this makes Thailand a democracy by a slim margin. "Many forms of government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe," Winston Churchill told the British House of Commons in 1947. "Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms." He might have added that democracy is only better than all those other forms of government when people accept the results. It is in the nature of elections that not everyone likes the outcome. There are winners and losers, and sometimes the winners are people with troubling views and backgrounds. The month of May gave us two cases in point — the victory in India of Narendra Modi, a former state governor whose role in the massacre of Muslims in Gujarat in 2002 is still open to question; and the election a few days later of numerous candidates with bigoted, jingoistic platforms to the European Parliament. http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/thailand-s-19th-coup-underscores-country-s-fatal-flaw-1.2658846 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts