A respected academic warned yesterday that a chronic social division could eventually lead to a clash and bloodbath if no attempts were made to avert it.
He said the problem of unbalanced society began since the time of King Rama V more than a century ago. The on-going social division does not involve only the elite, the middle class and the grassroots, as in the past, but also a large portion of the lowest group that has become a lower middle class both in the rural and urban areas.
"This group of people want more participation in public policy-making. In the future, these people will demand not only political equality but also other things, which will cause further stress in society. And I am not sure if the middle class will be able to accept it," Nidhi said.
Some observers say Thai society has become severely divided over the past three years following the 2006 military coup that overthrew the government of Thaksin Shinawatra.
Nidhi was speaking during an academic meeting entitled "A Balanced Path for the Thai Economy, Politics and Society", at the Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration of Chulalongkorn University.
He said that a "terrifying spectre" would be unnecessary and unreasonable bloodshed. "Are we going to prevent that from happening? Thai people will kill each other unreasonably. What to be done now is to reduce factors that can lead to bloodbath in the short and long terms," Nidhi said.
In the short term, he suggested a stronger system of political scrutiny to give the people more power to scrutinise politicians, in addition to allowing more freedom of expression. He expressed opposition against issuing a law to regulate public gatherings.
In the long term, he said a genuine rule of law and a welfare state should be established to provide security for the lower middle-class people.
Another panel speaker Vishanu Kruea-ngam, who is formerly secretary-general to the Cabinet, said that Thai society should adopt His Majesty the King's philosophy of sufficiency economy to maintain social equilibrium.
"There should be no extremes, no surplus and no shortage. The philosophy must be adopted in a reasonable way," he said.
Pisit Lee-ahtham, formerly a deputy finance minister, told yesterday's Sasin meeting that the government should spend more money on social projects in order to build up security for people in the middle and lower tiers of society.t
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