The Thai State and EthnicMinorities

The Thai State and Ethnic
Minorities: From Assimilation to
Selective Integration
Chayan Vaddhanaphuti
The Expansion of the Thai State
The hill tribe people in the northern Thai highlands are now facing an
uncertain future due to a drastic change in the state’s policy of national
integration. Such uncertainty reflects the dilemma of nation building,1
between national integration and ethnic pluralism.
The kingdom of Siam, as it was called until 1939 when the revolution
ended absolute monarchy, grew over a period of some 300 years, from
the rise of the Ayuthaya kingdom in the late 15th century to the early
Bangkok period in the mid-19th century. During this period, the Thai
state extended its military power over the principalities in the north
and northeast, as well as the sultanates in the Malay peninsular, making
them vassal states. By about 1851, the majority of Thai people lived
within the bounds of the Siamese empire.2
Although it had a relatively
small population — between one to two million people in the early
19th century — the kingdom included several ethnic minorities, some  Chayan Vaddhanaphuti
of whom were indigenous inhabitants, along with prisoners of war,
slaves, refugees, foreign merchants, mercenaries, and so forth. Even
in the Ayutthaya period, from the mid 14th century to its fall in 1767,
Siam was ethnically diverse. However, the majority of the population
spoke the ethnic Thai language.
It was not until the period of Western colonialism in the late nineteenth
and early twentieth centuries, with all the implications it brought for
the country’s sovereignty, that the efforts at national integration began.
With the incorporation of vassal states, a unified kingdom emerged. A
demarcation of the boundaries, after much competition and bargaining,
led to legitimate borders recognized by both the British and the French
colonial powers. Identification was also necessary to determine who
actually belonged in the kingdom’s realm.3
Many ethnic groups living
within this entity, who were differentiated from the Siamese by language
and culture, were nevertheless identified as “Thai” people. The “Yuan”
in the north and the Muslims in the south, for instance were included as
members of the emerging state. Similarly, other non-Thai ethnic minorities
and even indigenous peoples, such as the Karen and Lua in the north,
the Kui and Khmer in the lower northeast, and the Mon in the western
region, were incorporated and, to varying extents, assimilated.
The Laos in the northeast, given the similarity of the language, culture
and religion, were more easily identified as Thai. The state-building
process not only incorporated other peripheral vassal states, but also
involved improving control over the newly demarcated territory as the
state had to make good on the ground what it claimed on the map. A
territory based on a local administration system, with salaried officials
from Bangkok, replaced local lords. State power also extended through
manpower with the household registration system.4
The state also
accelerated the modernization of the country by introducing modern
education and scientific knowledge, and by universalizing the central
Thai language, reforming the administrative system, and improving
communication works.
The Thai state also took control of teak forests in the north and
all unoccupied land within the demarcated territory was allocated
to the newly established royal Forestry Department (RFD) in the late
1890s. Through this department, the state was able to manage forest
resources and, in the process, gain substantial revenues from teak forest
concencessions. The “territorialisation” of state power through mapping, The Thai State and Ethnic Minorities 
adoption and recognition of national boundaries, and the establishment
of a forestry department responsible for the unoccupied land, arguably
led to a paradigm shift in the relationship between the Thai state and
resources, people, and space,5
insofar as the state had for the first time
accepted responsibility to use all resources for the purposes of national
development. Although the state did not expel the hill tribe peoples
from the forests at this time, the implications of the “new paradigm”
were as such that tensions had the potential to develop between the
RFD and the hill tribe peoples, and possibly lead to conflict.
Modernisation and Nation Building
Siam wisely saw modernisation as a necessary tool to meet the challenges
from the West. It carefully drew upon the knowledge and skills from
the West in order to escape colonisation. Foreign advisers assisted
the Siamese government to develop their educational, financial, and
transportation systems. Some foreigners served as directors in new
departments that included the RFD. Siam also welcomed a large number
of Chinese immigrants mainly from the great port cities of China to
fill the ranks of middlemen, foremen, and laborers in the rice and saw
milling industries, for mining and construction work, as well as for
navigation and other such areas. The Chinese, alongside the Europeans,
gained control over a number of businesses, particularly in banking,
wholesale trading and mining, among others. To the extent that they
married Thai citizens and adopted Buddhism, they were gradually
assimilated into Thai culture.
Along Thailand’s porous northern borders with Burma and Laos,
overland Chinese traders from Yunnan Province known as “Haw”
developed elaborate trading networks in the northern provinces. Several
other ethnic groups, such as the Hmong, Lisu, Mien, Lahu, and Akha,
also moved across the border to settle in the hills, attracted by the more
benign political and economic climate there. The government even
granted them permission to cultivate opium for resale back to Bangkok.
At the same time, foreign logging companies obtained concessions from
the teak forests and hired the Shans, Karens, and Khmus from Laos to
work as laborers in harvesting teak and other hard woods.
By the turn of the 20th century, enclaves of hill tribe people, known
as the “Others Within”6
, dominated the highlands of northern Thailand  Chayan Vaddhanaphuti
and unbeknownst to Bangkok officials, began to establish ties with the
neighbouring lowlanders, creating a system of interdependence. The
emergence of the modern nation-state system, with its domination by
the centralized bureaucratic system, increasingly jeopardized the hillvalley
balance.7
The gulf between the hill dwellers (mostly Karens and
Lua) and the representatives of lowland authorities correspondingly
widened. Nevertheless, the state’s territorial control was limited, and as
the borders remained porous, flows of “perennial minorities” (Hmong,
Lahu, Mien, etc.) continued.8
The Chinese mainly concentrated themselves in the river basins of
the central plains and in the south, and were seen in a positive light
during the period of modernisation. This success, however, became
a potential source of ethnic problems during the early 20th century
when the ideology of nationalism reached its height. King Rama VI or
King Vajiravudh, whose father was deeply in favour of modernisation
and was thus, a nationalist, nevertheless accentuated a new and more
virulent nationallism that vilified the Chinese as the “Jews of the East”.
This change in policy toward the Chinese eventually affected the hill
tribe people as well. The government promulgated new laws requiring
immigrants seeking Siamese citizenship to foreswear allegiance to any
other state and to become subjects of the monarch. King Vajiravudh also
mooted the idea of the “Thai Nation”, and this was the predominant
theme running through his numerous writings and was sometimes
referred to as his “nationalism”.9
In addition, regulations were established to significantly reduce the
flow of Chinese immigration. Non-Thai schools were banned. Charles
Keyes also observed that King Rama VI believed that the Thai people
shared, as a national heritage, a common language, and common religion,
namely Buddhism, and demanded a renunciation of competing national
obligations.
Descendants of the Chinese however continued to dominate the Thai
economy through their extensive networks and accumulated capital.
Identifying themselves as Thai, and having adopted Thai names, and
embracing Buddhism, they, nonetheless, still retained Chinese traditions.
It was after the military and civilian reformers, the so-called “promoters”,
staged a successful coup d’état in 1932 that a new variant of nationalism
emerged. Although it still emphasised the notion of national identity,
the concept of “Thai-ism” was developed based on new interpretations The Thai State and Ethnic Minorities 
of Thai history and an emphasis on the Thai language. The populace
was, thus, oriented toward a celebration of state and nation with racist
overtones10 that could be detected in its cultural mandates and antiChinese
rhetoric. The resurgence of the monarchy after 1957 facilitated
a resurgence of the nationalism as propagated under Rama VI, with the
emphasis once again on the three pillars: Chat (the Thai people), Satsana
(Buddhism), and Pramahakasat (the Monarchy). According to Keyes,
“As with Chinese in the reign of King Vajiravudh, any person could
‘become Thai’ if she or he spoke Thai (even if they also spoke other
languages), adhered to Buddhism” and offered loyalty and obedience
to the king. This conception of nationalism “was highly tolerant of
cultural diversity”.11
The notion of nationalism also extended to ethnic minorities in
Thailand who wished to become Thai. Keyes made a distinction between
“ethnic minorities” and “ethno-regional” entities. By “ethno-regional”
he meant “that cultural differences [had] been taken to be characteristic
of a particular part of the country rather of a distinctive people”.12
Ethno-regionalism emerged in part as a result of the national integration
policy and the promotion of a “