PROGRAM
Rubkwan Thammaboosadee
Redressing the Deep Wounds - Re-narrating Democracy and Performing Political Drama in Thailand’s 2023 Post-Election amid Rising Economic Inequality
 
This discussion unpacks Thailand's political landscape in the aftermath of the May 2023 post-election events. It explores the political drama culturally manifested by political actors, the media, and the public against the backdrop of escalating economic inequality. While the formation of Phua Thai's government stimulated societal debates by embracing the concept of 'civic democracy' after nearly a decade of military-led government, it also marked a critical juncture that arguably allowed neoliberal policies to advance under a new guise. Amidst the rising economic inequality, issues such as labour exploitation and the necessity of universal public welfare have been shifted from the spotlight compared to the period of election campaign. The central question this presentation aims to address is: as public emotions are entangled in the turbulence of the clash between political camps, how can we restore and reclaim social memory to redirect public attention towards addressing economic inequality and promoting welfare and labour rights policies?
 
Dr Rubkwan Thammaboosadee is an academic and creative practitioner based at Department of Performing Arts, School of Communication Arts, Bangkok University, Thailand. Her research focuses on cultural performances, neoliberalism, and political communication. Rubkwan teaches modules such as Arts and Politics, Playwriting, Art of Storytelling, Citizenship, and Social Transformation. Her current research explores 'Performing Inequality: The study of body, noises, and cultural memory transmission in neoliberal Thailand.' In addition to her academic role, Rubkwan's creative works aim to foster dialogues addressing the impact of neoliberal socio-economic conditions on daily life, advocating for greater societal equity. Her recent storybook, "Walk to the Stars," received the 2022 Best Media for Promoting Creative Learning in People's Participation in Policies Proposals award.

Andrew Johnson
Deferral and Intimacy: Long-Distance Romance and Thai Migrants Abroad
Aek’s fiancée, Fern, was already married to a European man. But each month, she sent remittances back to Aek so that he could build them a home and rubber orchard in their hometown in northeastern Thailand. In the meantime, Aek waited for Fern to return. But in the time spent waiting, plans, aspirations, and even bodies changed. As Aek and Fern charted alife together, this deferred life grew more and more spectral. This presentation isan ethnographic study of the Thai male romantic partners of Thai women working abroad as sex workers or marriage migrants, and their engagement with the problems of impermanence and deferral. Via the “work of waiting” (Kwon 2015) of those left behind, I argue here that waiting is in tension with the impermanence of hopes, selves, and bodies. I ask: what does it mean to “wait,” when what is promised, who promises, and the future date when promises are to be realized are each in flux?

Andrew Alan Johnson is a cultural anthropologist and Associate Professor at the Department of Social Anthropology, Stockholm University, whose work examines urban planning, memory and haunting, and human and nonhuman worlds in Thailand, especially in the Lao-speaking Northeast. He is the author of Ghosts of the New City and Mekong Dreaming, as well as multiple journal articles. He received his PhD from Cornell University in 2010 and has previously taught at Yale-NUS College in Singapore, Princeton University, and most recently at Ashoka University. He has served for three years as the resident historian for the video game series Sid Meier's Civilization.

Ketnakorn Pojanavorapong and Chaiwat Wannakhot
The courage to work as migrant labour despite the risks involved: Solutions to Thai berry pickers issues?

Every year thousands of labour migrants travel from Thailand to Sweden to work as berry pickers in Swedish and Finish forests. Although the plight of the berry pickers has received attention in Swedish and Finish media and among sections of politicians and civil society organisations, their situation remain precarious. In this presentation two Thai labour and political activists, involved with the recently formed Move Forward Party, ask why the pickers remain unsupported in Sweden and Finland, countries that are famous for labour rights. They describe how discrimination, social, political and economic inequality drive workers to find temporary jobs abroad although overwhelmed by the risks involved - such as the risk of human trafficking, lack of labour protection, and even war conditions in some cases. The talk addresses how Thai berry pickers in Sweden and Finland are unsupported by labour policies in their home country, and how economic debt force them to accept shadow contracts and working conditions in the Nordic countries in which they have no bargaining power. After the workers return to Thailand, some have not received wages and have become targets of SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation). All these conditions combined, Ketnakorn and Chaiwat argue, force many into an endless cycle of debt and labour exploitation. When markets intertwine between countries, such as in the case of the berry picking industry, we need to find joint solutions in how to solve labour exploitation and inequality problems in developing countries.
 
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