The spilling of blood in modern political protest is an exceptional event. This article discusses the deployment of blood as a means of struggle by the members of an extra-parliamentary movement, known as the ‘red shirts’, in March 2010, in the course of their prolonged attempt to topple the government of the Thai prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva. Two contesting discourses of blood are discussed: the symbolic discourse of blood as a self-sacrificial act deployed by the protesters to curse their enemies, and the medical counter-discourse deployed by the authorities, in an effort to neutralise the protesters' act. Several issues raised by the blood-spilling act are examined: its perceived appropriateness, its ritual roots and its disputed effectiveness as a curse. In conclusion, it is suggested that the blood ritual constitutes a reflective move to counter the prevailing ‘regime of images’ in Thai society.

The figure of King Prajadhipok (r. 1925–35), Siam's last absolute monarch, remains of great significance to Thailand's contemporary political discourse. King Prajadhipok's historical role as the ‘founding father’ of Thai democracy, in particular, lies at the heart of the Chakri dynasty's claim to democratic legitimacy — a claim that is now widely questioned, both at home and abroad. This article re-examines King Prajadhipok's conduct in the early days of constitutional government in Siam. While the King's status as the father of Thai democracy is exposed as a myth, his actual historical legacy is shown to have been no less profound.

Between 1945 and 1965, what may be broadly defined as the politics of sugar in Indonesia passed through several critical stages. The industrial manufacture of sugar had begun in the Netherlands Indies in the mid-nineteenth century, but after a slump during the 1930s Depression, the industry virtually went into abeyance during the Japanese Occupation (1942–45). After the war, the years of struggle for Merdeka! (freedom) also saw a partial revival of the industry, which continued through national revolution and independence (1949) through to an incremental nationalisation in the late 1950s. Developments in the sugar industry culminated in massacre, rather than merdeka, however. The campaign against the PKI (Indonesian Communist Party) which began in 1965 resulted in the murder of labour unionists and peasant activists associated with the sugar industry. This paper traces the course of events from Merdeka to massacre, focusing on the sugar industry of East Java's Brantas valley. Its themes, however, relate to the industry in Java as a whole, and the question of why the commodity production of sugar came to be so deeply embroiled in the politics of the new republic.

This article explores English–Thai translations of ‘political ideology’. It traces the evolution of the Thai term udomkān and discusses how the complexity of the foreign discourse was reflected in its Thai counterpart. There was a conflation of ‘idea’ and ‘ideal’. Udomkān is a uniquely Thai word, translations of which have never been stable. The contemporary political conflict is analysed through an attempt to catalogue the points on which opposing sides pivot. While this tangled ‘pre–post–ideological’ predicament is not unique to Thailand, it exemplifies the ways in which cross-country comparisons might be wary of coding political factions along universal standards of coherence, contrast or temporal stability.

Anti-Chinese riots broke out in Rangoon on 26 June 1967. The riots, which resulted from Chinese students' defiance of the Burmese government's ban on wearing Mao badges in school, led to the deterioration of Sino–Burmese relations, symbolised by the cessation of ‘Pauk Phaw’ ties and the subsequent shift in China's foreign policy which included open intervention in Burma's civil war. The riots contributed to estranged relations between Beijing and Rangoon throughout the 1970s and 1980s despite the normalisation of bilateral ties in 1970. While the roots of the Rangoon riots lay in Burma's political economy and tensions within the local Chinese community in the context of Cold War international relations, Beijing bore primary responsibility, however, due to its export of the Cultural Revolution.

One of the recurring problems that emerged during the height of European expansion into Southeast Asia was the encroachment of European enterprises into indigenous lands. In most cases, problems existed especially in the manner that landholdings were understood by the natives vis-à-vis the new land laws introduced by the colonial powers. This often led to disputes which resulted in the natives being deprived of their rights. This paper looks into a case where the Dusun in Papar, North Borneo — an indigenous people — took the European colonial government to court over land rights which involved land encroachments by European enterprises and railways. The event took place barely 30 years after the first contact with European civilisation took place. The paper will examine the nature of the case and also investigate the role played by the Dusun and their fight against the government. The paper will also investigate the role of an English lawyer retained by the Dusun for the case, and that of the Roman Catholic Mission in championing the affairs of the indigenous people.

Based on Cambodian and French archival records, which include colonial and local administration reports, tax rosters and judicial sources, this paper explores landownership in Cambodia in the 1930s. It shows that, contrary to common belief, land access was already an issue in the 1930s. The study of tax registers of three communes in the province of Kompong Thom presents a Khmer rural society dominated by peasants with average-sized landholdings, but where landless peasants or those with very small holdings also existed. It also stresses that women were able to become efficient farm operators. In addition, this analysis of the different sources available shows that Khmer rural society in Kompong Thom was a form of gerontocracy dominated by men aged over 40.

As decolonisation gathered pace in Southeast Asia, Singapore became a source of considerable concern to the Robert Menzies government. Britain's hold on its colony appeared increasingly precarious as political turbulence gripped the island. With a predominantly Chinese population, Singapore was considered susceptible to communist China's propaganda and subversion. By relying on previously classified Australian and British diplomatic documents, this article sheds light on the Australian approach to Singapore's political and constitutional development between 1955 and 1956 and, in so doing, it hopes to make a contribution to a better understanding of Australia's policies in a rapidly decolonising Southeast Asia.

In Thailand the widespread assumption that bhikkhunī ordination has already been disrupted and that as a result Theravāda Buddhist women can no longer be ordained has been challenged by a group of women who have received the full monastic precepts from foreign saṅgha and practise Theravāda Buddhism in yellow monastic robes. Public concerns have centred on whether such bhikkhunī ordinations are possible, and how women could become bhikkhunī in a ‘correct’ way. Both supporters and opponents are often vocal in discussing ordination ceremony procedures, based on their interpretation of the vinaya, the monastic disciplines. This paper argues that it is not a matter of ‘right’ procedure, but rather of the authority of the religious institution or tradition that validates one's ordination. Even if a woman is ordained as a bhikkhunī by the ‘right’ procedure, her status remains unstable unless the religious authority of her country sanctions her ordination. In other words, it is only a political decision made by a religious institution — in the case of Thailand, the National Saṅgha — that can reinstate ‘legitimate’ bhikkhunī ordination.

Between 1949 and 1951, the Communities Liaison Committee (CLC), an unofficial body comprising leaders from the main Malayan ethnic communities, served as a prototype for elite intercommunal conflict resolution during a very challenging period amid an ongoing communist insurgency. Drawing upon previously inaccessible primary sources, this article reassesses the CLC's work towards resolving divisive issues such as Malay economic backwardness, federal citizenship, national identity, education and language in Malaya. This article argues that the CLC played a significantly bigger role than previously recognised and influenced government policy considerably. Equally importantly, it entrenched the concept of consociationalism, which was to shape the Malayan political landscape long thereafter.

This article reviews the memoirs of Phạm Duy, a famous Vietnamese composer, who in the late 1930s and 1940s composed some of the first modern Vietnamese songs. His memoirs describe his time with the anti-French Resistance, his break with it in 1950, and his years in Saigon and the United States. My review focuses on curious aspects of these memoirs: Phạm Duy's careful listing of his many love affairs; his insistence that he needed lovers to compose songs; and his failure to acknowledge that he profited from a culture that glorifies the self-sacrifice of women. After considering whether Phạm Duy's behaviour as depicted in his memoirs conforms to cultural norms for Vietnamese male artists, I argue that it is best seen as, in Judith Butler's expression, a ‘hyperbolic exhibition’ of the natural. I conclude by speculating about how Phạm Duy and his memoirs may be viewed in future years.

This article examines the recent expansion of large-scale rubber plantations in border areas of Laos and argues that this phenomenon as well as the attendant land concession controversy must be understood from the perspective of resource frontiers. While transnational Vietnamese investment in rubber plantations represents one form of land capitalisation, their establishment in southern Laos has been part of the turbulent political economic transition in Laos. Collaboration between frontier states which often bypasses central governance, chaotic boundaries between what is recognised as ‘used or productive’ and ‘unused or underproductive resources’, and regulatory disorientation of resource control allow what I call ‘frontier capitalism’ to proliferate.

Colonial race relations are regularly portrayed in light of the attempts to divide and rule colonialised Asian communities. While this article does not challenge this view, it attempts to uncover a hitherto hidden level of interaction and even intermarriage at the grassroots level in colonial Malaya and Singapore. With the exception of the various Peranakan communities that predated British rule, little to no evidence exists to show that interaction and especially intermarriage existed within early first- and second-generation migrant communities during the British colonial period. The findings show how colonial attempts to encourage a heightened sense of race and its frailties may have fallen short among some sections of the Asian community.

This paper presents an overview of the main features and nature of Tết, the Vietnamese lunar New Year festival, as it is currently experienced in Hồ Chí Minh City. It outlines a variety of social practices associated with Tết and suggests that it is through these that one can identify a ‘festive landscape’ in the city, within which a number of diverse places are made into and experienced as ‘meaningful space’ in the context of the Tết festival. The emphasis is on how the spatial practices associated with the festival constitute the lived experience of Tết by urban residents and on how this both transforms and connects various sites. Of particular importance here is the family home and how it is linked to the wider holistic experience of Tết, bringing together in a single place sacred and secular, public and private, and the production and consumption of place, in a social construction that is characterised as a heterotopia.

Research on the social effects of tourism and beachfront property development in Southeast Asia finds that foreigners and local elites reap the main benefits, rather than fishing families and coastal communities, who also become vulnerable to displacement. This article, discussing cleavages and co-operation among parties brought together in court cases over land on a Philippine island, demonstrates that poor coastal dwellers just north of Dumaguete City on Negros Island differ in their ability to use social relations within and beyond kin groups to resist development-induced displacement from the increasingly lucrative foreshore. Members of families who are considered to be descendants of the ‘original people of the place’ have been far less vulnerable to displacement pressure than settlers with more of a ‘migrant’ status.

The state-administered monopoly on the production of distilled rice alcohol instituted in Vietnam after 1897 evolved into one of the colony's most pervasive and unpopular institutions. This article examines the origins and operations of the monopoly, focusing on how much revenue it generated and for whom. It reveals that the monopoly generated little net revenue for the state, and instead functioned to promote the creation of a centralised and ostensibly civilian administration, capable of intervening in the economy to promote the accumulation of capital by local French entrepreneurs, but ultimately dependent on vast, invasive and frequently brutal systems of surveillance and control.

Most models that explain the development of agricultural systems suggest evolutionary relationships between extensive (e.g. swidden cultivation) and intensive (e.g. wet-rice cultivation) forms of production. Recent information from highland Southeast Asian farming systems questions the validity of this assumption. As a case in point, this article presents the results of a combined ethnographic study and spatial analysis of the Ifugao agricultural system in the northern Philippines, focusing in particular on the relationships among intensive rice terracing, swidden farming and agroforestry (Ifugao forest management). Informed by the Ifugao example, this article suggests that extensive and intensive systems are often concurrent and compatible components of a broad-spectrum lifeway.