The Political Economy of Decentralization in Thailand: How Past and Present Decentralization Affects rural Actors’ Participation

Dufhues, Thomas; Theesfeld, Insa; Buchenrieder, Gertrud

doi:10.1057/ejdr.2014.68

Cited by 13 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 47 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…However, the strategy does not detail how the acknowledged challenges will be addressed or the objectives met. Planning at provincial, district and subdistrict levels is organised with little public participation, partially due to the lack of capacity of local administrations (Dufhues et al 2015 ; Lorsuwannarat 2017 ).…”

Section: Thai Farms: Many Challenges Few Explored Futuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

Which pathway to address interrelated challenges to farm sustainability in Thailand? Views of local actors

Faysse

Phiboon²,

Purotaganon

2022

Reg Environ Change

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Farms in Asian newly industrialised economies are increasingly faced with operational and structural challenges (e.g. small farm size, ageing of farmers). Public policies have generally focused little on several of these structural challenges or on links between the challenges facing farms. The future of these farms looks uncertain. However, in Thailand, multi-stakeholder dialogue on this future has been limited. This article analyses possible farm futures that actors of a rural territory in Thailand identified and the changes they were willing to support to address interrelated challenges facing the farms. These farm futures resulted from a participatory planning process, which mostly involved farmers and staff from local administrations and public agencies. Participants designed future farm scenarios that took the main operational and structural challenges facing the farms into account. The pathway designed by participants to achieve their preferred scenario involved intervention of various dimensions, e.g. water management, value chains, and farm structure. Actors expressed their readiness for several farming system transformations. They proposed actions to enhance land tenure security and youth engagement in farming, which were two topics relatively overlooked in prevailing public policies. Supporting discussions between actors of rural territories could help identify ambitious innovative pathways to address challenges to farm sustainability in Asian newly industrialised economies.

show abstract

Section: Thai Farms: Many Challenges Few Explored Futuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

Which pathway to address interrelated challenges to farm sustainability in Thailand? Views of local actors

Faysse

Phiboon²,

Purotaganon

2022

Reg Environ Change

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The elite capture critique perpetuates this ethos by focusing on the negative aspects of local elites while disregarding their pro-social functions (Kusumawati & Visser, 2016). Development professionals tell countless stories of elite capture while the research shows mixed results (Duchoslav, 2013).…”

Section: The Emergence Of the Concept Of Elite Capturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Bourdieu's thinking appears relevant because our disposition toward the elite capture critique frequently aligns with our position in the power struggle. Development researchers and practitioners identify elite capture as the central problem in bottomup development approaches (Casey, 2018;Duchoslav, 2013;Fox, 2020), while the participants of development projects see many of these alleged instances of elite capture as unproblematic or even pro-social behaviour (Beath et al, 2011;Conning & Kevane, 2002;Khatun et al, 2015;Kita, 2019;Mawomo, 2019, p. 340;Jean-Philippe Platteau, 2004Rao & Ibáñez, 2005).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Politics of Knowledge in Inclusive Development and Innovation

Ludwig¹,

Boogaard²,

Macnaghten³

et al. 2021

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This book develops an integrated perspective on the practices and politics of making knowledge work in inclusive development and innovation.While debates about development and innovation commonly appeal to the authority of academic researchers, many current approaches emphasise the plurality of actors with relevant expertise for addressing livelihood challenges. Adopting an action-oriented and ref lexive approach, this volume explores the variety of ways in which knowledge works, paying particular attention to dilemmas and controversies. The six parts of the book address the complex interplay of knowledge and politics, starting with the need for knowledge integration in the first part and decolonial perspectives on the politics of knowledge integration in the second part. The following three parts focus on the practices of inclusive development and innovation through three major themes of learning for transformative change, evidence, and digitisation. The final part of the book addresses the governance of knowledge and innovation in the light of political struggles about inclusivity.Exploring conceptual and practical themes through case studies from the Global North and South, this book will be of great interest to students, scholars, and practitioners researching and working in development studies, epistemology, innovation studies, science and technology studies, and sustainability studies more broadly.

show abstract

“…It happens in a sociocultural environment as well as in a context of inherited rules and procedures. Within an ambitious decentralization program of government structures in the early 1990s, the Thai government has created the Tambon Administrative Organizations (TAOs) which represent the lowest administrative bodies and likewise the arenas in which deliberative stakeholder participation ought to take place (Dufhues et al 2015). The TAOs are supposed to increase the role of the rural population at the community level and empower them in decision-making.…”

Section: Rules In Participatory Proceduresmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Constitutional-choice rules in turn affect the set of operational rules through their effects in determining who is eligible to craft the set of collective-choice rules. The constitutional-choice rules might be important in analyzing the political economy of creating the decentralized development plans in Thailand (Dufhues et al 2015) or the dimension of how the social and political unrest of recent times influences administrative and political processes. In the present research, we will primarily concentrate on the operational rules, i.e., the daily rules-in-use: (a) within 26 selected villages that prepare a community development plan and (b) within the procedures of four TAOs to finalize the Tambon development plan including budgetary guidelines.…”

Section: The Iad Framework: a Rules Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

The effects of rules on local political decision-making processes: How can rules facilitate participation?

2017

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

It is often claimed that participation empowers local actors and that an inclusive decision-making process is crucial for rural development. We aim to investigate how formal and informal rules are set in local decision-making processes and how those rules may impact the actual level of participation by local actors. In a comparative case study, the rules-in-use for the planning of community projects in Thailand are examined. For our analysis, we use the Institutional Analysis and Development framework, which allows for more precise analysis of the impact of the rules. Fifty-three villages are served by four selected Tambon Administrative Organisations (TAO) which are either known for success in achieving participation or ranked as problematic in implementing the decentralization and local participation goals of the Thai government. The study is based on 60 semistructured interviews with TAO staff, a survey of village leaders in 50 villages and a household survey of 104 villagers. We scrutinize seven types of rules and show some particular differences in terms of the impact from the rules-in-use. In the TAOs ranked as less participatory, the attendance rate in the meetings is found to be lower (boundary rule), villagers are informed about a meeting with a shorter notice (information rule) and more villagers mention that elites interfere in the project selection process (aggregation rule). A high level of fuzziness appeared in the position and authority rules. Further, we obtained information on the particular deontic logic, showing generally a high share of de facto may-statements in the implementation of the rules. We conclude that if the policy goal is enhancing participation, rule-setting offers good scope for intervention. From a practical perspective, information on administrative procedures has to be made more accessible and public administrators should receive procedural training.

show abstract

The Political Economy of Decentralization in Thailand: How Past and Present Decentralization Affects rural Actors’ Participation

Cited by 13 publications

References 47 publications

Which pathway to address interrelated challenges to farm sustainability in Thailand? Views of local actors

Which pathway to address interrelated challenges to farm sustainability in Thailand? Views of local actors

The Politics of Knowledge in Inclusive Development and Innovation

The effects of rules on local political decision-making processes: How can rules facilitate participation?

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About