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For the last six months Thailand has been in the midst of a political crisis. Two weeks ago on May 7, Thailand’s Constitutional Court ordered the removal of Yingluck Shinawatra as the nation’s prime minister. Shinawatra’s supporters, who also followed her brother Thaksin, a telecommunications billionaire that served as the nation’s leader from 2001-2006, are rural and poor. Middle-class and professional Thais look down on Shinawatra’s supporters and believe that Thailand’s political system is rigged against them. As a result, they have taken to the streets against the Shinawatras and the remaining members of the existing government, choosing to go outside of normal political channels and undermine existing political institutions. The current environment is causing analysts to worry that political tensions could produce a civil war or, at the very least, drag the Thai economy into recession.
This topic brief will give an overview of Thailand’s political problems, analyze the current political stalemate, and highlight scenarios that extempers should consider for speeches as the Thai political crisis deepens.
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