Middle-class and De-democratization? Discourse Analysis of Good People, Evil Politician and Genuine Democracy

Middle-class and De-democratization? Discourse Analysis of Good People, Evil Politician and Genuine Democracy

Thailand’s political turmoil before May 2014 led to a coup d’état after months-long demonstration of the People’s Democratic Reform Committee (PDRC), the anti-government movement headed by the former prominent political figure, Mr. Suthep Thaugsuban. During PDRC’s protest movement, Mr. Thaugsuban produced and reproduced the discourse of ‘Good People,’ ‘Evil Politician,’ and ‘Genuine Democracy.’ The objective of this paper is two-fold: (1) to analyze these three discourses within the de-democratization process of PDRC; and (2) to find out the role and idea of the urban middle-class in the de-democratization process. Adopting the theory of anti-politics as its analytical framework, this study uses discourse analysis in order to examine the political ideology of the middle-class, as well as to determine how the said discourses affected the political movement. The author’s analysis realized that the middle-class was influenced by the said discourses, encouraging them to assert themselves more politically. In addition, the discourses of ‘good people’ and ‘evil politician’ significantly influenced the mindset of prominent political figures in Thai politics. The relationship between the urban middle-class, the elites, and the military worked together to constrain politicians from the parliamentary process, claiming that opposing politicians were fraud and their careers immoral. Conversely, ‘good people’ in politics are guaranteed in the network of elites; whereas ‘genuine democracy,’ which is primarily conceptualized as good governance in terms of the absence of corruption, is their political ideology.