Sunday, September 25, 2016

"Phitsawat: a Thai soap that serves authoritarianism"

PRA:
Thai soap operas play a crucial social role in constructing political ideas of nationalism, Buddhism and morality. This mechanism, however, is not a stagnant process. The recent airing of a nationalistic soap has shown how Thai soaps adapt to changing political contexts.

...

it is clear that the intention is to highlight Akhara’s suspicion of elected politicians. In this way, the conversation reflects current debates in Thai politics over the junta-backed organic laws governing the political party system. The military appointed lawmakers have proposed that new laws should contain severe punishments for politicians involved in corruption cases. There has also been a proposal to give the Election Commission of Thailand more power to ban politicians and order re-elections