Gambling, prostitution, drugs, arms trading, oil smuggling, and trafficking in people?these six illegal businesses are large and getting larger in Thailand. They distort the economy and victimize people. They are increasingly linked together through networks of protection and organized crime. They help to fund Thailand's corrosive ?money politics? and to sustain corruption in the police. The authors argue that control of the illegal economy, especially through reform of the police, is vital for the development of a modern economy and functioning democracy.

Pridi Banomyong (1900-83) was one of the greatest figures in twentieth-century Thailand. At the age of just twenty-seven, he started the movement which led to the 1932 revolution against Thailand's absolute monarchy. Through the 1930s, he introduced a wide range of reforms in law, local administration, economic policy, and foreign affairs. During the Second World War, he formed the Seri Thai resistance movement against the Japanese occupation. After the war, he served briefly as prime minister and became deeply involved in the politics of the Asian region during decolonization. From 1947...

In the early 1990s, Thaksin Shinawatra came from nowhere to become a multi-billionaire in just four years.In 2001, he was elected prime minister on a single-minded promise to accelerate Thailand to first-world status through unrestrained capitalist growth. In 2009, over video link from exile in Dubai, he urged thousands of red-shirted supporters to revolution, provoking days of street fighting and the biggest-ever domestic operation by the Thai army.

Thaksin's tenure gave new meaning to the role of prime minister and transformed Thai politics. It is an extraordinary...

Siam's folk epic of love, war, and tragedy

Khun Chang Khun Phaen is one of the most famous works of old Thai literature. The plot is a love story, set against a background of war, and ending in high tragedy. This folk epic was first developed in oral form for popular performance with lashings of romance, adventure, violence, farce, and magic. It was later adopted by the Siamese court and written down, with two kings contributing. This first-ever translation is based on Prince Damrong's standard edition of 1917-18, with over a hundred passages recovered from earlier...

Siam's folk epic of love, war, and tragedy

Khun Chang Khun Phaen is one of the most famous works of old Thai literature. The plot is a love story, set against a background of war, and ending in high tragedy. This folk epic was first developed in oral form for popular performance with lashings of romance, adventure, violence, farce, and magic. It was later adopted by the Siamese court and written down, with two kings contributing. This first-ever translation is based on Prince Damrong's standard edition of 1917-18, with over a hundred passages recovered from earlier...

Khun Chang Khun Phaen is an outstanding classic in the Thai language, an entertaining folk epic set amidst the social panorama of traditional Siam. Masterfully told in the style of an ancient saga, it is a spectacular love story rich in romance, adventure, violence, farce, and magic, and ending in the tragic and enigmatic death of its heroine.

The great Thai linguist William Gedney once remarked, ?if all other information on traditional Thai culture were to be lost, the whole complex could be reconstructed from this marvelous text.? Written in lively prose, this new, abridged...

This book contains the first academic translations of key legal texts from the Ayutthaya era (1351 1767), along with an essay on the role of law in Thai history. The legal history of Southeast Asia has languished because few texts are accessible in translation. The Three Seals Code is a collection of Thai legal manuscripts surviving from the Ayutthaya era. The Palace Law, probably dating to the late fifteenth century, was the principal law on kingship and government. The Thammasat, a descendant of India's dharmasastra, stood at the head of the Code and gave it authority. Here these two key...

Written after a battle fought in approximately 1475, this poem may be the oldest work of literature from Siam. It features the earliest and most detailed description of a Siamese army, the most elaborate eulogy of an early Thai monarch, and a fascinating discussion of the concept of loyalty. Scenes of personal treachery, heroism, combat, and looting after victory give an absorbing image of early Siam.

This translation shares the poem?esteemed in Thailand for its historical and literary importance?with a wider audience. Blank verse conveys the rhythm and atmosphere of the original,...