01513nam a2200133   4500008004100000100002300041245013400064260000900198300001300207520105100220650002101271650001601292773007101308190802b           ||||| |||| 00| 0 eng d  aKongkirati, Prajak  aFrom illiberal democracy to military authoritarianism: Intra-elite struggle and mass-based conflict in deeply polarized Thailand.  c2019  ap.24-40.  aThailand fits the pattern of pernicious polarized politics identified in this volume, where a previously excluded group successfully gains political power through the ballot box, governs unilaterally to pursue radical reforms, and produces a backlash from the traditional power elites. In Thailand, elite conflict has been a major part of the story, but this article argues that political polarization there cannot be merely understood as “elite-driven”: conflict among the elites and the masses, and the interaction between them, produced polarized and unstable politics. Violent struggle is caused by class structure and regional, urban-rural disparities; elite struggle activates the existing social cleavages; and ideological framing deepens the polarization. While the Yellow Shirts and traditional elites want to restore and uphold the “Thai-style democracy” with royal nationalism, the Red Shirts espouse the “populist democracy” of strong elected government with popular nationalism and egalitarian social order. - Reproduced.  aAuthoritarianism  aMilitarism   aThe Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science