Move Forward, a reformist party that won last year’s general elections in Thailand, has been disbanded by the country’s Constitutional Court, which also barred nearly a dozen party leaders from politics for a decade. The court ruled that Move Forward’s proposals to weaken Thailand’s lese majeste laws, which prohibit criticism of the monarchy, amount to an attempt to overthrow the monarchy. (New York Times)
Our Take
While certainly a shake-up for Thai politics, this ruling is also just the latest example of Thailand’s powerful conservative establishment—an informal coalition of royalists, the military brass and other elites—targeting a party that threatens its power. But for much of the past two decades, the biggest threat was not Move Forward, but rather Pheu Thai, a populist vehicle for the Shinawatra family, in particular former PM Thaksin Shinawatra.
Over the past two decades, Shinawatra, successive iterations of his party and other members of his political dynasty have been repeatedly targeted by the conservative establishment, the Constitutional Court and multiple coups. In 2014, during Pheu Thai’s previous stint in power, the military resorted to a coup, deposing Thaksin’s sister, Yingluck, and ushering in a military government, while subsequently drafting a new constitution that reserves considerable power for the conservative establishment in the form of an appointed Senate.