Publication Code: Y93K
by Marc Askew
The process of urbanization in Thailand is inseparably tied to the character of demographic, economic and social change since the close of World War II and even before. Bangkok, the centre for government and administration, the royal capital and cultural and religious focus, the centre of commerce and by far the largest urban settlement in Thailand at the beginning of this period, has been the major beneficiary as well as a principal victim of the many changes set in train from the early 1950's. While the most striking contrast in Thailand today is that between urban and rural living standards and opportunities, Bangkok's urban environment itself expresses much about the complexity and character of inequality among its own inhabitants as well as the nature of power and governance in Thai society. This paper interprets the economic forces shaping the physical patterns of the metropolis since around 1945, patterns which have expressed as well as influenced the quality of urban life and will increasingly do so in the future, given Bangkok's centrality in Thai society and economy. The purpose of this paper is not to reiterate in detail the now-familiar catalogue of urban ills besetting the Thai metropolis but to delineate the main features of urban change in this primate city which throw light on the patterns of ecological change framing the lives of ordinary people.
December 1993