Governance and Policy Making in Thailand

This study offers a greater understanding of increasing complexity of contemporary governance and its nexus with policy-making in developing countries. It explores the nature of Thailand’s governance configuration in the making and delivery of anti-poverty policy since the 1997 financial crisis especially in the context of globalization which the roles and influences of globalized agents are asserted. It investigates some dynamic patterns in the relationship between various actors involved in the governance of anti-poverty policy. Instead of the Thai state turning into a weak and less powerful actor in shaping policy and service delivery, the state was able to use different governing approaches and strategies to maintain its power to steer society, to influence other actors, and ultimately to align all other domestic and international non-state actors with its purposes. The governance configuration of Thailand appeared to shift toward a state-guided, state-governed governance.