Crisis discourse, response, and structural contradictions in Thai Buddhism, 1990-2003
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Kusa, Julian
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Canberra, ACT : The Australian National University
Abstract
Is the Thai Buddhist Sangha in crisis? This is a ubiquitous question posed and
discussed in social, academic and monastic circles in Thailand over the past decade, a
questioning which intensified after the 1997 Asian economic crash that began in
Thailand. However, despite the often intense attention paid in these circles to the
claimed crisis in the institutional body of Thai Buddhism, what this crisis actually
means remains unclear. One of the causes of this confusion is the diffuse use of the
notion of 'crisis' (wikrit). This notion has been used to refer to factors as diverse as
the impact of globalisation on Buddhism, the escalating levels of commercialised
forms of religiosity, the representation of monastic scandals in negative terms in the
media, anxieties concerning the role of monks in contemporary society, and the
undermining of the traditional male Sangha hierarchy as a result of the increasing
efforts by women to enter the monkhood. Equally, what constitutes a crisis is also
unclear. At times, the notion is used to emotively incite a sense of alarm and even
panic that something disastrous has occurred or might soon happen to Thai Buddhism.
This study has three key aims: first, to understand how the idea of a crisis in the
Sangha is understood in Thailand and how this is produced; second, to examine the
Sangha's response to the perception of crisis; and third, to consider the implications of
the Sangha's response and how this response contributes to an understanding of the
functions of the Thai Sangha today. The central argument proposed here is that the
source and persistence of the perception of an ongoing crisis in Thai Buddhism
emerges from contradictions brought about by the secular administrative structures
imposed by the Thai state and internalised within the Sangha. While the Sangha's
acceptance of the secular bureaucratic structure maintains its hegemonic control over
Thai Buddhism, this also creates a continuous source of tension between the Sangha's
worldly involvement and its stated non-worldly goals. What is more, the bureaucratic
structures that are the source of the perceived crisis have been internalised within the
Sangha so much that they form the basis of responses, thus perpetuating the very
conditions that I argue are the main source of the claimed crisis. I develop this
argument through case studies of recent Sangha administrative reforms, the Sangha's
formal relationship to the state since the early 1990s, the policing of the moral
standards of the Sangha's members, and shifting gender demarcations within the
monastic Order brought about by moves for women's ordination.
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2037-08-07
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