Dynamics of prachakhom (village civil society) and civil society movement in Northeast Thailand after a coup d'etat in 2006

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This is a result of the research on prachakhom (village civil society) as the basis for the emergence of civil society and development in Thailand's northeastern region.In our past projects, we have discussed the possibilities of the formation of civil society movement in Thailand. We concluded that "Prachakhom" or village civil society was the foundation of the formation process, and, therefore, the approaches to foster Prachakhom were studied.Prachakhom as a gathering of people has been an integral part of Civil Society Movement is a new idea, derived from the West. The principal focus of the civil society movement in Thailand, therefore, lies with the study of Prachakhom. Arguably, village civil society can be divided into two types : one is truly born out of the grassroots as expounded in the alternative development paradigm while the other arises in response to government policies. The research shows that the village civil societies which emerged during the implementation of Prime Minister Thaksin's projects, such as One Tambon One Product (OTOP) Project, the Village Fund, the establishment of Tambon Administrative Organization (TAO), were the second type of Prachakhom, which lacked the true participation of the people in the communities. Therefore, the research objective is to study the role of the media, network, educational institutions, factors and motives which engender the village civil society from the grassroots that will lead to the formation of civil society movement in the future. After Thaksin's banishment, our research has to adopted new direction of research.