Is Thailand Due For Another Coup?

In Bangkok, protests that began over a week ago demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra turned violent over the weekend. Joshua Keating explains the origins of the protests and points out a curious anomaly:

Thailand’s political predicament appears to contradict the longstanding idea in political science that as populations become wealthier and more educated, they will become more democratic. In Thailand, the wealthy, urban middle class are perhaps the least supportive of democracy. It’s not the only place where this seems to be the case.

Steve Herman notes that Thai democracy “has long been fragile here with the military conducting 18 coups since the end of absolute monarchy rule in 1932.” Jay Ulfelder considers why certain countries are prone to coups:

The most informative factors in thinking about coup risk are a country’s wealth, its form of government, and the recent occurrence of coup activity.

Coup attempts very rarely happen in countries that are rich, either fully dictatorial or fully democratic, and have no coup activity in the recent past. Almost all coup attempts, successful or failed, occur in countries that are relatively poor and have political regimes that mix features of autocracy and democracy. These mixed regimes are especially susceptible to coups when politics within them is sharply polarized, as it has been in Thailand for nearly a decade now.

Bruce Einhorn adds that, with the anti-government forces pressing for the military to step in, the current standoff could end the same way:

Pimpaka Nichgaroon, head of research for Thanachart Securities in Bangkok, warns that the current unrest could end as it often does in Thailand, with the generals intervening. Chances of a military coup are now 50-50, according to Pimpaka. The anti-Yingluck forces “want some kind of national unity government to help reform the political system before the country has a new election,” she wrote in a report published yesterday. However, that kind of regime change is unlikely “without some kind of military intervention or a coup, a risk we see rising from only 5% a month ago to a 50% probability now.”