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South Asian economies has witnessed very slow growth over the years and the gap has widened manifold between other nations of Asia particularly East Asian nations and South Asian nations. This paper examines co-integration between the economic growth and reach of higher education in South Asian nations explaining this disparity. The research employed an econometric panel co-integration investigation to analyse the long run relationship of higher education and economic growth among these nations. The research confirmed positive long run causality between the economic growth of the South Asian nations and gross enrolment ratio of higher education. So, if the South Asian nations continue with their existing pattern of paying less attention to higher education by allocating low share of investment on it, poor human capital formation would result in growing further economic disparity between developed and South Asian nations where rich nations would remain richer and poor nations would remain poor with the gap remaining unabridged. This research will serve as an aid to policy makers, educators and financers of South Asian nations to bridge the gap between high- and low-income nations. The focus on the quantum of spending on higher education by the government will help improve the reach of tertiary education and build economic prosperity in these nations.

After fifty years of almost continuous economic growth in Thailand, it is now possible to reevaluate the developmental process of the education system. Until now, the structural indicators of education development that have been mainly used are the level and pace of the increases in public expenditure on education, the effect of increasing enrolment on social mobility, and the private and public distribution of investment in education. The impact of these factors undeniably offers a better understanding of the quantitative advances in education. However, the dynamics of the education system nowadays encounter structural limits related to both the integration of what is now widespread education within the social structures and Thailand's contribution to globalization. As a result, the contribution of education to the growth regime is increasingly questioned. The aim of this paper is to use a historical approach to explore this evolution. Theoretical and historical perspectives are combined within a quantitative history methodology, drawing on new time-series.

How much is hegemony and how much is self-determination in the higher education systems in Southeast Asia? This paper argues that while the question of centre and periphery is still relevant to the analysis of international university systems, the analytical frameworks from which it has arisen may lose viability in the long term. Southeast Asian states are making use of higher education to act in ways that will contribute to the altering of their peripheral position in the global economic and political system. While changes in Southeast Asian higher education are closely tied to global markets and follow what sometimes appears to be a dependent pattern of adaptations driven by Western developed economies, the paper argues that there is also a significant amount of resistance. As Southeast Asian countries adapt in ways that help embed economic globalisation within their national landscape, the manner in which the adaptation occurs is more selective, open, and democratic than before. Moreover, while global communication with core (centre) university systems has been more open and transparent, the system is closed to direct intervention from the outside, making hegemony a less plausible explanation for the manner in which the system is reacting within the new global environment of financial interdependency.

Thailand has been a global economic success story, transforming from one of the poorest countries in Southeast Asia in the 1960s, to a modern and dynamic nation, and all within the lifetime of the current generation. However, growth has been accompanied by marked increases in economic inequality both at the regional and individual levels. In this context studying how relatively poor people appraise their situation ("subjective wellbeing") and how this relates to traditional "objective" measures of wellbeing such as wealth and basic needs is particularly relevant. This paper investigates the relationship between basic needs as defined by the Theory of Human needs (THN, Doyal and Gough 1991), material wealth and happiness. Specifically, we intend to answer the following research question: Are wealth and basic needs indicators always interchangeable when analyzing happiness determinants in low income settings? The paper focuses on seven communities in the South and North-east of Thailand with contrasting levels of access to markets and services. It challenges the common assumption that at low economic levels, wealth or income matter for people's happiness because they increase satisfaction of basic needs, arguing instead that wealth might contribute to happiness for personal or symbolic reasons, which are not related to the use of goods as basic needs satisfiers. Thus, it suggests that indicators of wealth and basic needs should not be used interchangeably when studying happiness determinants in low income settings.

This paper describes a career development program for staff involved in providing training for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Thailand. Most of these staff were professional vocational teachers in schools. The program uses information communication technology (ICT), and its main objective is to teach Moodle software as a tool for designing e-learning courses and to use the tool for developing effective online courses. The underlying purpose of the program was to equip training staff with e-learning skills to enable them to provide training for those involved in SMEs in Northeast Thailand. By doing so, it was hoped that economic development would be promoted within the SME sector and that lifelong learning would be embedded and career opportunities created, so sustaining that development. It was found that the training program was able to help the trainers learn to develop effective e-learning courses for local SMEs and experience of conducting this training suggests it could, if modified, benefit other developing countries. (Contains 3 tables.)

The objective of this paper is to highlight the role of adult education as a tool in addressing labour migration issues, specifically those concerning the protection of migrant workers' rights and the transformation of the impact of migration into positive holistic developmental gains. The view of labour migration as a means to forge the economic stability of countries in this era of neo-liberal globalisation has put migrant workers at a highly vulnerable position open to persistent forms of exploitation and abuse. Issues that revolve around this topic have been the subject of many international discourse which has led to the formation of national migration regulations/policies, as well as bilateral and regional agreements between states in an attempt to respond to the urgent needs of migrant workers and manage their migration while continuing to benefit from the process. However, migration controls alone have not been progressive in resolving the core problems of labour migration reflecting the need for more structural reforms and strategies. Many civil society groups have recognised adult education as a promising platform from which to launch effectively a campaign to resolve migration issues. In line with this principle, several efforts from this sector have been made such as awareness campaigns that inform migrants of their labour and fundamental human rights. It is imperative for governments of both origin and destination countries to follow suit. Establishing effective and sustainable adult education programmes that build on the dignity and capability of migrant workers is beneficial to both social and economic development. Better pre-departure orientations, widespread information in accessing available protective mechanisms, integration and reintegration processes, savings management are underscored as plausible foci of such programmes. [Abstract presented in English, Spanish, and French.]

This theme issue includes eight articles that discuss the information age, the impact of information technology, and the role of libraries. Highlights include libraries in Brazil, Indonesia, and Nigeria; the Universal Availability of Publications (UAP) program; community literacy; database development in Malawi; and the Regional Energy Resources Information Centre (RERIC) in Thailand. (LRW)

Agriculture plays a key role in economic development, alleviating poverty and malnutrition, especially in the early stages of agricultural development. Several studies have demonstrated that neglecting agriculture, especially at the early stages of industrialization, can disrupt the process of economic transformation. This paper reviews the process of agricultural transformation in Asia through the framework proposed by Timmer (1988). It finds that agricultural transformation in Asia has followed a uniform pattern with unique characteristics in each stage. Moreover, the public sector has been instrumental in facilitating and guiding agricultural transformation. Emerging challenges in the agri-food sector in Asia have prompted some countries to promote a more inclusive and integrated approach to rural and agri-food system development. The next phase of agricultural transformation--pioneered in Japan, Republic of Korea (South Korea), and China--seems relevant to most countries in Asia and elsewhere. In all three countries, the role of the state in facilitating the next phase of agricultural transformation is highly instrumental in terms of policy, strategy, incentives, and resources. However, there is insufficient evidence to assess the efficacy of the transformative initiatives dubbed as the "6th industrialization in agriculture". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Thailand must direct its educational efforts towards socioeconomic and political development and, to this end, is focusing on basic literacy. Continuing education is also an important strategy for achieving the goal of "education for life." (Author/WD)

This paper examines nation branding in the context of post-coup Thailand. It challenges the dominant view within the nation-branding literature that nation branding is an externally-oriented, apolitical, business-derived practice aimed at increasing a country’s global competitive advantage. Instead, the paper argues, nation branding is a highly-politicised practice that is primarily aimed at changing the social attitudes and behaviours of the nation’s citizens. To demonstrate the political nature and internal focus of nation branding, this paper examines one of Thailand’s recent branding initiatives - the Thailand 4.0 project - that promotes sustainable economic growth in a digital age. The paper first discusses nation branding from a theoretical perspective drawing on studies in the fields of business, international relations, culture and the media. Secondly, it contextualises Thai nation branding within the political developments of the past decade. Thirdly, it analyses the project’s contents and surrounding discourses, drawing on primary data gathered during the author’s 2016 field research in Thailand. The paper argues that Thailand 4.0 is an exercise in internal nation branding aimed at enhancing the military junta’s power and legitimacy by “selling” a vision of economic prosperity to the Thai people in exchange for their support, trust and loyalty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper applies Johansen's cointegration and error-correction model to examine the relationships among a set of economic reform policies, the contribution of external factors, and Thailand's economic growth. The Johansen's cointegration results reveal that fiscal reform, openness, and deregulation have a positive effect on economic growth, while financial development has no significant effect on economic growth. Meanwhile, we also find that some external shocks have a highly significant effect, with a large magnitude, on Thailand's economic growth. Additionally, the estimation of the VECM indicates that the variables in the model may be in disequilibrium in the short run since the short-run adjustment coefficient is significantly negative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nations around the world continue to grapple with the role and status of minority or rural populations within their borders. Thailand's experience in assimilating rural populations outside of the state structure may provide some lessons-learned on assimilation techniques that benefit both the minority populations and nation–state. In the post-World War Two period leading up to, and through, the Second Indochina War (1959–1975), the Thai state embarked upon a nation-building effort to improve the kingdom's security posture. Conflict was advancing on peninsular Southeast Asia, and Thai leaders reckoned a durable way to protect Thailand were to enhance its national security through two measures: improve the population's quality of life through rural economic development and acculturate remote, rural villagers into the greater Thai Kingdom. This paper focuses on the latter, how the Royal Thai Government acculturated and assimilated villagers living in the outermost reaches of the kingdom, many of whom were only vaguely aware of the concepts of government and Thai nationhood. The Thai government accomplished this assimilation, through rural development, nationalism, and promotion of Buddhist values. Although lingering social and economic problems remain, they are a far cry from the rural separatist movement that once plagued Bangkok. Thailand successfully integrated the rural population culturally, socially, and linguistically, creating an enduring kingdom. This paper discusses how the Thai government conducted this effort and achieved its results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One major aim of the Greater Mekong Subregion ( GMS) integration programme, supported by the Asian Development Bank ( ADB), is to foster regional 'community' for sharing resources, people and financial flows. This 'community' is the target of both economic growth and poverty reduction. The emphasis on 'community' in the ADB's mushrooming quantity of documents raises important questions about what kinds of people are included, in what roles and with what kinds of support and protection. This paper explores these questions in relation to the political economy of regulating ethnic migrants from Myanmar working in Thailand. This paper argues that extra-legal relations between migrants and state/para-state agents constitute a crucial part of regulation. In transferring the regulation of migration to the national scale, the ADB inadvertently reinforces national differences between Thais and cross-border people. Additionally, the complicated and fluctuating implementation of national regulations in both countries leaves migrants subject to violence and extortion from state and quasi-state agents in Thailand. This paper shows that the dynamics of global capitalism require 'deportable labour' supplied by ethnic migrants who are included in the GMS community as the most invisible, vulnerable and exploited members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to analyze the effect of research and development expenditure and foreign direct investment (domestic and international technological transfer, respectively), on economic growth in Thailand by measuring the total factor productivity (TFP) from 1986-2016. The findings indicate that research and development expenditure and foreign direct investment, have a long-run relationship with economic growth measured by TFP. At the same time, when independent variables experience shock, TFP deviates from the equilibrium path. The results of the error correction model (ECM) show that TFP returns to equilibrium in the next five periods approximately. Moreover, growth rate is applied to measure the effect of the relationship between research and development expenditure and foreign direct investment on economic growth. The least squares estimator (LSE) is used to identify the relationship since the growth is stationary at level. The results show the different effects of research and development expenditure and foreign direct investment on the TFP of Thailand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There have been attempts to develop and employ tools for measuring development that shifted away from economic growth. In Thailand, a number of alternative indicators to measure the progress of development were created and employed. However, the indicators and measurements of development continued to be challenging, partly because of the dynamic changes of socio-economics, and partly due to the inconsistency between aggregated and local, or individual units of measurement. This paper aims to study meanings and develop wellbeing indicators of a community in the Northeast of Thailand. The data was derived from qualitative research conducted during 2013-2014. Focus group discussions with thirty-five formal and informal community leaders were used, and in-depth interviews were applied to collect data from thirty key informants. The results showed that the indicators of community wellbeing are classified into four groups, namely objective community wellbeing, community trust, community security, and community strength. The objective community wellbeing indicators were consistent with those that are used to guide policy and practice in Thailand. However, based on the local meaning of community wellbeing, new dimensions of indicators were found and proposed. This study recommended that these indicators should be developed further, to be employed as a tool to monitor progress, especially by local government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a growing recognition that regional growth outside major urban centres should not – indeed cannot – be marginalized or ignored. In Europe, especially, important work now considers the growing role and importance of small and medium-sized cities in terms of spatial flows and networks and alternative pathways to economic growth than the city-centric, mega-urban approach. However, despite their prominence in economy geography, there is little mention of global production networks in this debate; and there has been much less focus on national contexts that lie beyond the traditional Euro-American heartlands of neoliberal capitalism. In the paper we address this issue by analysing the province of Korat in the north-east Thailand, revealing how Korat was unprepared for an influx of new firms; however, we note the untapped potential of peripheral regions to contribute to ameliorating regional inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper explores factors affecting individual goal satisfaction in Bangladesh and Thailand. Analysing the determinants of goal satisfaction in two countries at different levels of development enables the paper to address the broader question of whether the common practice of classifying goals as 'universal' (e.g. health) or 'local' (e.g. community relationships) has any empirical support. The study uses data from communities in Thailand and Bangladesh that were researched from 2002 to 2007 by the Economic and Social Research Council's Wellbeing in Developing Countries Research Group at the University of Bath. Results from the study based on regression analysis show that universal and local goals have the same determinants, supporting the view that they are interdependent. The implications of this finding are that both types of goals should be given equal priority and need to be taken into account to better understand people's wellbeing. This finding is, however, moderated by the second finding of the paper, which is that socio-economic variables and the extent of need satisfaction play different roles in explaining goal satisfaction in countries at different stages of development. For example, whilst in Bangladesh wealth only contributes to goal satisfaction if it increases needs satisfaction, in Thailand it has an independent effect. The implications of both findings for global frameworks such as the Millennium Development Goals are addressed in the conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper intends to fill a gap in the literature on the past performance and future development of cooperation in science and technology (S&T) between China and one of its Southeast Asian neighbours, Thailand. It is divided into two parts: the first part looks at the system of science and technology in China. After an introduction on China's position in science and technology vis-à-vis leading countries of the world, it then presents: 1) the organizational structure of Chinese S&T system in terms of major players and sources of funds, 2) its vision for the future, 3) its leading sectors, and 4) its geographic distribution. The second part of the paper discusses the cooperation in S&T between Thailand and China. It covers: 1) key players and mechanism of international S&T cooperation in China, 2) sources of research and development (R&D) funds in Thailand, and 3) major mechanism and areas of S&T cooperation between Thailand and China. The strategic values of S&T cooperation between the two countries are found to be: 1) China as a source of funds and technology, 2) strength of Thailand in selected areas, such as agriculture and medicine, 3) common problems in economic and social development to be resolved by S&T, and 4) position of Thailand as a gateway towards continental ASEAN. The paper concludes that the past performance of S&T cooperation has laid down a strong foundation for the future. The strategic values of S&T cooperation can be fully realized with the development of promising sectors in strategic locations with prospective partners and through potential mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to introduce the Decision Support System (DSS), which is an area informatics approach to area studies, and the research network complex based on DSS's application in Thailand. In particular, the paper presents and discusses cur-rent activities of the DSS research network at the national level in Thailand rather than being a theoretical and analytical study of the DSS mechanism or its cases. DSS has wide applications in Thailand, extending to various fields such as agri-cultural and natural resource management, economic and social management, historical and cultural preservation, and so on. DSS generally refers to a support system embedded into a computer system for providing intellectual resources with the appropriate numerical model necessary for decision making in production activities. Agricultural and natural resources have been the foundation of social and economic development in Thailand since the country's first national plan in the 1960s. Decision making to maintain agricultural productivity as well as to protect natural resources requires well-integrated data sets. The Thailand Research Fund (TRF) established a DSS research and development network (TRF-DSS) in 2002 to help various research teams in Thailand develop DSS tools and components for addressing agricultural and natural resource management issues. Using a "systems" approach, the DSS framework allows researchers and users to identify and inte-grate key components as well as to define databases and model-base management systems. This paper focuses on the TRF-DSS research and development network, which consists of 12 universities, two line agencies in Thailand, and a line agency in Cam-bodia. During 2002-10, a total of 59 research projects were granted a budget alloca-tion of 140.1 million baht, and a budget of 15.4 million baht was allocated to support activities of the network. In addition, 10 projects were funded to carry out post-project activities, with a total budget of 1.5 million baht. More than 20 DSS tools were developed and implemented by various users, ranging from policy makers to provincial and local government agencies engaged in short- and long-term planning and management. Most DSS tools were designed to allow the integration of bio-physical and socioeconomic data as well as the decision support modules for alterna-tives evaluation and analysis. These approaches support the choices of dynamic simulation models as well as multi-criteria analyses for modelbase software develop-ment. They also allow users to evaluate various alternatives in agricultural and natural resource management. Networking is a powerful platform for DSS research and development and may be applied to other types of research and development agenda in Thailand, such as area study projects. DSS tools contribute to an understanding of sustainability of production systems against a background of climate change, poverty reduction, and food security. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we address the often sterile and circular debates over relationships between poverty and deforestation. These debates revolve around questions of whether forest loss causes poverty or poverty contributes to forest encroachment, and questions of whether it is loss of access to forests or dependence on forest-based livelihoods that cause poverty. We suggest that a way beyond the impasse is to set such debates within the context of agrarian change. Livelihoods of those who live in or near forests depend considerably on a rapidly changing agriculture, yet agrarian contexts receive only background attention in popular, political and academic discourse over poverty and forests. Moreover, to the extent that agriculture is considered, little heed is paid to social, technical and economic change. We therefore address agriculture's changing relationships with the wider economy, otherwise referred to as the agrarian transition, and with the natural resource base on which it depends. The paper draws on the experience of Thailand to illustrate our key argument, and more specifically addresses the situation on the resource periphery through a look at the agriculture-forest interface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The food industry has received discontinuous support from the government over the past decades. The contribution of the food industry in terms of increasing value added of agricultural products is often shed light, while studies on other aspects have been limited. This paper provides a sector comparison on the benefits of the food industry to the whole economy, using Thailand Input-Output tables of years 1980, 1990, and 2000. The empirical analyses concluded that among various leading industries, the food industry provided the strongest contributions to the Thai economy in terms of production inducement, employment generation, value added inducement and net foreign exchange earning although its export value was not the highest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper compares long-run economic growth in Indonesia and Thailand as related to technological progress during the second half of the twentieth century. It adopts a two-stage approach. It first provides an estimation of long-run total factor productivity differentials between the two countries then offering an in-depth analysis of this differential and associated trends and policies concerning, amongst others, capital goods imports, foreign direct investment and R&D expenditure. The paper argues that technological progress shaped by official policies and the institutional framework of absorption sufficiently explains why outcomes have differed so substantially in Thailand and Indonesia despite apparently similar initial conditions of long-run economic growth. Macroeconomic policies need to pay explicit attention to the acquisition of modern technologies in order for rapid economic growth to be sustained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tourism, including nature-based tourism, simultaneously produces and conceals the contradictions of capitalism. This is because it relies on creating attractions, or new sources of accumulation from the very crises it produces. Nature-based tourism is promoted as a ‘win-win’ that can resolve the contradiction between continual economic growth and finite natural resources. This is made possible via a process of neoliberalising nature, which cuts the threads that bind ecosystems together, so that the constituent parts can be transformed into new commodities. To draw out these broad arguments, this paper firstly examines the claims around tourism as ‘green economy’ – which proponents claim can produce environmentally sustainable economic growth – a benefit also associated with nature-based tourism. I also show that this can be regarded as simply the latest version of an existing debate rather than offering a new interpretation. This is explored further via a comparative analysis of how tourism neoliberalises nature at the scales of the individual animal (elephant trekking in Thailand) and the landscape (by global networks of NGOs operating in Madagascar). In the case of neoliberalisation of nature at the individual animal scale, the notion of bodily fix is also important. It is not just the elephants that are primed for commodity capture, it is the emotional experience of close interactions with elephants which is commodified. Such changes reshape societal relations with nature, but in uneven and incomplete ways. This is underlined by a discussion of the case of the Durban Vision Initiative in Madagascar – which reveals how neoliberalisation was incomplete as a result of its encounter with local level materialities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the relationship of foreign direct investment inflow (FDI inflow) to economic growth of Thailand during the period of 2006 to 2016. The analysis used the simple linear regression model. Aside from assessing the relationship of FDI inflow and GDP of the country, the relationship of the variables for major 11 sectors of the Thai industries were also studied. The results showed that total FDI inflow had a positive effect on the economic growth of Thailand. However, when analyzing each sector, the results indicate that FDI inflow had a significant effect on the GDP of 4 sectors including electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning; construction; transportation and storage, and a group of poorly defined sectors. For the other 7 sectors, FDI inflow did not have a significant effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, Thailand has experienced the emergence of 'overeducated' workers as the supply of university graduates in Thailand has outpaced growth in high-skilled employment opportunities. Using the 2007 to 2009 Thai Labor Force Survey, this paper quantifies the incidence of overeducation and estimates overeducation wage penalties among male university graduates. The results show that the incidence of overeducation is greatest among younger cohorts. Quantile wage regression results suggest that overeducation wage penalties for older workers capture the impact of unobserved low ability on wages. In contrast, persistent wage penalties of 11-26% across the wage/ability distributions for younger workers are consistent with structural imbalances in the Thai labor market. These imbalances make it difficult for university graduates to find jobs commensurate with their level of formal education and to achieve their full earning power. The wage penalties are especially large for new entrants into the labor market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper examines the extent to which Thailand's current general or equalization grant program has helped reduce local fiscal disparity. Theoretically, the general grant transfers ought to be inversely related to local revenue-generating capacity. However, based on the 2010–2012 local government financial data from Khon Kaen province, this paper finds that local jurisdictions with high fiscal capacity and income per capita tend to receive more equalization grant per capita than the fiscally and economically disadvantaged localities. Descriptive statistics, the Gini coefficients, and fixed-effects econometric model are used to examine the relationship between general grant transfers and local fiscal capacity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The garment industry was once the leading manufacturing-based export sector of Thailand. While its international competitiveness has been diminishing since the 1990s primarily due to increases in wage levels, it nevertheless remains an important source of income for a large number of workers. Given this fact, we look at what survival strategies garment suppliers have adopted. In particular, this paper will examine the Thai garment industry from a global value chains perspective, and determine whether upgrading in process, products or functions has occurred. In this context, the paper shows that the Thai garment industry has been stagnating in terms of process and product upgrading. This, in turn, has induced suppliers to move to rural areas where cheaper labour, including migrant labour, is more readily available. We attempt to provide a more evidence-based account of this industrial relocation using unpublished data. Functional upgrading in more locally oriented production networks has occurred; however, competition in such functions has also increased, leading to price-based competition and the erosion of economic rents of network co-ordinators. The paper further argues that informalisation is becoming more common in production and employment relationships, and concludes that such strategies may not be viable in the long run. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]