Governmentality of Identification Card in Thailand (2011-2020)

Abstract

The objectives of this research were: 1) to forms of methods used by the state to control citizens through identification cards (2011-2020) 2) to phenomena that led to a change in the way people were controlled. (2011-2020) and 3) to a tool used by the Thai government to control citizens through identification cards. (2011-2020). It is an integrated research study. Both quantitative and qualitative. By quantitatively collecting data from people who gave in-depth interviews. The qualitative part collected data from relevant documents and in-depth interviews from 3 groups of key informants: people, academics and government officials. In which the people are divided into 3 groups: 1) people living in the area Mueang Chiang Mai District, Chiang Mai Province, 9 people 2) people living in Chiang Dao District, Chiang Mai Province, 9 people and 3) people in general, 15 people. In which the first 2 groups were divided into 3 low, medium and high levels, respectively, 3 people per group. As for the academics, five academics who were interested in Thai politics were interviewed. Three government officials were interviewed, consisting of officers, deputy district officials and sheriffs. Additionally, three government officials were also interviewed, who directly perform duties related to identification cards.

The results of the research revealed that 1) The Thai state during 2011-2020 has developed a mechanism to control people even more. Through identification cards by developing the identification cards to have a function that covers the lives of the people even more and control the people from data sets collected and linked from the identification cards database. 2) Elections, coups, economic crises and epidemics are key phenomena that have led the state to change how it controls people. 3) Things that allows the state to control people through identification cards are a government policy that ties identification cards to government services.