Framing legitimacy and the 2006 Thai Coup

Abstract

The 19 September 2006 coup in Thailand saw the overthrow of the democratically elected government of Thaksin Shinawatra by conservative forces loyal to the King and led by the military. This paper analyses excerpts from two Thai academic articles written shortly after the coup. In particular, it explores the ways in which the first article forms part of a mainstream discourse in Thailand that has sought to defend and legitimise the coup and the actions of the military, and how the latter seeks to challenge this discourse. The context in which both articles were written and the power relations at play limit the linguistic resources available to these writers in their attempt to frame legitimacy for the actions of the military and the coup group. The analysis presented here draws on the categories of Systemic Functional Linguistics as proposed by Halliday and Matthiessen (2004) as well as the approach to Critical Discourse Analysis developed by Fairclough (2003). In addition, the paper will draw on van Leeuwen's (1996) categories for examining the representation of social actors in the text.