A book newly acquired by the Thammasat University Library analyzes the behavior of crowds, a subject always of interest in the crowded city of Bangkok. Crowds and Power by Elias Canetti was generously donated to the TU Libraries by the late Professor Benedict Anderson and Ajarn Charnvit Kasetsiri, former Rector of TU. It is shelved in the Charnvit Kasetsiri Room of the Pridi Banomyong Library, Tha Prachan campus. Students and ajarns interested in social groups, social psychology, and the social sciences in general will find the book highly interesting. Elias Canetti (1905–1994) was not a sociologist. He was a writer born in Bulgaria, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1981, for writings marked by a broad outlook, a wealth of ideas and artistic power. Among other books by Mr. Canetti in the TU Libraries collection are a novel, Auto da Fé and an essay about Franz Kafka. Crowds and Power, written in 1960, discusses how and why crowds behave the way they do. It also examines why people join crowds:
Within the crowd there is equality. This is absolute and indisputable and never questioned by the crowd itself. It is of fundamental importance and one might even define a crowd as a state of absolute equality. A head is a head, an arm is an arm, and differences between individual heads and arms are irrelevant. It is for the sake of this equality that people become a crowd and they tend to overlook anything which might detract from it. All demands for justice and all theories of equality ultimately derive their energy from the actual experience of equality familiar to anyone who has been part of a crowd. The crowd loves density. It can never feel too dense. Nothing must stand between its parts or divide them; everything must be the crowd itself. The feeling of density is strongest in the moment of discharge. One day it may be possible to determine this density more accurately and even to measure it. The crowd needs a direction. It is in movement and it moves towards a goal. The direction, which is common to all its members, strengthens the feeling of equality. A goal outside the individual members and common to all of them drives underground all the private differing goals which are fatal to the crowd as such. Direction is essential for the continuing existence of the crowd. Its constant fear of disintegration means that it will accept any goal. A crowd exists so long as it has an unattained goal.
It is difficult to study the phenomena of crowds because of their temporary nature:
The crowd, suddenly there where there was nothing before, is a mysterious and universal phenomenon. A few people may have been standing together-five, ten or twelve, not more; nothing has been announced, nothing is expected. Suddenly everywhere is black with people and more come streaming from all sides as though streets had only one direction. Most of them do not know what has happened and, if questioned, have no answer; but they hurry to be there where most other people are. There is a determination in their movement which is quite different from the expression of ordinary curiosity. It seems as though the movement of some of them transmits itself to the others. But that is not all; they have a goal which is there before they can find words for it. This goal is the blackest spot where most people are gathered.
Thailand and Crowds
In 2014, The Nation reported on some of the effects of overpopulation and crowding in urban life today. The editor and journalist Achara Deboonme confessed:
Nowadays, some of us (including me) refuse to visit shopping malls at the weekend. Meanwhile, over long weekends some opt to stay in Bangkok rather than heading to popular destinations, knowing they would have to fight for everything from road space to a seat at a restaurant. The rising population also means today’s parents are making more effort to ensure their kids have a good education as competition for jobs intensifies.
The behavior of increasing crowds of people are linked to many other sociological issues, as Khun Achara points out:
Thailand’s problem is complicated by the high rate of teenagers becoming pregnant. Of every 1,000 births in Thailand, about 54 are to mothers aged 15-19. This rate is among the highest in the world, and 10 times higher than Singapore’s. Many pregnant Thai teens end up at abortion clinics. If they do decide to have the baby, the child’s care often becomes a problem. Ever visit an orphanage? Most operate through government funding and donations, offering basic care. Needless to say, few orphans ever make it to university. Handicapped from the beginning, they find themselves competing with wealthier and better-educated peers in the fight for a slice of precious resources… Most of us would agree that improving education is the priority in tackling problems like income inequality and uneven access to information and opportunity.
In 2012, the Thai Health Working Group, which issues reports with academic information on health in its physical, mental, social, and cultural dimensions, announced that Thailand had a success story in its efforts at population control:
During the past four decades, Thailand has been very successful in quickly reducing the population growth rate. This success is a result of different policies both to reduce the population growth rate and increase the quality of life for the population with better education and healthcare systems.
This agrees with conclusions published by the Context Institute, an American NGO focused on global sustainability, about Thailand’s good overall results in family planning:
Those of us who easily become discouraged by population issues will do well to focus on the extraordinary gains of Thailand’s family planning program. With 54 million people living in an area slightly larger than California, Thailand once faced a population growth rate as daunting as that of other developing countries. But as a result of a far-reaching family planning effort – officially launched in 1971 with the adoption of a national population policy – Thailand has gained impressive control over its growth rate… Thailand has lowered its birth rate quickly – and substantially – thanks to the creativity of family planning approaches, the openness of the Thai people to new ideas, and the willingness of the government to work with the Population and Community Development Association (PDA), a private non-profit organization and the largest nongovernmental agency in Thailand. Primary to the effort is the character of the Thai people and their culture. Relationships between men and women in Thailand are more egalitarian than in most of the developing world. Thai spouses share equally in decisions regarding children, family life, and contraception. And the prevalence of Buddhism (95 percent of Thais are Buddhist) has also supported the family planning effort in Thailand. Buddhist scripture preaches that “many children make you poor.”
(All images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)