Socio-Political Transformation After the 2011 Floods in Thailand

Thailand has experienced serious floods, which normally occur about once every 15–20 years, on the Chao Phraya River, the longest and most important river in the country. Its tropical location, the influence of seasonal monsoon rains and local alluvial plain landscape make the country prone to floods (Fredrickson 2010; Dutta 2011; Gale and Saunders 2013). However, the floods in 2011 were especially severe and precipitated the worst flood crisis in Thailand in the past 50 years in terms of the extraordinary volume of water, the extent of land inundated, the number of people affected and the duration of the disaster (Boonyabancha and Archer 2011; ‘2011 Thailand Flood Executive Summary’ 2012; Yoda et al. 2016). The floods affected 66 out of 77 provinces. It was estimated that more than 884 people were killed and 13 million people were left homeless or displaced (Imudom et al. 2012; Ghaderi, Som and Henderson 2015).