ABSTRACT
As in Cambodia at the end of the 1960s, what is revealed half a century later by the collective and open practice of black magic is the implosion of consensus at the top of the political and economic power apparatus, opening the way—in a polity traditionally characterised by the impermanence of allegiances—to an accelerated fragmentation and re-composition of networks of clienteles and interests. The two coups d’etat of 2006 and 2014 were therefore primarily aimed at breaking an institutional deadlock (to the detriment of individual liberties and supporters of Thaksin) rather than at directly opposing the evolution of the recruitment of politicians in the “legal” phases of the state—provided that the “institutional exception” allowing military rule. The constant acceleration in the speed of information flow, the political awareness of the provincial ordinary people129 and decentralisation thus fuelled the efflorescence of groups that demanded both to exist by themselves and to share power with the central authorities.
