ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the transformation of Chiang Mai as a micro-colonial space in which global forces were translated into local and urban forms. By looking at the spatial negotiations over administrative and legal power at the urban scale, this chapter argues that Siamese internal colonialism tamed and transformed the political and economic authority of the Chiang Mai royal elite by exerting control over the spaces of the city center. The transformation of Chiang Mai’s city center clearly shows Siam’s domination of the north through urban space; at the same time, however, elements of the premodern persisted, which could be productively reimagined as “internal” to the newly formed Siamese state and which helped to shape the space of modern Chiang Mai.
