The Journal of the Siam Society Vol. LXIV, Part 1-2, 1976 - Khamkoo

404 REVIEWS
The essays are extremely interesting because they reflect the public
policy debates among Thai economists. Over the past fifteen years, a
great deal of material has been written on the Thai economy by "visiting
economists" on tbe staff of USOM, the major Bangkok universities and
the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations. These foreigners have published
a considerable body of work, but whether they worked for six months
or sixteen years their preoccupations were necessarily not distinctively
Thai and their understanding (or lack of understanding) of Thai language
and culture bas inevitably limited the scope of their enquiries. A very
large amount of work bas been produced in Thai and English in the Bank
of Thailand, the Ministry of Finance, the National Economic and Social
Development Board and the other ministries. Much of this material is
unpublished and even the establishment of the Thai Economic Review in
May 1971 bas only partially solved the problem of discovering the
younger Thai economists' views of the major policy problems of the Thai
economy. The present volume not only covers these major policy issues:
rice policy, income distribution, efficiency of industrialisation over the
last decade, monetary policy etc., but also a number of minor issues.
The biography of Khunying Suparb is too short (less than one page)
and only gives the bare dates and details of an extremely interesting life.
A longer essay dealing with Khunying's work in economic policy-making
would have been valuable and normally expected by the reader of such a
festschrift.
Dr. Puey Ungphakorn's own useful essay on "Steps to International
Monetary Order" (the Per Jacobsson Lecture in 1974) (Part 1 Special
Essay pp. 5-22) is preceded by a very emotional letter dated 22nd of
August 1974, which records his difficulties in fighting for democracy
(p.4):-
"In my fight for freedom inside and outside the National Legislative
Assembly during the past seven months, as to be expected,
I have had to contend with much hypocrisy, distortion of facts, a~d
even downright lies."
Dr. Puey can take considerable credit for his battle to reestablish
democracy in 1973 and 1974.
The present Thai Government certainly