Thailand’s 2025 Municipal Elections: Triumph of Tradition or Transition?
A voter casts her ballot at a polling station during nationwide elections for municipal mayors and council members, in Narathiwat, Thailand on May 11, 2025 | Photo by Madaree TOHLALA / AFP
In an article by Fulcrum, Paul Chambers asserts that the recent municipal elections in Thailand underscore the staying power of baan yai or “big houses” at the local level.
Decentralised popular elections in urban areas only commenced with the 1997 Constitution, following attempts beginning in 1933. In 2003, mayors were elected by popular vote for the first time. Since then, there have only been four municipal polls containing both council and mayoral elections (2008, 2012, 2021, 2025), with urban or municipal polls temporarily nixed during the 2014-2019 period under military rule. The sequence in which electoral decentralisation (1997) was initiated also post-dated national elections (1933) and the establishment of strong national political parties (beginning in 1957), which relied on local powerholders for support. Had Thailand experienced more bottom-up political development, with local representative institutions preceding national ones, local political family influence could have evolved to be stronger than they are today.
Traditionally, baan yai (“big houses”) or political families have dominated local (including municipal) politics in Thailand. Their influence often extends to the national level through control of vote canvassing networks and factions that parties need to mobilise electoral support. In all previous municipal elections up to the last ones in 2021, these local “big names” with local prestige, wads of cash (and allegedly, with vote buying) have been successful. Perhaps surprisingly, the baan yai have retained influence in local elections even in urban contexts and despite broader shifts toward nationalised and party-centred politics best seen in general elections. The interest of the baan yai in municipal politics owes partly to their acquiring and retaining influence over local businesses and maintaining sway over local budgets.
