Talk on Critical Theory, Part II, Philosophy of Social Sciences

Critical Theory
Part II
Soraj Hongladarom
Philosophy, Chulalongkorn University
Training Session on “Philosophy of Social Science” organized by the
Philosophical and Religious Society of Thailand, Bangkok University,
May 20-22, 2004.

Outline
• Workshop on analyzing social situation
through Critical Theory.
• Case scenario: Thaksin’s buying of
Liverpool shares.
• Please join in the discussion.

Thaksin Shinawatra
• Current Prime
Minister of Thailand
• Leader of the Thai
Rak Thai Party
• Past President of the
Shinawatra Corp.
• Ph.D. in criminal
justice from Eastern
Kentucky University

Liverpool FC
• 1892 Formed out of
conflict with Everton
• 1901 Won first title
• 1965 Won FA Cup for the
first time
• 2001 Won UEFA, League
Cup and FA Cup
• 18 times League
Champions; 6 times FA
Cup; 4 times European
Cup

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BANGKOK Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said Tuesday that Liverpool Football
Club had accepted a $106 million offer by the Thai government and a group of
investors for a 30 percent stake in England's most successful soccer team.."By the end
of June, part of Liverpool will be owned by Thais," Thaksin said.
The government will probably sign a nonbinding agreement with the English club this
week, he said..Thailand may fund the purchase by selling lottery tickets and shares in
the holding company for the investment, which will be 51 percent-owned by Sports
Authority of Thailand, a state-run body, officials said. Thailand has run a budget deficit
for seven straight years, and Thaksin is already facing criticism for selling state
companies to raise revenue..
"There are only minor details that have to be discussed, like the number of directors
that we can have in the board," Thaksin said. "In principle, the deal is basically
concluded.".
Thailand will get rights to sell club merchandise in Asia and a sports academy for
young players run by Liverpool coaches, the prime minister said this week..By
providing funds for players and a new stadium, the agreement may help Liverpool
catch up with Arsenal and Manchester United, which between them have won the
English Premier League the last nine years.
The International Herald Tribune

Liverpool won the most recent of its record 18 English titles in 1990. The club last week
rejected an offer by Steve Morgan, a shareholder, to underwrite a share sale to raise
$129 million..Thailand may sell up to $244 million in lottery tickets to raise money for
the Liverpool stake, said Santiparb Tejavanija, governor of Sports Authority of Thailand.
The government also plans to sell shares in the holding company, said Somchainuk
Engtrakul, the Finance Ministry's permanent secretary..Pongsak Raktapongpaisal, the
Thai deputy commerce minister who headed talks with Liverpool, and Santiparb fly to
England on Wednesday to discuss details, Thaksin said.
A Liverpool spokesman was not available to comment..Half of the money raised in the
lottery would fund the share purchase, with the rest going to prizes, Santiparb said.
The government will sell 10 million tickets at 1,000 baht, or $24.50, each. Losing tickets
will be converted into shares in the holding company that owns the Liverpool stake, he
said.
The Government Lottery Office currently sells tickets and picks winners for state-run
lotteries twice a month..Ten Thai senators led by Klaew Norapati, from northeastern
Khon Kaen Province, submitted a letter to the Senate speaker opposing the purchase
of the Liverpool stake, Thai News Agency reported. Taxpayers' money should be used
to help the poor, Klaew was cited as saying..Thaksin said last week that about $80
million would be available for Liverpool to spend..
Bloomberg News

Why is the PM interested?
• “Enhancing the capability of soccer players
in the country”
 Football academy run by Liverpool in Thailand
 (But has Thaksin been interested this much in
sports before?)
• “Promoting Thai products, esp. One
Tambon One Product”
• But is there a real reason?
• (Perhaps AIS logo on Liverpool players?)

What does a social scientist or a
philosopher do?
• Analyzing the situation so as to understand.
• Usually theoretical framework is employed.
• Let’s try to see how the Critical Theory
perspective would help us understand the
situation better.

Culture Industries
• Let us remind ourselves of Adorno: In
modern capitalism, various means are
employed to bring the workers to line,
which include the use of mass media.
• Here culture becomes a tool for propagating
the unjust tendencies.

TV Soap Operas
• TV soap operas are very, very popular.
• Millions of Thai women watch these
everyday.
• Most of the plots are the same - jealousy,
women competing for men’s attention,
materialism, consumerism.
• Many of these tendencies reflect and are
reflected by the real lives these women are
experiencing.

Analysis
• The role of commercials is apparently to
support the programs.
• But in a way the programs do exist so that
they support the commercials.
• We are watching the commercials, only
briefly interrupted by the programs.
• Growing similarities between commercials
and programs.

Soap opera industries
• The soap opera industries are organs of the
corporations to promote their wares through
the programs.
• Relations of these with the emphasis by
Critical Theory of perpetuating capitalist,
exploitative tendencies and the need to
expose these fabrications.

Thaksin and Liverpool
• But what do these soap operas and the “news” of
Thaksin buying Liverpool have in common.
• They are all soap operas!
• Sports events have to compete for TV audience
with soap operas.
• Success on the field becoming more dependent on
how much money the club has.

• Thus the logic that underlies soap operas also
underlies sport events.
• Success of the 1984 Olympic Games
• The World Cups and so on.
• The aim is to attract the greatest number of
viewers, which bring in advertising revenue.
• Marshall MacLuhan: The medium is the
message.

• Question: Why does a Third-world country
think of buying a stake in an icon of cultural
industry in a First-world one?
• This is a business investment - what if
Liverpool does not do well?
• The PM said that the country will be
promoted, but chances are that it’s the PM
himself.

• There has been no public debate and
discussion on the issue. Thaksin wants the
whole country to own Liverpool, but he
decided everything himself.
• What we are seeing is a Third-world
country trying to assert itself in the global
arena. Sort of injecting chemicals to
accelerate growth.

Analysis according to CT
• Factors: entertainment/culture industries
- Liverpool, English Premier League, global
TV audience
• First world vs. third world - Global
inequality
• Threat of all domineering capitalism
• Mass homogenization of consciousness
• End of individuality --> irony --> Thai logo
--> end of distinctively Thai quality

“Colonization of the Lifeworld”
• Thaksin’s attempt to buy Liverpool shares
amounts to a ‘colonization of the lifeworld’
whereby the logic of capitalism, the instrumental
rationality, prevails over cultural icons such as
Liverpool which hitherto has been a model of pure
competition untainted by monetary concerns.
Lifeworld of Thai people as well as those around
the globe are being taken over through the image
of Liverpool players bearing OTOP logos on their
shirts.

Who is being colonized?
• Thai people, for being led to watch English
football games, and for buying the
Liverpool lottery.
• Thaksin Shinawatra, for putting away
money from a TW country to serve the
interest of a FW one.
• Who else?

Criticism of CT
• Technological/economic determinism
• Is there a place for the individual to assert
herself in this kind of scenario?
• But is resistance really possible?
 According to Adorno and Horkheimer, no.
• How can anybody resist Thaksin
nowadays?
• The Democrats?

Talk on Critical Theory, Part II, Philosophy of Social Sciences

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