Bangkok 1892

"A fertile country in which the inhabitants are satisfied, in order to live, with a fistful of rice, should be rich: for Siam which is in this case, that is not true" (Fournereau, 1998 p.95).

In 1892, Siam (as Thailand was then called) was benefiting from the wise and reforming monarch King Chulalongkorn the Great (also known as Rama V). Despite the efforts of his father, King Mongkut the Great, most of the Siamese people remained in fairly dire straits, being forced to survive on very low income and with little food security. The main reasons for this were the continued feudalistic system that made all people subject to corvée labour at the fiat of the royal family or the state. Most people belonged to the Lek social class whose labour was reserved exclusively for the use of mandarins and princes:

"They are subdivided into two classes, soldiers and domestic servants. They are compelled to pay annual taxes of two to six ticals and if they do not wish to accept this forced charge, they become slaves in the strict sense of the term.
The latter, represented by former prisoners of war and their descendants or children sold when young by their parents, form the good half of the population. It also happens that not being able to reimburse a debt, the indebted spontaneously make themselves into slaves of their creditors.
The price of individuals varies according to the age and the sex; children are worth from 50 to 70 ticals, a vigorous man from 90 to 180; a young girl from 80 to 200 according to her beauty, her qualities or her virginity" (Fournereau, 1998, p.101).

The result of this lack of personal liberty greatly reduced the incentives that people had to better themselves or even to produce high-quality work, even though many were highly capable and skilled.

"There is, to speak the truth, no industry in Siam: the exaggerated taxes and the demands of the governing administrators make progress in this matter impossible. Besides, a labourer in which one recognises a certain talent in a profession is immediately requisitioned for the service of the king or the princes who will not pay him or poorly pay him; thus skilful artisans are almost obliged to hide in order to produce, which is in the final analysis a rather poor way of improving the industrial situation of the country" (Fournereau, 1998, p.103).

The capture of skilled artisans and indeed workers of all sorts had been an inspiring feature of the almost continual warfare that mainland Southeast Asia suffered from throughout history. King Chulalongkorn eventually managed to abolish slavery. However, this was a difficult measure to force through, not just because of the vested interests of the nobility and the elite who benefited from the labour of slaves but also from many poor people themselves, who were both attached to and valued the possibility of selling themselves or their children into a period of slavery, thereby earning some income. However, the reality of slave labour remained that of unrewarded drudgery, even if treatment was generally humane.

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