1800, according to Hopkins. It refers to the rise of the nation state and the spread of
industrialization. The last process, postcolonial globalization, refers to the con-
temporary form that can be dated approximately from the 1950s.
The term“globalization”used in this chapter is defined as aflow of ideas,
services, cultural products, and technology that includes the global diffusion and
local consumption of culture, values, social, political, and economic concepts.
These factors have had an impact, via different communication modes, on a dif-
ferent locality in a different way at a different speed from the archaic past to the
present (see also Malikhao 2012 ).
The periods of globalization used for Thailand as adapted from Hopkins ( 2002 )
are (a)archaic globalization, starting from the ancient time to the 1500s; (b)proto-
globalizationstarting from 1600 to 1768, when Ayutthaya was defeated by Burma
for the second time and Siam (former name of Thailand) later shifted the capital city
from Ayutthaya to Bangkok; (c)globalizationstarting from 1769 to 1945; and
(d)contemporary globalizationstarting from the 1946, when King (Rama IX)
ascended to the throne to the present. In each period, hybridization can be observed,
and the current Thai Buddhist culture is a consequence of dynamic interplays
among the polity, economic, beliefs, worldview, practices, and social change within
the globalization and hybridization processes from archaic to present.
Let’s start with the religious culture that has changed and hybridized in each
globalization period:
In archaic globalization (before 1500s), there were many kingdoms and people
had animistic beliefs before Buddhism arrived in the thirteenth century (Rajadhon
1988 : 39). The Sukhothai Kingdom can be highlighted as the starting point of the
present day Thailand. Sukhothai Kingdom adopted Theravada Buddhism from
southward Nakhon Si Thammarat. This adoption process denotes
trans-nationalization. Sukhothai Kings had a reciprocal relationship with the
Buddha’s domain, which has the Sangha (Buddhist monk community) as the center.
Sukhothai monarchs entered the monkhood and were supposed to rule with ten
Buddhist virtues (Ishii 1986 :61–63). In this period, evidence from inscriptions has
shown that the Monarchs conferred the titles of ecclesiastical rank to the Sangha
domain. It was a starting point of“state Buddhism”and the hierarchical system in
the Sangha (Ishii 1986 : 62). Griswold ( 1967 ): 13 reports on bronze statues of Hindu
gods found in old Sukhothai as good evidence of Brahmanic practices then. Wyatt
( 1984 ): 55 stated that although Brahmanism was given court patronage during the
Sukhothai period, it did not seem to have any effect on Buddhism at that time. The
works of Rajadhon ( 1986 ), Keyes ( 1978 ), and other scholars in Thai studies also
report that animistic beliefs (such as the beliefs in ghosts–phi- and spirit cults) have
been side by side with the Brahman rites and Buddhism since this period. The
worldview of Thais in this period is based on King Lithai’s Trai Phum cosmology
from 1345 which consists of three worlds: the world of sensual desire, the world of
material factors, and the world of non-material factors (Ganwiboon 2014 ).http://
http://www.academia.edu/2322014/Cosmology_as_described_in_the_Trai_PhumPhra
Ruang. Accessed Oct 1st 2014). Thefirst world is about seven realms of happiness:
human being, four great kings, 33 deities, full joy, those who are delighted in their
1.2 Thai Buddhism in the Phases of Globalization 3