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Thailand The Chinese
The largest number of non-Tai peoples were the Chinese. In
1987 an estimated 11 percent of the total Thai population, or
about 6 million people, were of Chinese origin, which meant that
Thailand had the largest Chinese population in Southeast Asia.
Assimilation of the various Chinese communities was a continuing
process. Chinese were encouraged to become Thai citizens, and in
1970 it was estimated that more than 90 percent of the Chinese
born in Thailand had done so. When diplomatic relations were
established with China in the 1970s, resident Chinese not born in
Thailand had the option of becoming Thai citizens; the remaining
permanent Chinese alien population was estimated at fewer than
200,000.
Given their historic role as middlemen, Chinese were found
everywhere in Thailand, particularly in the towns. There was,
however, a major concentration in the Bangkok metropolitan area
and another in the central part of peninsular Thailand, where
many Chinese were engaged in several capacities in the tin mines
and on the rubber plantations. Although many Chinese played an
important part in the ownership and management of economic
enterprises and in the professions, a substantial portion had
less lucrative and significant occupations
(see National and Urban Structures: Class and Status
, this ch.).
Except for a minority, the Chinese not only were Thai
nationals but also had, in some respects at least, assimilated
into Thai society; many spoke Thai as well as they spoke Chinese.
Most of the descendants of pretwentieth-century immigrants and
those people of mixed Chinese-Thai ancestry (the so-called
Sino-Thai--see Glossary) were so fully integrated into Thai
society that they were not included in the Chinese population
estimates.
The accommodation between Thai and Chinese historically
depended in part on the changing economic and political interests
and perspectives of the Thai monarchs and others in the ruling
group. Also relevant were the roles assigned to the Chinese at
various times, e.g., in the nineteenth century, that of tax
farmers. Under the tax farming system, private individuals were
sold the right to collect taxes at a price below the actual value
of the taxes. The barriers between Thai and Chinese became more
rigid in the early twentieth century with the emergence of Thai
and Chinese nationalism and also the increased tendency of
Chinese females to accompany male immigrants, which reduced the
amount of intermarriage. Consequently, despite a level of Chinese
integration in the host society surpassing that found elsewhere
in Southeast Asia, the Chinese remained a separate ethnic
community, although the boundaries became less defined in the
more mobile post-World War II society. The Chinese spoke a number
of southern Chinese dialects, the most important being Teochiu,
which was used by most Chinese as a commercial lingua franca.
Data as of September 1987
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