In this article, I attempt to remedy this situation by drawing on important theoretical
work on networks in the fields of sociology and political science in order to advance a
networked approach to governance that has implications beyond Thai society. While I do
not intend to suggest that all of Thai political society can be reduced to networks, I argue
that the theoretical lens that a network approach to governance provides fills important
gaps in the literature, allowing us to isolate diffuse and often invisible (but politically
significant) agglomerations of actors which operate within and between conventional
political actors. A theoretically informed scholarship on political networks in Thailand
6 J. Harris
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is only just emerging (Sripen and Walt 2008). However, it remains the task of scholars to
lay out the significance of this approach and to put it in context with other dominant
approaches to governance in Thailand. Below I present a theoretical basis for a network
approach to governance and point to two understudied networks that have played important
roles in politics – one historical and one contemporary – in an effort to underscore the
usefulness of the approach. I then conclude with a brief discussion of the benefits and
disadvantages of this approach in the context of the approaches to governance that have
featured most prominently in the literature.