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Looking back, moving forward: Thai political leader Pita Limjaroenrat speaks at Duke
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Democracy is not a straight line.” —Pita Limjaroenrat
On March 4, the Asian/Pacific Studies Institute (APSI) at Duke sponsored a fireside chat featuring Thai political leader Pita Limjaroenrat and Edmund (Eddy) Malesky, professor of political science and director of the Duke Center for International Development (DCID). watch a recording of their conversation >>
In 2023, Pita was poised to become the prime minister of Thailand, following a landslide victory by his progressive Move Forward Party. However, in 2024, Thailand’s Constitutional Court dissolved the party, banning Pita and other key party leaders from politics for 10 years.
For over 90 minutes, Pita candidly reflected on his experience and the ways in which Thailand can still address pressing challenges, including socio-economic inequality, political polarization, shifting regional relationships among ASEAN nations and their neighbors, and climate change in Asia as well as globally. Displaying the charisma that made him a successful politician, Pita spoke to the realities of Thailand’s situation today and his belief in the ability of the Thai people to play an active role in shaping their country’s future for the better. The audience, representing a mix of students and professionals from Duke and around the Triangle, responded enthusiastically to Pita’s vision, underscoring how perspectives from Asia can provide critical insights into complex issues affecting multiple places.
The conversation began with a discussion of Pita’s background as a businessman who took on leadership of his family company before his shift into politics, which began when he was elected to Parliament as a member of the Future Forward Party. Discussing his career transition, Pita observed that “the goal of the private sector was to make a lot of profit, make a lot of money, but the goal of public service is service.”
Following the Future Forward Party’s mandated dissolution in 2020, Pita joined with other former party leaders to establish the Move Forward Party. As he wryly noted, “I was the designated survivor. Future Forward was formed for about 8 months, and they banned the party 8 months into operation. We had to rebuild a lot of organization structure, especially campaign financing.”
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Through a savvy combination of grassroots organization and deft usage of social media, the party’s emphasis on reducing corruption and the need for economic decentralization appealed to both conservative and progressive voters from a wide swath of the Thai electorate, particularly young people and urban residents. “What the Thai Rak Thai Party did for Thailand was a boon in the past, but it could not carry Thailand forward,” Pita stated.
A large part of the Move Forward Party’s electoral success in 2023 stemmed from its ability to organically connect with and turn out the youth vote. Although many had supported Future Forward, Pita did not take their votes for granted. “You’ve got to empathize with the younger generation before you mobilize them. Politicians nowadays, they mobilize the youth, but they don’t empathize with the youth,” Pita reflected, drawing parallels between his party’s experience and parties in India, Japan, and the U.S.
Pita’s somewhat universalist perspective about democratic political organizations is that succession planning is an essential factor of success. As he phrased it, “Leadership within the party during my time was servant leadership. Leaders that create more leaders, not leaders that create more followers.” This focus on institutional resilience is a message that fragile and even established democracies around the world can take to heart.
Surprising many political observers, the Move Forward Party ultimately won a substantial plurality of parliamentary seats in Thailand's May 2023 general election. The party’s success was heralded as a hopeful sign for a country that has been characterized by political instability, tense relationships between the military and civilian government, and high levels of political polarization.
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After successfully negotiating with other progressive parties to form a governing coalition, Pita was on track to become the country’s prime minister. However, political maneuvering instigated by established political elites led to Pita falling 51 votes shy of the 375 votes needed to be appointed Prime Minister under Thailand’s 2017 constitution. Somewhat ruefully, Pita explained that his experience was a “death by quorum,” with numerous senators effectively abstaining from the nationally televised vote via their absence. An hour before the second round of voting was to commence, the Constitutional Court suspended Pita as an MP for six months due to an investigation into his campaign finances.
Although he was ultimately cleared of any wrongdoing, Pita chose to step down from his elected office since he felt he could not be an effective representative for his constituents. “There are autocrats that allow election once in a while,” Pita stated. “But if the election outcome is not satisfactory, they can make sure that the result and the outcome doesn’t have to be the same.”
Most recently, Pita publicly championed People Party leader Natthaphong Ruengpanyawut, though he was careful not to violate the boundaries preventing him from engaging in overt political activity. He clarified, “I can register to be a campaign assistant…. I can only appear during election season.” This response visibly surprised Professor Malesky, an expert on the political economy of Vietnam, who believed acting as an informal policy adviser would have been more acceptable than openly participating in campaign activities.
Pita responded that he can only campaign as a civic duty, assisting with driving voter turnout and organization. Looking back on his 2026 experience, he observed, “I think the lesson learned, or the takeaway from this election that I participated in the last two weeks touring the country, now I understand that mobilizing and organizing is a different thing.”
Pita continues to closely follow policy questions in Thailand as well as other countries. Asked about his plans for the remaining eight years of his political hiatus, Pita revealed that he is very much enjoying being a teacher. In his residency at Harvard, his alma mater, he works with young aspiring politicians from numerous countries, providing advice and helping them plan strategies on how to run for public office. “It gives me a unique position to teach classes that I took and turned textbooks into reality, and now, finally, turning reality into textbooks for the newer generation. Full circle.” Pita concluded, “I feel like hope is alive because of these younger folks.”
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One of the people who helped make this event possible was Charlie Colasurdo, a 2023 graduate of Duke and DKU who has been a keen student of Thai politics since before coming to university. Asked what motivated him to facilitate this talk, Colasurdo responded, “I took Professor Malesky’s course on the Political Economy of Southeast Asia, which included several days devoted to Thailand’s modern political history. Five years later, it is an honor to host Pita, who has become a symbol of the country’s progressive movement, at Duke.”
Reflecting on the significance of both the capacity audience and the ability of the university to invite prominent speakers such as Pita Limjaroenrat, Colasurdo shared, “The turnout today, from political science students to members of the Thai diaspora from across North Carolina, is reflective of a vested interest by the community in Southeast Asia, a region growing in geopolitical importance and soft power. I’m excited to see Duke University take a more active role in shaping the conversation about Thailand and Southeast Asia, and hosting more of the region’s emerging leaders and change makers.”
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Photographs in this article taken by Renate Kwon, Nicole Filippo, and Tangmo Choi (website, Instagram)