Information technology and bureaucratic surveillance: a case study of the Population Information Network (PIN) in Thailand

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Ramasoota, Pirongrong

Affiliations: Department of Journalism, Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University, Phyathai Road, Bangkok 10330, Thailand E‐mail: [email protected]

Abstract: This paper analyzes the application of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in a major bureaucratic surveillance system – of civil registration and personal identification cards – in Thailand. It attempts to show how the new technologies have expanded the capacity of the state to control and have thereby affected the power relations between the state and society in a developing democracy like Thailand. The analysis draws upon the development of the Population Information Network (PIN) which was initiated by the Ministry of the Interior in the early 1980s and is still evolving into the new century with new technological trajectories.

Journal: Information Technology for Development, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 51-64, 1998