Can Thailand and Cambodia get beyond the quarrel potential?

I managed to get to one day of the very informative Thai Studies Conference in Melbourne last week (Andrew Walker has a summary here).

Pasuk Phongpaichit and Chris Baker did a great opening presentation on how the recent election fits into wider social and political trends.

During question-time, they were asked about the temple conflict with Cambodia. The previous Thai government had a particularly bad relationship with Cambodia, for various reasons, so did a change of government herald better things?  

Chris Baker underlined that there is now a great opportunity to move forward. He felt that most people in Thailand don't really care all that much about this issue, and basically wonder what all the fuss is about, and why opportunities are being wasted to develop this site for everyone's benefit. Older people remember the original decision (when the International Court of Justice decided in 1962 that the temple belonged to Cambodia) – in fact, people remember it in the way others recall the death of Kennedy, remembering where they were and what they were doing when it happened. But younger people are not that interested.

But the shrill voices of extreme nationalism are still very powerful, and even though the moment is ripe for finding a solution, it will take a lot of nerve, Baker continued, to face the nationalists down. There will be "lots of shouting and screaming", he predicted.

There have been some signs of movement (it's interesting that most of this article gives details of meetings, but it is headlined "Border observers not needed" – the border observers would be Indonesian, of course, and although Indonesian attempts at damage control were well meant and certainly very much needed, they also raised resentment about "interference").

But when nationalism is high, there is always something to get annoyed about – the hand position, or jeeb, that is often seen in traditional dance, for example... Is it Cambodian or is it Thai? This kind of cultural tussle is reminiscent of the tug-of-war between Malaysia and Indonesia over batik, which periodically raises huge tension.

I'm not underestimating or mocking these sensibilities. After all, Australia and New Zealand still squabble over who invented the pavlova. 

But in Southeast Asia, where cultural influences were flowing and spreading a long time before national borders were demarcated, there are likely to be many such trigger points. They need to be kept in proportion. Otherwise, a much larger regional project will be jeopardized.