Primate City free essay sample

The rapid expansion of a deteriorated environment and high social costs are the most obvious and immediate results of this overconcentration process. Eventually, the public investment on the expansion of urban infrastructure will reach a point of diminishing returns. Urban problems can bring national development to the edge of failure. This would be an appalling situation indeed! Vimolsiddhi Horayangkura1 Hyperurbanization signifies a prolonged condition of superheated urban growth. John Friedmann2 Bangkok, perhaps more than any other major world metropolis, represents a primate city. It is forty times larger than Chiang Mai, Thailands second largest city, and dominates Thai political, economic, and intellectual life. Bangkok is simultaneously Thailands castle, market, and temple. Once known as the Venice of the East, Bangkok has changed dramatically from the tranquil pre-modern days of Joseph Conrad and W. Somerset Maugham. Lynch has emphasized the importance of a citys image. 4 Bangkok has diverse images. The Thais refer to it as Krungthep eaning City of Angels. In fact, modern Bangkok with its sprawling laissez faire urban development does indeed resemble its American namesake, Los Angeles. Some Thais have called modern Bangkok a concrete jungle. 5 Foreign visitors to Bangkok in the 1940s and 1950s would hardly recognize the thriving metropolis of the 1980s with a population of over six million. Prior to 1960, Bangkok had almost no buildings over five stories. Today numerous skyscrapers house the offices of transnational corporations and international agencies. Gerald W. Fry is Assistant Director of the International Studies Program at the University of Oregon. 14 Despite Bangkoks modernization, it also retains traditional images. Sternstein in conducting research on Bangkoks image, found that Wat Phra Keo was the most common image among Thais interviewed. 6 This is Thailands most sacred Buddhist temple, which houses the Emerald Buddha, the holiest image in the country. While Bangkok is both symbolic of Thailands dynamic economic expansion during the past several decades and its rich cultural history, its role as a classic primate city also presents crucial policy problems. Unfortunately, many urbanization studies are merely descriptive, ignoring an analytical discussion of important policy issues. 7 In this article, empirical evidence is presented to show the extent and nature of Bangkoks dominance as a hyperurbanized primate city. Then key policy issues and future directions are considered from a political economy perspective. The Concept of the Primate City As background, it may be useful to discuss briefly the evolution of the concept of the primate city and previous related research. 8 The concept of urban centrality has attracted the attention of many prominent world scholars. In the early 1800s, German writers were already directing attention to the organization of space by society. 9 Then in the 1900s, German geographers introduced the concept of central place theory, which has influenced much subsequent research related to urbanization. 10 In more recent years, major contemporary thinkers such as Arnold Toynbee and Barbara Ward have also directed their attention to urbanization. 11 Toynbee, in discussing cities on the move, worries about mechanized cities which he feels are noisy, dirty, and soulless. Ward describes monster cities defiled by environmental deterioration and technological hammers. 3 In fact, many intellectuals have revolted against the city and its corrupt cultural influences. 14 Radical thinkers such as Harvey and Lefebvre see the modem city as reflecting exploitative parasitic relationships typical of the larger society. 15 Harvey also makes the important distinction between the city as a built form and urbanism as a way of life. Harveys distinction is particularly important in understanding Bangkoks dual image and the tendency for individuals to develop an ambivalent attitude towards this rapidly changing Southeast Asian metropolis. More optimistic are the works of visionaries such as Doxiadis, Mumford, and Fuller. 16 They present new configurations for a more equitable, efficient, and humanistic use of space. Unfortunately, the impact of their work is hardly noticeable in Third World primate cities such as Bangkok, Manila, or Mexico City. 15 Bangkok as a Hyperurbanized Primate City Many primate cities are not in the geometric centre of a natural region. 17 Bangkok, however, stands almost perfectly at the centre of Thailand, almost equidistant from its northern and southern borders. It is also centred between its eastern and western boundaries and in this sense, it is comparable to Ankara in Turkey and Brasilia in Brazil. Bangkoks demographic primacy is revealed by several indicators. It has been growing at a much faster rate than the rest of the country. While Thailand in the 1960s was growing a little over three per cent per year, Bangkok was growing at an annual rate of over six per cent. 18 The differential between its growth rate and that of the rest of the country in the late 1970s is shown in Table 1. Its dominance is also illustrated by data showing that 56 per cent of Thailands urban population is concentrated in Bangkok. 19 Since 1947, its population has increased sixfold, making it now the worlds fifteenth largest city. Table 1 Bangkoks Rate of Population Growth Compared to Thailand as a Whole 1976 1. 92 4. 41 1977 2. 42 4. 25 1978 2. 12 2. 66 1979 1. 95 2. 61 198( 1. 82 3 . 04 Thailand Bangkok Source: Khryangchii Phaawa Sangkhom 2523 (Social Indicators 1980), (Bangkok: Office of the National Economic and Social Development Board, 1980), p. 3. Several quantitative techniques exist for empirically analyzing the extent of a citys primacy. The first approach uses what are termed indices of primacy. The most simple is the ratio, P1/P2, where Pj is the population of the largest city and P2, the population of the next largest city in a country. A three-city index compares the largest city with combined populations of the next two largest cities. A four-city index can be computed in analogous fashion. Table 2 shows Bangkoks various indices of primacy both in 1960 and 1972. Using equation (c) in an iterative process, the theoretical distribution for Thailand is computed and compared with the actual distribution of city sizes (see Table 3). As can be seen, the Thai pattern diverges significantly from the expected pattern. Instead of having 10 cities over the population of 100,000, Thailand has only one. Thailand also has twice as many cities in the 20,000-49,999 range as expected. In discussing city-size distribution, Zipf introduces the concepts of diversification and unification. 4 Diversification implies that a population is disaggregated into many small communities close to scattered and diverse raw materials. Unification in contrast concentrates the processing of raw materials in a single location and minimizes the difficulty of providing processed goods to the ultimate consuming population. Thus, the abnormal Thai distribution suggests both extreme diversification and unification. This pattern seems completely consistent with Thailands highly succ essful agricultural and economic diversification programme, and Bangkoks role as a major world port serving a large consumer oriented population. Though Thailand is predominantly an agricultural economy with approximately 70-80 per cent of the labour force in that sector, Bangkok dominates a rapidly growing industrial and manufacturing segment of the economy. Though Bangkok has only 10 per cent of the countrys population, it has 29 per cent of the countrys national income, giving it a ratio of advantage of 2. 9. 26 The Bangkok Central Region similarly accounts for 37. 4 per cent of Thailands GDP. 27 Given Bangkoks superior communications infrastructure, major local and foreign corporations tend to locate in Bangkok. Banking is perhaps the economic area in which 19 Bangkok is most dominant. In Thailands capitalistic economy, private banks account for 80 per cent of credit available. Though branch banks have spread widely throughout the country to collect deposits, rural areas account for only 5-6 per cent of bank credits. 28 Bangkoks political, educational, and intellectual primacy is even more dramatic than its demographic and economic dominance. Thailands political system has been described as a bureaucratic polity. 29 Though Bangkok has only 10 per cent of the countrys population, 52 per cent of the elite are from Bangkok. 0 Three institutions have been central to Thailands contemporary political system: the bureaucracy, the military, and the monarchy. All ministries have large headquarters in Bangkok. The Department of Local Administration, Ministry of Interior, in Bangkok appoints all provincial governors and district officers, the most powerful local officials in the Thai government. Major military offices are similarly located in Bangkok. Historically, control of the First Army, which is responsible for Bangkok, has been a major avenue to both military and political power. 2 Though the monarchy has not played a direct role in politics since 1932, its presence in Bangkok provides the major source of political legitimacy. This was revealed most dramatically in the student revolution of 1973 when the monarchy refused to grant legitimacy to the three tyrants and again in April, 1981, when those engineering a coup against the Prem government were unable to attain royal legitimacy. 33 Since the student revolution of 1973, parliamentary politics has also grown in importance. But again Bangkok remains dominant. Most political parties are Bangkok based and led by prominent Bangkok polit icians. Under Thai law, Bangkok politicians can run in constituencies in remote rural provinces. In the summer of 1981, for example, former Prime Minister Kriangsak Chomanan was elected M. P. from Thailands Northeastern province of Roi-Et and it is quite common for prominent Bangkok politicians to run in rural constituencies. Though regional political parties have existed, their success has been limited. With 20 per cent of its population being students, Bangkok is the centre of Thailands educational system. Of Thailands eleven selective universities, eight are in Bangkok. Of ten private colleges, eight are also in Bangkok. Thailands large open university, Ramkhamhaeng, which now has over 200,000 students, is also in Bangkok. With the exception of several schools in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, all of Thailands elite secondary schools, public and private, are in Bangkok. It, thus, should not be surprising that 48 per cent of those individuals passing the highly competitive entrance examination to selective universities are from Bangkok. This gives Bangkok students a ratio of advantage of six to one. Thus, it is necessary to live in Bangkok to attend elite secondary schools such as 0 Suan Gularb, St. Gabriels, Assumption, Bangkok Christian, Mater Dei, Wattana, and Satri Withaya. To illustrate the extent of Bangkoks educational dominance, imagine that Harvard, MIT, Yale, Michigan State, Berkeley, and Minnesota were all located in Washington, D. C. Given Bangkoks large student population, commuters look forward to the period of school vacations when the heavy traffic congestion declines noticeably. In view of Bangkoks dominance in politics, economics, and education, it is only natural to expect a strong cultural and intellectual primacy as well. Its cultural influence is predominantly expressed through the media such as films, television, radio, newspapers, and other printed materials. Though local regional newspapers do exist, Bangkoks seventeen daily newspapers are dominant, with Bangkoks Thai Rath having the nations largest circulation. With a heavy tax on foreign films imposed in 1976, the Thai film industry, based in Bangkok, has flourished. Since the student revolution of 1973, there has also been a major publishing boom, particularly in inexpensive paperbacks in Thai. Thailands many publishers are nearly all located in Bangkok. Push and Pull Factors Contributing to Migration into Bangkok Migration is the most commonly studied aspect of urbanization. 35 With respect to Thailand, migration has been a major factor contributing significantly to Bangkoks remarkably high index of primacy. Both push and pull factors explain Bangkoks role as a magnet in attracting migrants from all parts of the country as well as numerous foreign immigrants, primarily from China and India. Major push factors relate to Thailands agricultural context. The major sources of Bangkoks permanent migrants are from the agricultural provinces in the Central Region surrounding Bangkok. 6 Though most Thai farmers own their land, tenancy has increasingly become a problem in provinces near Bangkok and has reached as high as 18. 5 per cent in Ayuthaya province. 37 As tenants these farmers lose their commitment to the land, and face difficult economic conditions as farm labourers. A second push factor relates to the amount of agricultural land available. Historically, Thailand has had ample land available which enabled the children of large families to obtain adequately sized farm plots. This situation has now dramatically changed. There is now little possibility for the expansion of cultivable land, particularly given serious environmental concerns related to the overcutting of forests and the potential desertification of important rural areas. 38 An important third push factor relates to inadequate water for irrigation in Thailands populous Northeast, containing approximately a third of the nations total population. 39 Rainfed irrigation allows for only one crop 21 of rice in most of the Northeast, except for the limited areas near large dams which make possible multiple cropping. In the many areas with only one rice crop, farmers are idle for many months during the dry season. Consequently, they frequently migrate to Bangkok to take temporary jobs such as taxi or samlor drivers. 40 Though these agricultural push factors are important, Bangkoks urban pull factors are numerous as well. First, there is the large differential between incomes in Bangkok and most rural provinces (see Table 4). Though Bangkok has several sizeable slums, the incidence of poverty in Bangkok is only 12 per cent compared to 44 per cent in the rural Northeast. 41 Table 4 Income Differentials between Bangkok and Thailands Four Major Regions Region Northeast North South Central Bangkok * * 23 Baht are equal to approximately $1 U. S. Source: Somsak Xuto et at. , eds. , Pratheet Thai nai Thasawat 1980: Panhaa Samkhan Upasak lae Naewnom (Thailand in the Decade of the 1980s: Important Problems, Obstacles, and Trends) (Bangkok: Prasaansinkaanphim, 1981), p. 20. Annual Income Per Capita in Bant** 3,962 6,445 10,227 14,547 26,781 Second, the individual in Bangkok has access to a wide range of amenities, particularly of a public service nature and many highly subsidized by the central government. For example, 59. 8 per cent of government physicians and 51. 3 per cent of nurses work in Bangkok. 42 In Bangkok, 78. 5 per cent of homes have running water, while outside Bangkok only 5-10 per cent of homes have this amenity. 43 As mentioned above, many of Thailands public universities are in Bangkok, and their fees are kept intentionally low, covering only approximately 5 per cent of the costs of instruction, with the remainding funding provided by government subsidies. Private amenities in Bangkok are also impressive. 39. 8 per cent of Thailands private hospitals are located in Bangkok. 4 Other private amenities include huge modern shopping centres, thousands of excellent restaurants, a diverse set of night life establishments (bars, night clubs, 22 massage parlours, discos, and coffee shops), sports facilities (world class golf courses, squash and tennis courts, and swimming pools), and many luxurious but inexpensive movie theatres. Bangkoks television stations bring viewers the latest programmes from Hollywood, rock programmes from Germany, American NFL football, exciting Chinese drama, and satellite news from the worlds major capitals. Particularly for youth from remote rural areas used to dust, dryness, and everyday sameness, the bright lights of Bangkok can indeed become addictive, once the initial cultural shock is overcome. The Thai version of the Horatio Alger myth also drives individuals from the rural areas to Bangkok. There are the common stories, publicized by the media, of individuals from humble backgrounds and with little formal education who have become famous and wealthy millionaires. 45 The Nature of Bangkoks Crisis Though Bangkok has over 200 slums scattered around the city, it is estimated that only 100,000 families are without proper housing. 46 Thus, Bangkok fortunately diverges from the pattern typical of many Third World primate cities such as Bogota and Calcutta where slum and squatter populations constitute over 50 per cent of the citys population. 47 Toynbee describes mechanized cities as noisy, dirty, and soulless. 48 Though Bangkok is certainly noisy, it is definitely not soulless. Even in slum areas, there appears to be an impressive degree of conviviality and neighbourliness. 9 In Bangkok, there is little of the impersonality typical of many large industrial cities in the West. There is a plausible explanation for this. Since many of Bangkoks residents are recent migrants from rural areas, they bring with them to the city the conviviality of Thai rural culture. This cultural invasion ensures that the city retains its soul. This is not to deny that important cultural collisions are t aking place between the rural culture of migrants and an emerging modern urban way of life. 50 Any time spent in Bangkoks hectic traffic would lead to scepticism about the gentle Thais. In contrast, in pedestrian traffic, the slow leisurely pace of walking reflects the rural roots of many Thais living in Bangkok. 51 Bangkoks contemporary crisis has a number of dimensions. Most prominent is the imbalance between size of population and the citys environmental carrying capacity. If Bangkoks current population growth continues, the city will have a population of approximately twelve million by the year 2000. Even with a current population of roughly six million, Bangkoks physical quality of life has deteriorated seriously. It is common 23 or commuters in Bangkok to spend from two to four hours a day in getting to and from work. Air pollution, particularly along major roads, has reached harmful levels. Underground water is being consumed at an alarmingly high rate, contributing to the gradual sinking of the city. Recent years have also seen an increase in urban crime and middle and upper class families are reluctant to leave their homes unattended. Bangkoks traffic congestion is far more than an environmental problem. It also represents a serious drain on Thailands foreign exchange, given the high costs of imported energy. In addition, there are significant opportunity costs associated with extensive time lost in traffic congestion. This is particularly adverse for higher paid professionals and students. A second dimension of Bangkoks contemporary crisis relates to a growing disparity between the quality of private and public goods. Bangkoks ratio of private golf courses to public parks remains alarmingly high and epitomizes the nature of public-private disparities. In the area of transportation, there is the contrast between intensely crowded public buses and thousands of private luxury automobiles. A final disturbing statistical indicator is the unfortunately low ratio of public municipal libraries to luxury massage parlours. There are three major causes of Bangkoks contemporary crisis. The first relates to a lack of long-range integrated planning. Like many American corporate officials, Thai politicians and policy makers have been preoccupied with short-run immediate considerations. This is the problem which Textor terms tempocentrism, an adaptation of the concept of ethnocentrism to describe the dominance of contemporary values and the neglect of alternative futures. 2 Central to the planning problem has been a failure to integrate urban, regional, and national planning. 53 Also given the strong Thai cultural emphasis on personal freedom, no serious effort at land-use planning has been implemented. A second cause of Bangkoks crisis is a failure to recognize economic externalities. The metropolitan bus authority is expected to be selfsupporting financially. Any recognition of the many positive externalities of public transportation would lead to an acceptance of the need to subsidize public transportation heavily. External diseconomies with respect to various types of environmental deterioration are not being penalized adequately from either an economic or entropic perspective. The third major factor underlying Bangkoks crisis is the weakness of the tax system in collecting public revenues from urban wealth. Thailand still relies heavily on regressive indirect taxes, and the tax burden for the wealthy, as in many other societies, remains unreasonably small. 24 Existing Governmental Efforts to Reduce Bangkoks Primacy On a gradualist basis, the Thai government has been introducing policies to reduce Bangkoks primacy. In the education area, three major universities were established in each of the major regions of the country. Several Bangkok universities are also being gradually moved outside of Bangkok through the construction of new rural campuses. A new open long distance university, Sukothaithammatirat, enables students to take college level courses by correspondence without needing to reside in Bangkok. A major change in Thailands educational system introduced in 1980 is designed to deconcentrate Thailands overly centralized educational system. 4 New economic policies have also been implemented to channel more funds into rural development. In 1975, the Social Action Party of M. R. Kukrit Pramoj adopted the Ngoen Pan programme, which provided 2,500 million Baht to tambol (sub-district) councils to undertake a wide variety of rural projects based on local level needs and decision-making. This programme, now called the Rural Job Creation Programme under the current government, continues to funct ion and now provides annually 3,500 million Baht to rural areas. The programme provides jobs for rural farmers during their idle dry season. Thailand has fortunately had a remarkably successful family planning programme. As a result, the countrys natural rate of population growth has slowed considerably. 55 This has served to defuse part of the push factor, contributing to migration into Bangkok. The Thai government also has plans to develop its eastern seaboard, southeast of Bangkok as an alternative planned area for future urban and industrial growth. 56 The area has two deep sea ports which can potentially relieve the heavy congestion at Bangkoks own port. A new modern expressway now links Bangkok to the eastern seaboard. This seaboard area is also attractive because of its proximity to new natural gas pipelines from the Gulf of Thailand. The Thai government plans to invest heavily in new infrastructure for the region including a new Bangkok-SattahipRayong railroad. This infrastructure should be completed by the end of the Fifth Development Plan (1986). The eastern seaboard will be Thailands first fully planned industrial area. Major Policy Issues, Problems, and Recommendations From a political economy perspective, Bangkoks crisis of hyperurbanization primarily results from Thailands dual polarized development. Bangkoks growing wealth and amenities have been a dynamic magnet attracting migrants from throughout the nation and abroad. 25 As pointed out above, Bangkoks public goods are in many respects seriously deficient relative to private affluence. If policies are introduced, however, to improve Bangkoks public goods and services, this will compound the crisis of hyperurbanization. This represents a major policy paradox. A significant improvement of Bangkoks public services would also divert potential funds away from rural development. It is in effective rural development itself that the major solution can be found for Bangkoks hyperurbanization. While existing government programmes aimed at improving rural development are important, they are not sufficient. The gap between Bangkoks economic conditions and those in the countryside must narrow more rapidly. Underlying the present economic gap between rural areas and Bangkok is the basic political condition of what Thais frequently call half-leaf democracy. The rural sector is still inadequately represented in the Thai polity. Two political changes are needed to strengthen the voice of the rural sector. First, the appointed Senate dominated by Bangkok politicians and bureaucrats needs to be replaced by a popularly elected body to achieve full-leaf democracy. Second, Bangkok politicians should not be allowed to compete for parliamentary positions in rural constituencies. Political changes of these types would facilitate the development of public policies to improve the terms of trade for Thailands rural sector. Four basic economic policies are essential to improve Thai rural conditions. First, investments in small-scale irrigation projects for Thailands dry Northeast must be increased. Second, the government needs to support more aggressively better prices for Thai agricultural products, even though this will increase the cost of living for Bangkok residents. Third, a stronger land reform effort is needed in those provinces, especially in the Central Plains, where land tenancy has become a serious problem. 57 Fourth, new industries should be encouraged to locate outside Bangkok. In this regard, the new Eastern Seaboard Development Project is an impressive step in encouraging the dispersal of economic power and infrastructure. Related to the above policies, greater incentives must be provided to encourage professionals, particularly in the health field, to work in remote rural areas. Such individuals need to be more adequately compensated for the sacrifices they undergo in serving the countrys most needy areas. With respect to policies affecting urban development in Bangkok itself, three policy areas of critical importance are urban land values, land use planning, and public transportation. As in many other primate cities, land values in Bangkok have escalated rapidly encouraging significant speculation in land. A century ago, Henry George in his classical writings 26 on the need for a land tax eloquently exposed the detrimental consequences of free land speculation. 58 In contemporary times, Barbara Ward precisely defines the significant nature of this problem: A first principle in developing countries must therefore be to insure basic control over urban land prices But they have to be clear about one thing. If, at a time of breakneck urbanization, the public authorities have no controls over the land market or of the gains to be made there, the whole process will be skewed in favor of the skillful or lucky minority who use their private monopoly of ownership to engross fortunes created solely by the growth of the community Moreover, the increment of value secured by private owners will be irretrievably lost to the municipal authorities responsible for providing the citys basic infrastructure — water, drains, roads, schools, the whole apparatus of urbanity. They will simply fail to profit from the gains which they themselves create. 59 Ward also sees the planned control of land use as essential to achieving beauty, cleanliness, and a genuine community in an urban environment. Actually, the lack of adequate control of land use partially explains Bangkoks transportation crisis and its excessive reliance on mechanized road vehicles. Transportation researchers have shown that an urban train is thirty-eight times more efficient than an automobile and seven times more efficient than a bus. 1 Since public authorities in Bangkok have limited access to land, the costs of developing a rail system and acquiring the necessary land right of ways is extremely high and dramatically increasing. Thus, despite its much greater efficiencies and many positive externalities, a public rail system for Bangkok is difficult to achieve. Fortunately, during the past several years, Bangkoks bus system has improved significantly. Yet despite such improvements, the city still suffers enormous energy and economic losses from excessive traffic congestion. The long-run solution to Bangkoks traffic problem requires reduced dependence on mechanized road vehicles and the development of an above-ground62 rail system connecting major areas of Bangkok. Bangkoks hyperurbanization and extensive dominance as a primate city present a dramatic challenge to Thai policy makers and planners. Even in the Soviet Union, which has highly unified and comprehensive civic planning, Moscow and Leningrad have doubled in size despite explicit policies designed to limit the urban growth of these major cities. Thus, it is inevitable that Bangkok will continue to grow. The question instead is whether the growth can be reduced in any meaningful way. 27 Throughout its history, Thailand has shown considerable resilience in responding to challenges. The country avoided Western colonialization and survived World War II without serious loss of life or damage to national cultural treasures. Despite many predictions to the contrary, the IndoChina war did not spill over into Thailand. 63 Unlike many Third World countries which are overly dependent on a few export commodities, Thailand has successfully diversified its exports and markets. For these reasons, there is hope that Thailand can deal creatively and successfully with its Bangkok problem. Jeremy Rifkin in an important new book directly related to the problems of hyperurbanization brilliantly articulates the supreme law of entropy which governs nature and everything we do. Commenting on urban problems, he states: The challenge is whether this decline can be halted, or whether all big cities are to falter and eventually become ghosts of their once-thriving selves The sober truth is that we can no longer afford to maintain these incredibly entropic urban environments. 64 I am optimistic that Thailand can respond to this challenge and moderate the dangerous entropy associated with Bangkoks hyperurbanization. Several factors underly my optimism. First, there is Thailands achievement in the field of birth control in recent years. Such success significantly reduces pressures from natural growth. In this sense, Bangkok is far ahead of cities such as Mexico City or N airobi. Second, there is Thailands explicit plan to develop its eastern seaboard as an alternative commercial and industrial centre. Related to this second factor is the rapid urbanization of Thailands regional areas. In fact, smaller regional towns are now growing faster than Bangkok. 65 Regional cities such as Chiang Mai, Phuket, and Chantaburi presently offer a higher quality of life than Bangkok itself, and are beginning to attract migrants from Bangkok. This emerging pattern appears consistent with Doxiadis ideal as summarized by Toy n bee: As Dr. Doxiadis puts it, the closed city has now to be replaced by one that is open-ended. Long before the pressure on a particular city-centre has increased to a degree at which it would be intolerable, the increase must be halted by diverting the further quanta of the mounting pressure to another centre — and then to another and another, in a continually lengthening echelon, as population, construction, production, and traffic continue to increase. 66 28 A third encouraging factor is represented by efforts such as the rural job creation project to reduce the economic push for migration to Bangkok. Illustrative of rapid development outside Bangkok is the following health statistic. In 1972, 78. 6 per cent of private hospitals were in Bangkok. But by 1977, this percentage had dropped significantly to 39. 8 per cent. A fourth positive development has been the construction of rural campuses by major Bangkok universities such as Mahidol and Kasetsart. Given these trends, there is certainly the possibility that Bangkoks primacy may lessen as new commercial and industrial activities are dispersed to the eastern seaboard and rapidly growing regional towns where basic economic costs are lower. Bangkoks own role as a governmental, cultural, and intellectual centre could then be stressed. With such an orientation much of Bangkoks traditional and classic beauty could be preserved. Buddhism provides Thailand with a basic value system consistent with the ecotopian67 ideal and a less entropic urbanization pattern. A fundamental question for the future is whether Bangkok in its quest for an improved quality of life will turn outward to excessive materialism and follow the urban patterns of societies dominated by the private automobile, or will turn inward towards its own rich cooperative Buddhist traditions and become a balanced garden and machine society.