Sulak Sivaraksa

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Sulak Sivaraksa (Thai สุลักษณ์ ศิวรักษ์, born March 27, 1933 in Thailand) is founder and director of the Thai NGO "Sathirakoses-Nagapradeepa Foundation“. Besides being the initator of a number of social, humanitarian, ecological and spiritual movements and organizations in Thailand, like the College SEM (Spirit in Education Movement) Sulak Sivaraksa is known in the West as one of the fathers of INEB (International Network of Engaged Buddhists), which, in 1987 was established by leading Buddhists like the 14th Dalai Lama, the Vietnamese monk and peace-activist Thich Nhat Hanh and the Theravada Bhikkhu Maha Ghosananda. When Sulak Sivaraksa was awarded the Alternative Nobel Prize (Right Livelihood Award) in 1995 he became known to a wider public in Europe and the USA.

Sulak Sivaraksa

Sulak Sivaraksa was educated in Bangkok and at the University of Wales, Lampeter, where he is now an honorary fellow in Buddhism. Upon his return home, he became the editor of an intellectual magazine ("Social Science Review“). Soon he directed his energies towards the development of sustainable models for a rapidly changing economic and social environment. The military coup of 1976 forced him into exile for two years. At this time he toured Canada, the US and Europe to lecture to academic audiences.

These contacts were to prove beneficial when Sivaraksa was arrested in 1984 for lese majesty, causing international protests which pressured the government to release him. Sivaraksa was again charged with lese majeste in September 1991 after a talk he gave at Thammasat University about the repression of democracy in Thailand. Sivaraksa fled the county and went into exile until he was able to convince the courts of his innocence in 1995. In the same year he was awarded the Right Livelihood Award.

Sulak was a strong critic of deposed Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. He publically accused Thaksin of adultery at rallies organized by the People's Alliance for Democracy. However, he has never cited any evidence for his claims.^[1] During a protest on 26 February 2006, Sulak called Thaksin a pitifiul dog. Sulak's comments were condemned by Somsri Hananantasuk, Chairperson of Amnesty International (Thailand), who said that such words could provoke violence.^[2]

[edit] Works

Sulak Sivaraksa: Seeds of Peace: A Buddhist Vision for Renewing Society.

Foreword by H.H.The Dalai Lama. Parallax Press/International Network of Engaged Buddhist/ Sathirakoses-Nagapradipa Foundation 1992.186 Pages

Sulak Sivaraksa: Global Healing. Essays and interviews on structural violence, Social development and spiritual transformation.

[edit] Footnotes

^ Specifically, Sulak's own personal website notes that he said that "As for breaking the Third Precept, I don’t have hard evidence. But there are lots of rumors that Thaksin and his cabinet ministers have engaged in many illicit sexual reveries—that Thaksin has been unfaithful to his wife. There is even a toddler who looks astonishingly like Thaksin. All these still cannot be proven. So we may have to give him the benefit of the doubt. But truths about Thaksin’s notorious sexual life will surely surface after his fall from power—like those of the dictator Sarit Thanarat."
^ The Nation, Non-violence is not simply the absence of physical violence, 1 March 2006