Lessons from the Khanom Nuclear Power Plant Conflict: Community Resistance, Discursive Strategies, and Sustainable Development in Southern Thailand

Abstract

Introduction: This study examines community resistance to the proposed nuclear power plant project in Khanom District, southern Thailand, as a discursive and strategic response to hegemonic, state-led development paradigms. It explores how local actors perceived the project and how collective resistance reshaped local understandings of sustainability, development, and community autonomy. Methods: The study adopts a qualitative research design with phenomenological sensitivity and a participatory orientation to examine lived experiences and meaning-making processes within the resistance movement. Fieldwork was conducted between January and March 2023 and involved 20 participants, including community leaders, local university graduates, fisherfolk, agricultural residents, local government officers, and civil society actors. Participants were selected through purposive and snowball sampling. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and document analysis, and were analyzed thematically, guided by Husserlian phenomenology, to identify patterns of perception, discourse, and collective action. Results: The findings reveal that the proposed nuclear power plant was widely perceived as a multidimensional threat to environmental integrity, sustainable livelihoods, and local self-determination. Resistance was galvanized by concerns over the absence of mandatory Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs), limited public participation, and opaque state decision-making processes. Local leaders and university graduates emerged as key knowledge brokers, translating technical risk information into culturally grounded narratives that mobilized ethical, environmental, and social justice concerns. Through this process, sustainability was rearticulated as a locally embedded moral and political claim rather than a technocratic policy objective imposed from above. The conflict reveals persistent structural tensions between centralized national energy governance, represented by the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT), and community-based participatory governance. Implications: This study contributes to sociological debates on development, social movements, and sustainability by demonstrating how grassroots resistance operates through discursive reconfiguration rather than oppositional protest alone. It highlights the role of knowledge brokerage in shaping collective action and underscores the need for reforms in Thailand’s energy governance, particularly the institutionalization of meaningful public participation, transparent and independent EIAs, and the integration of community-led renewable energy alternatives into national energy planning frameworks.