Focusing on broad social and cultural influences on organizational behavior within the Thailand Ministry of Education, this study examined the response of the Division of Adult Education to political and administrative changes imposed on its goals and purposes of the national literacy effort by the gradual strengthening of its planning system. For many years after the 1932 revolution, the government stressed literacy as a means of uniting diverse ethnic groups. Later, as it interacted with experts from international agencies and foreign governments involved in modernization efforts, the Thai government shifted its emphasis toward developing human resources for economic and social growth. Such factors as the interpenetration of politics and bureaucracy, high regard for hierarchical status, personal relations, and security, a lack of effectively delegated authority, and relative disregard for efficiency, legality or secular rationality, have loomed large. (The document includes regional illiteracy statistics, a historical review of the Thai educational system, and current community development activities.) (LY)