Remember, I recently allowed the Liberal Party into power, rather than the Conservative Royalist Party.
Because of the makeup of the Upper House (and I don't remember if I've seen an election since I brought the Liberals in or not -- seems not, but I obviously already had enough Liberals for Reform -- probably around 45% plus some Conservatives who were afraid enough of the Militancy that they would support Reform), I can enact Reforms.
I choose to adopt the Jefferson Method of electing members to parliament. Why? Well, to be quite honest, partly because I didn't like any of the other choices. But also partly because the Jefferson Method allows some sensitivity to popular sentiment (okay -- what's popular with the Rich, anyway) without the likelihood of granting any fringe parties representation.
In 1864 not only am I still dealing with resentment over the collision of traditional Siamese customs with Western ideas and contacts, but also my POPs -- many of them -- are having trouble making ends meet. I lower my spending on Education and Administration in order to try to balance things out. I keep a modest Tariff, and about 50% Taxes, to get a gradual income for my Treasury (much of which is going toward building army units and Men o'War right now.
Believe it or not, the reduced spending on Admin and Education doesn't completely stop, or turn around, my increase in Clergy or Literacy -- it just slows it down. I use my National Focus to try to mitigate this slowdown among Clergy. The Focus gets shopped around to different large states where the Clergy population is lower than elsewhere. I don't worry about the slowdown. I have plenty of time to get my Research Points -- this is a temporary economic doldrum.
As you can see, I've been funding the military enough that I have lots of Soldier POPs, which I'm turning into armies as quickly as funds will allow (plus some debt). I'm dreadfully worried that a European power will decide to come knocking, or China, and so I want my military as strong as possible. Plus, I want the freedom to take on a moderately powerful enemy if I see an opportunity that will benefit Siam.
Around September 1864 I get the first election results with a Liberal Party as the Ruling Party. The results drastically favor the Liberals. Of course. Why "of course?" Because of my electoral system, as it stands now -- I have about a 25% bias toward the Ruling Party from Political Parties policy alone. Add in State control of the Press, the method of counting votes, etc. and the Ruling Party will always have a tremendous advantage in Elections until Political Reforms are well established. This is how I've quickly switched the balance of power from the Conservatives to the Liberals when I want to.
The resulting Upper House arrangement puts Liberals in control of the Upper House. This will allow me to do Reforms again, when I wish to.
One thing that concerns me is the attention the USA is paying to east Asia. They're a huge and growing power, and they're sniffing around my neighborhood!
They already have Japan in their Sphere of Influence, and they are working on Korea (note the "friendly" opinion Korea has of them, and the number of Influence points USA has invested in Korea. They're very, very close to entering the USA Sphere.
It's also worth noting that they have 25 points of Influence upon Siam, and we're already "friendly" to them -- the step before coming into their Sphere also! Hmm...
By mid 1866, I still have not been able to get a handle on either, the economic crisis for my POPs who can't buy enough of their Needs, and the rising Militancy which is partly caused by their lack of money.
I crank back the spending and taxing again. Tariffs and Taxes lower, across the board, and my "big ticket" spending category (Military) goes down to 30%. Yes, I'm making a concerted effort to increase my Military Score in order to Civilize, but this seems to be an economic recession that I can't ignore without Militancy accelerating.
Umm.... I know this doesn't make much sense in light of the previous paragraph about our economic crisis. But I saw an opportunity for a quick score against Luang Prabang, and so I took advantage of their recently broken treaty to tackle them alone. The costs would have to be covered by our lenders. Burma was actually allied, and I prepared to defend that border too, but Burma was too weak to do anything -- they declined to participate in the war.
It was a quick war, of course, (no enemy troops!) and so the costs were limited. Only 4 1/2 months from beginning to end. Our Infamy had been high to begin with, but a Humiliation war only increases Infamy by less than 2 points (if I recall correctly), so no problem there. The Prestige from winning the war catapults us over our 40 Prestige threshold for the Embrace Westernization decision. Very close in Military Score too, but I'll wait a little bit on that until we can handle the expense to expand.
It's worth noting that, if I hadn't gone to war, I would likely have gotten the needed Prestige boost a few months later from Researching Romanticism. It wasn't 100% necessary for me to do this war, but I did speed up the Civilization process by about 9 months or so. That was worth it to me, to get out of the stagnation.
I want to point to a couple things in the screenshot above before we go on. I can enact Political Reform, but choose not to for now. I COULD end Slavery, but that would anger alot of my Population because Slavery is THE most popular issue on the minds of both, voters and the people in general. I'm starting to see a little peep out of the socialist thought patterns, so I'll keep a careful eye on that. Not a problem for now. It's the Reactionaries and Anarcho-Liberals that have me slightly worried (look at the Rebel list!). But with a Military Score of 50, I should be able to handle any rebellion.
And so...
In October 1867, Siam has met the requirements to become a Civilized country! 
Making the Decision to Embrace Westernization lifts us by another 5 Prestige, so that we have almost 100 total score, which is NOT insignificant.
Now, the time is ripe for us to look around for our next challenge, as an aggressive newly Civilized power, ready to test its new freedom!
