Cambodia’s Bumpy Road to Development

CAMBODIA’S BUMPY ROAD TO DEVELOPMENT

BY DONALD JAMESON

KI-Media would like to thank Mr. Donald Jameson for providing us with an early copy of his talk to be given at the University of Ohio on Saturday April 30, 2011.

When US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Cambodia in late 2010 she told senior government leaders there “this does not look like the country I have been reading about in the press”. Most casual visitors to Phnom Penh would likely react similarly. They would see a vibrant society, with traffic-clogged streets, a proliferation of stylish restaurants and boutiques and numerous buildings under construction, many of them high rise apartments or office blocks, and including upscale satellite towns with names like “The Grand Phnom Penh International City”. Outside Phnom Penh, the visitor would observe large-scale development of infrastructure, including new roads and bridges, with work underway on many additional projects. If they ventured further afield the visitors would see land being cleared for plantations to grow rubber, palm oil, coffee and other tropical products as well as new industrial sites springing up along main transportation arteries. In short, they would find a country clearly on the move economically.

Having prepared for the trip by reading recent media coverage of Cambodia, much of it carrying headlines such as “The Beleaguered Cambodians”, “Cambodia’s Curse” and “Country for Sale” our visitor would probably, like Mrs. Clinton, be a bit confused, Much media coverage would have described Cambodia as a country plagued by rampant corruption benefiting a wealthy ruling oligarchy and their crony capitalist friends while a large segment of the population lives in abject poverty. It would have reported widespread human rights abuses, including confiscation of land from smallholder owners for investment projects, often without adequate compensation and sometimes resulting in forced evictions by the police or military forces. Beyond this the media would have described a culture of impunity that protects the rich and powerful while victimizing the poor and powerless. Also highlighted would have been the strict limits on freedom of expression and assembly as well as frequent intimidation of politicians, journalists, labor leaders, human rights advocates and other critics of Prime Minister Hun Sen and his ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP).

In fact, both of these contrasting visions are accurate and represent important aspects of the complex reality that is Cambodia today. In recent years PM Hun Sen has consolidated his power at the expense of a weak and fractured opposition and, since the 2008 election, he has enjoyed a CPP supermajority in the National Assembly. This allows him to enact whatever legislation he desires without regard to the views of opposition MPs and to take punitive actions against them, including withdrawal of parliamentary immunity from prosecution for those who attempt to confront him. He has used this power to sideline opposition leader Sam Rainsy and his high profile female associate Mu Sochua by engineering their convictions on charges of defamation and other trumped up crimes. To avoid a 12-year prison sentence Sam Rainsy has taken refuge in France, with no prospect of return to Cambodia in sight. Meanwhile, Hun Sen has rammed through laws criminalizing some forms of civil society activity, facilitating the seizure of land for investment projects, restricting the size of public demonstrations and limiting them to a so-called Freedom Park. He has also enacted a long promised but seriously flawed anti-corruption law without consulting interested civil society organizations and with no input from the opposition. Under this law whistleblowers unable to prove their allegations of corruption in the government controlled court system would risk imprisonment, a provision clearly intended to discourage such accusations.

As a consequence, Hun Sen now has virtually absolute power and governs Cambodia in a manner that historian David Chandler has likened to a monarch presiding over his realm. Another Cambodia scholar, Caroline Hughes, has compared Hun Sen’s ruling style to that of former King Sihanouk, who dominated political life in the 1950s and 60s. To flaunt his power, Hun Sen makes almost daily off the cuff speeches using colorful, and at times demeaning, language to castigate his foes, both domestic and foreign. Meanwhile, he has cultivated close relations with China, Vietnam and South Korea, who bankroll many of his development projects and provide political cover, which allows him to defiantly reject criticisms of his authoritarian behavior by Western countries and the UN. He has successfully forced the withdrawal of a UN Human Rights envoy who was vocal on Cambodia’s shortcomings and has threatened to expel other UN officials for making public statements that he claims constituted “interference in internal Cambodian affairs”.

Recently Hun Sen has further quieted domestic critics by stoking nationalist sentiment over a border dispute with Thailand involving land surrounding an 11th century Khmer temple listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site in 2008. Even his most vocal opponents agree with him (and would not dare to oppose him) on this issue of territorial integrity. In this respect he is following in the path of previous Cambodian rulers, nearly all of whom have played upon longstanding Cambodian fears of being victimized by their neighbors Vietnam and Thailand, who have for centuries chipped away at Cambodian territory before the arrival of the French.

However, bad as all this may seem, there is a positive side to Hun Sen’s dominance of the political scene. He has imposed stability on a country that has experienced more than thirty years of turmoil and civil war. This has boosted the tourism industry and attracted the interest of international investors, who see Cambodia as another potential “Asian tiger”. He has welcomed this interest by opening the country to virtually unrestricted foreign investment and easing laws that prohibited foreign ownership of land. This, along with the ongoing activities of foreign aid donors and the more than 2000 Non-Government Organizations operating in the country, has led to outside involvement in Cambodia on a scale unprecedented in its history. These developments and accompanying rapid economic growth are triggering major social change, with large numbers of young Cambodians abandoning the rice paddies for jobs in urban areas or contracting out as laborers to countries such as Korea, Thailand and Malaysia. In the process an insular, heavily rural and very conservative society is being transformed into an extension of the modern globalized word.

It is impossible to predict where these deep social changes will lead but the old Cambodia characterized by an apparently gentle, smiling people and a languorous pastoral charm seems destined over time to become more like other fast growing Asian countries. This will no doubt be a wrenching experience for a people that have long been considered almost impervious to change. But Cambodians are basically pragmatic, with a strong survival instinct, and when necessary they have adapted to changing circumstances, even under the Khmer Rouge regime. As the country moves toward greater integration with the outside world, the personalized patrimonial political culture, which underlies current abusive governance practices, may gradually evolve toward a more responsive modern polity.

An urbanized, better-educated and informed populace will likely demand more responsible and accountable leadership, although this may take a generation or more to evolve and will have to cross a number of hurdles along the way. Cambodia’s weak and corrupt educational system could hamper the ability of young Cambodians to acquire the skills necessary for successful participation in a modern economy and the civic knowledge required to become more responsible citizens. In addition, despite the appearance of stability that Hun Sen has managed to instill in recent years, a strongman government without a broad institutional foundation is inherently fragile, especially when the time comes for a transfer of power. This has long been a problem for Cambodia, dating back to Angkorian times, when there were often clashes among various pretenders to the throne in the absence of a clear line of succession. These conditions still exist today and it remains an open question whether social and political change in Cambodia will occur fast enough to avoid a repetition of this scenario.

Many believe that Hun Sen intends to install his son Manet, a graduate of the US Military Academy at West Point who also holds a doctorate in economics from a British university, in his place. There is speculation that he might try to do this while he is still able to serve as a mentor and provide Manet with political advice, following the model of Lee Kwan Yew, whose leadership style and history he admires. This would be a risky undertaking and could open the doors for rivals within his own political circle or other pretenders from outside the current ruling oligarchy to make a bid for power. Political continuity could also be disrupted by popular unrest stemming from a severe economic downturn, failure by the economy to create adequate employment opportunities for the 200,000 new job seekers joining the labor market annually, or a backlash over continued disparities in wealth and human rights abuses, especially land grabbing. Should Hun Sen depart the scene suddenly due to illness or accident a destabilizing battle for succession might erupt, creating an opportunity for underlying popular grievances to surface.

Nevertheless, barring events leading to a complete breakdown in authority that drives investors and aid providers away, Cambodia may well remain generally on a trajectory toward continued economic development and a more modern socio-political system, although, for the reasons outlined above, there will likely be significant bumps along the road. Indonesia, which during the Suharto era bore similarities with present day Cambodia, offers one example of how such a successful evolution might occur.