Cambodia needs to change, adapt

As her neighbors embrace the dynamism of this new century, Cambodia must adapt or she may be left far behind.

June 15, 2011
A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
PACIFIC DAILY NEWS

I know some Cambodian democrats are provoked that I continually emphasize that Cambodian democrats are on their own to face Premier Hun Sen's autocracy; that there's no international guardian of rights, freedom and the rule of law coming to their rescue and the sooner democrats accept that a nation-state's national interests generally trump its concern with human rights violations, the better.

But I keep on writing -- I am grateful to the Pacific Daily News for providing its pages as an outlet. Together, I believe we are making a difference. The great Chinese teacher, Confucius, said, "It is better to light one small candle than to curse the darkness."

A sine qua non condition for the Cambodian democratic opposition to move forward in its fight for rights, freedom and the rule of law is for the diverse opposition groups to stop tearing each other apart. This internal dissension is precisely what Hun Sen and his ruling Cambodian People's Party would like to see continue.

It weakens and diminishes the opposition in the eyes of Cambodian citizens in general, and it presents those in the international community with an excuse to continue dealing with the autocrats in power.

Khmer future in hands of youths

Mar. 16, 2011
Written by A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
PACIFIC DAILY NEWS

In the final analysis, the future of the Khmer nation rests in the hands of the young generation of Khmers who must decide and dictate which road to development and progress Cambodians need to take.

A quotation familiar to many -- "All that is needed for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing" -- is attributed to Anglo-Irish statesmen Edmund Burke, who supported the cause of the American Revolution and criticized the French Revolution.

Another statement I have often quoted, "The world is a dangerous place. Not because of the people who are evil; but because of the people who don't do anything about it," was offered by the Nobel Prize winning American physicist Albert Einstein.

And perhaps French playwright Moliere summed up best who's accountable: "It is not only for what we do that we are held responsible, but also for what we do not do."

We are today in the year 2011. The world has changed and would be an unfamiliar place, indeed to the sages of centuries past. Yet French critic Alphonse Karr said long ago, "Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose" -- "The more things change, the more they stay the same."

Good ideas can inspire action

November 10, 2010
By A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
PACIFIC DAILY NEWS (Guam)

"A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history." - Mahatma Ghandi

Some people seem to be able to recall a million facts and bits of data. The harder job of intellect is to do something with those bits. Imagine, wonder, inquire, interpret, compare, relate, analyze, assess, calculate.

The bits of data are information, not knowledge. Learning is limitless, but learning can also require "unlearning."

Importance of thought

People naturally engage in patterned behavior and reproductive thought with little energy or effort.

Patterned behavior and reproductive thought imprison men in a vicious circle: To do the same thing over and over, with a predictable outcome.

Breaking away means entering a new mode of behavior and productive thinking: Do what has not been done before; think critically with the goal to understand, relate, determine alternatives and select the best option; and think creatively through imagining and generating new ideas, improving on them and generating still newer ideas, until a "breakthrough change" occurs.

In reproductive thinking, the intellect is asleep. In productive thinking, the intellect is alive and active.

The great thing about the human brain is it can be taught to think better. Some would say that in today's world, what we know is less important than how we think.

Power of thinking

Positive thinking helps render life better in the family, at work, in the community and in the world. A positive mind makes us strong spiritually and physically, opens doors to new things and different views, and provides opportunities where a negative mind sees only difficulties.

The Dec. 5, 2008, British Medical Journal reported a study that showed happiness is contagious -- more contagious than unhappiness. Your own actions, behaviors and thoughts can make you happy, but your chances to be happy are increased by 15 percent through connections to happy people!

Recall the saying, "Live with cow, sleep like cow; live with parrot, fly like parrot."

The world can be a stressful place. International economic conditions have brought hardship to many. Though we live longer, eat better and have more material things, many people are basically unhappy. A positive attitude, backed by better thinking and imagination, can help us deal with life's problems, which can be solved, and deal with life's predicaments, which can be coped with.

Those who respond to a difficult challenge with an offhand comment -- "pigs can't fly" or "a hyena does not give birth to a lion" -- do not inspire fighting dictatorships. Think instead of Nelson Mandela's determination not to be broken when he was in jail: "I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul"; and a 13th century England warrior, whose motto was: "Rise and rise again until lambs become lions."

Words on a poster in my college dorm room more than 40 years ago read: "You can blindfold me, you can gag me, you can close my ears, you can chain my hands, but you cannot prevent me from thinking." That's positive, better thinking!

The 'Monkey Master'

The 14th-century Chinese fable, the "Monkey Master," cited in Dr. Gene Sharp's "From Dictatorship to Democracy: A Conceptual Framework for Liberation," is worth retelling.

An old man used monkeys to pick fruit from the mountains. One-tenth of each monkey's harvest had to be given to the old man, or the monkey would face a hard flogging. The monkeys dared not protest.

One day, a small monkey got other monkeys to talk. All monkeys agreed -- the old man didn't plant the fruit trees, hence, the fruits didn't belong to him. The monkeys could take the fruits for themselves; there was no reason why monkeys must serve the old man!

So the monkeys tore down and destroyed their place of confinement, took all the fruits in the old man's storage, took off for the woods and never returned. The old man died of starvation.

The moral of the story: When monkeys were enlightened and awakened to the nature of the old man's injustice and ruthlessness, the old man's rule ended. Likewise, a people enlightened and awakened can end dictators' rule.

Power of ideas

Just as a rock thrown into a pond of still water produces a ripple that expands into larger and larger circles, a good idea, however small, can inspire people, who will inspire still others, into action. The first rock and the first person can make a difference.

Recall Newton's first law of motion: "An object at rest stays at rest and an object in motion stays in motion, with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force."

Great painter Vincent van Gogh said, "Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together."

When asked how she determined where to begin to help others as there's so much need and injustice in the world, Mother Theresa replied: "Do the thing in front of you."

So, do it now. This is the moment you have, your moment. Don't lament missed opportunities; tomorrow is yet to come.

Robert F. Kennedy explained how human history is shaped: "Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope." India's Mahatma Gandhi, pronounced: "A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history."

Then, you say, "Yes, we can!"

A. Gaffar Peang-Meth, Ph.D., is retired from the University of Guam. Write him at peangmeth@yahoo.com.

There's no change without belief

Click on the comic strip to zoom in

September 15, 2010
By A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
Pacific Daily News (Guam)

Opportunities to interact with others and engage in situations through which our own beliefs and habits are challenged, are engaging and stimulating. Through such interactions, we learn to take new perspectives into account.

The reconsiderations that result are an important element to improving the quality of our thinking. To paraphrase Sir Isaac Newton -- and take his reference into a new realm -- an object at rest tends to stay at rest; an object in motion tends to stay in motion; unless stopped by an unbalanced force.

A founding partner of a firm that provides global corporations with training, facilitation and consultation in productive thinking and innovation, Tim Hurson, says better thinking can be taught.

He admits "truly focused thinking" is hard work. It involves "observing, remembering, wondering, imagining, inquiring, interpreting, evaluating, judging, identifying, supporting, composing, comparing, analyzing, calculating, and even metacognition (thinking about thinking)."

It's no wonder "why so few people" actually engage in it, he says.

In the words of Martin Luther King: "Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think."

No 'cut to the chase'

In this age of instant gratification with a click of a keyboard or a push of a button, who has the patience to wait 20 years for education to bear fruit? In my teaching days, students' whispers and body language could transmit their frustration with the hard work of "thinking." As a teacher, sometimes my best efforts to engage my students fell short.

But as the world marches on, dedicated teachers inspire, challenge and prepare students for a competitive world.

Education takes time; there is no "cut to the chase," no ABC action manual, no one-size-fits-all.

We have to rely on our "one kilo of brain" to think -- and to think better.

Denial

"You are in denial. I am in denial, We are all in denial," someone wrote.

Denial is used across cultures and national boundaries, by individuals, groups or nations as a defense mechanism to escape from unwanted feelings of hurt, shame or guilt. Denial is an unwillingness to face an unpleasant reality or a painful truth.

Children love to play in their fantasy worlds. But they grow and learn about reality.

The comic character Calvin plays in his fantasy world, away from the real world of his father and mother. Invincible fantasy Calvin saves the world from inhumanity and injustice -- until his parents subject him to human cruelties such as eating dinner or taking a bath or doing homework.

Then Calvin knows his world of fantasy has ended.

For us grownups, denial persists. We live in the real world, where we cannot avoid an unpleasantness or a pain that we wish never occurred. Life affects us with its ups and downs. We are not beyond doing foolish things and making mistakes, being neither saints nor angels.

We differ from animals in that they rely on instinct. We have our intelligence to help us think, learn from our errors and move on.

Yet there are those who are stuck, who cannot move on.

Denial and blaming go hand in hand.

Simple denial is a rejection of a reality or a truth: "No, that's just not so!"
As we live in a world of our own creations, our self-righteousness makes us the good guys who can't do wrong; the others are the bad ones, responsible for all ills under the sun.

Minimization is playing down the level of seriousness of a reality or a truth, without really denying it: "But I had only two social drinks."

A most dangerous form of denial is transference: One in denial excuses oneself from the unpleasant painful reality but holds others responsible for unpleasant, hurtful things: "Had you not done that, this wouldn't have happened!"

One excuses oneself from culpability, but reproaches and condemns others as responsible.

Change

Karma -- or what Cambodians termed "prumlikhit" -- is a belief that one's lot is determined by a supernatural force, or by what is ordained that can't be changed. They explain one's failed exam, bad marriage, accident, illness, poverty and so on.

If so, is any person responsible for anything?

Cambodians in general say they worry about Cambodia's continued existence as an entity. Their neighbors to the east, the Vietnamese, and to the West, the Thais, have repeatedly encroached on Khmer territories over centuries. Much of today's Vietnam and Thailand once belonged to the Khmers. Many denounce Khmer kings, queens, princes, princesses and elites for the disintegration and shrinkage of modern Cambodia, and condemn their neighbors.

Justifiably so, one can argue.

But is such an exercise misplaced energy? Energy should be channeled to educating and to learning for a better future.

I, myself, write about the losses of Khmer territories, the usurpation of Khmer land by the neighbors, the maddening Vietnamization of Cambodia with the compliance of Khmer rulers, royal and non-royal.

Khmers should learn from their neighbors to block their dark designs. They must unlearn old habits that keep Khmers from advancing. A respected Cambodian-American scholar said the Khmers' neighbors to the east were Khmers Anh-Em, a term of endearment, while Khmer activists refer to them in pejoratives, as if this is going to change anything.

Change begins with one's self. There cannot be change until we believe change is possible.

A. Gaffar Peang-Meth, Ph.D., is retired from the University of Guam, where he taught political science for 13 years. Write him at peangmeth@yahoo.com.

Real progress requires change

"We all can make change, I truly believe that with the right mindset, and the right people, Cambodia will see change ... It's only a matter of time before justice comes along" - Sopheap Chak

May 12, 2010
By A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
Pacific Daily News (Guam)

There's no end to learning. I cherish the words and experiences of those who have seen and accomplished things I have not.

People change; things change -- a natural inevitability. Nothing stays the same. We must anticipate what may come and be proactive to influence the change we want to see, so we won't spend our lives getting out of the rubble that could have been avoided had we done something in the first place.

The late veteran professor Henry Steele Commager said: "Change does not necessarily assure progress, but progress implacably requires change. Education is essential to change, for education creates both new wants and the ability to satisfy them."

Martin Luther King Jr. said: "The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically."

For some, formal education takes too long to produce results in this instant-gratification era of a click on the keyboard or a push of the button. But learning also has been made easier to acquire through technology.

An education leader of one of America's most successful public school systems, Jerry D. Weast, said, "The toughest job of any leader ... is to move from strategy to execution because it's people who do the work, not the plan." He asserts, "Visionary leadership will drive change, but to sustain it, you must shift leadership strategy to incorporate the work of teams."

Creative thought -- using our minds to imagine and create what we want to see -- and critical thought -- using our brains to evaluate and judge what our mind has produced -- are two interwoven determinants of action that dictate our future.

Specialists say organizations' and movements' successes are better assured when they are more inclusive, and individual members are encouraged to think creatively and critically, to innovate and take risks.

A Khmer saying goes, "Think first before you draw."

Yet, Cambodians say cases of drawing first and thinking later are plentiful in Khmer society.

A comparativist by training, I see connections in thought -- a Khmer proverb is connected to psychologist-consultant Dr. Linda V. Berens' "four temperaments" -- the theorist, the catalyst, the improviser, the stabilizer -- and to Weast's "teams" that "work within a culture."

A Khmer proverb says, "Curved wood makes wheel; straight wood makes spoke; crooked wood makes firewood." All things have a purpose.

Berens says one may be a "best-fit" in one temperament pattern, but display characteristics of other temperaments. In "Understanding Yourself and Others," she describes four temperaments. A theorist values competence, coherence and expertise, uses strategic analysis to approach situations and builds a path to achievement. A catalyst idealizes a vision of the future, advocates, builds bridges between people and helps them attain self-actualization. An improviser seizes the moment and varies actions to get things done using whatever is at hand. The stabilizer wants structure and sequence to maintain order, stability and security, and to prevent groups and institutions from falling apart.

Recall retired Johns Hopkins University professor Naranhkiri Tith's calls on Cambodians to remove their "blindness and irrational trust and belief in ... the god-king." He knows challenging the old mentality and monarchical practices may be "unthinkable" for many, but Tith asks why we fear going against old habits and conventional wisdom if doing so serves justice and human rights, a higher end?

There are Cambodians of Berens' temperaments and of Weast's teams, inside and outside the country, who seek to foment change.

I profiled some in my columns: Opposition lawmaker Mu Sochua; grassroots activist Serey Ratha Sourn, head of Cambodian Action Committee for Justice and Equity; former Radio Free Asia reporter, Piseth Lem, who now fosters the successful Free Press Magazine Online.

Last month, a Cambodian graduate student in Japan, Sopheap Chak, wrote "'Development' does not justify land grabs," which looks at Cambodia's forced evictions and land grabs through comparative lenses. Of the 18 million people evicted in 80 countries, Cambodia ranks first among Asian countries in the number of evictions. This month, Chak defends her master's thesis, "Urban Forced Eviction in Cambodia: Causes and Possible Solutions."

The youngest of three siblings from Kompong Cham, where her father was a tailor and mother a housewife, Chak finished high school in 2002, worked for a nonprofit organization, involved herself in conferences on democracy, election and poverty reduction, and pursued university studies in Phnom Penh.

With a bachelor's degree in international relations and another in economics, she ran a volunteer youth network, working with people in rural areas. She was an advocacy officer of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights before she went to study in Japan in 2008.

"We all can make change," Chak said in an interview on Global Voices Online. "I truly believe that with the right mindset, and the right people, Cambodia will see change." Her biography in her website reads, "It's only a matter of time before justice comes along."

Chak's "Reflection on Cambodian Women Value and Model" tells how her parents raised her to value education, but Khmer society pulled her to "old tradition" in a male-dominated society that considers females inferior -- a topic worth another column!

Chak, 25, plans to join a civil society organization upon her return to Cambodia this summer. She envisions earning a doctorate degree in the future.

A. Gaffar Peang-Meth, Ph.D., is retired from the University of Guam, where he taught political science for 13 years. Write him at peangmeth@yahoo.com.

Collective efforts drive positive change

The country [Cambodia] cannot survive because "the legacy of the past, especially the institution of the (Khmer) monarchy," combined with the "conservative nature" of the Khmer society, form the "main causes" for Cambodia's current "economic, institutional, legal, political, and social problems" - Naranhkiri Tith

May 5, 2010
By A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
Pacific Daily News (Guam)

Saudi Arabia, the Middle East's largest Arab country, is home to some 28 million people and encompasses Islam's holiest cities, Mecca and Medina. The country is an ally of the United States and the homeland of Osama bin Laden, and of 15 of the 19 terrorists of Sept. 11, 2001.

More than 90 percent of Saudi Arabia's exports derive from oil, which provides some 75 percent of the government's revenues.

This undiversified economy is mirrored in a rigid social structure: Saudi Arabia has the world's most stringent institutionalized gender segregation. Today, reform-minded Saudis are pitched against those fundamentally entrenched in Islamic Sharia.

Change is inevitable, but change involving religious beliefs and traditional customs, such as the Saudi tribal customs upholding gender segregation, is no simple matter.

On April 19, the Christian Science Monitor published an article by Carlyle Murphy, from Riyadh, which catalogues the significant conflict between Saudi forces for change, led by the king, and the institution of the strictly enforced Sharia.

Last September, King Abdullah inaugurated a graduate school of advanced scientific research -- the King Abdullah University for Science and Technology, decreed as the country's first co-educational institution. Though the co-ed status attracts foreign faculty and students, King Abdullah believes a modern Saudi Arabia, with a diversified economy less dependent on oil, must revise some of its old social strictures.

As reported in the Monitor, in Saudi Arabia men and women use different doors to enter government offices and banks; companies segregate women workers to a separate floor; the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce uses different hours for men and women employees to arrive and leave work to avoid mixing; male professors use closed-circuit television to teach female university students, etc..

The Monitor reports that King Abdullah makes no secret of his determination that "conservatives won't be allowed to hold back reforms," as he chips away "the edges of restrictive traditions." He makes women members of his delegation on foreign trips, has his photo taken with them, expands opportunities for women to attend university.

King Saud University professor Fawziah al-Bakr says, "King Abdullah has a strategy: He's trying to empower women as much as he can."

"Gender apartheid is the best word to describe the situation in Saudi Arabia," the Monitor quotes women as saying. Professor of history Hatoon Ajwad al-Fassi of King Saud University called the Saudi institutionalized segregation "one of the major obstacles in normalizing our lives, and it's affected our work and our education ... (and) quality of life."

Murphy wrote about Sheikh Ahmed al-Ghamdi, head of the Mecca chapter of the religious police, whose primary task is patrolling public places to ensure segregation of men and women. In a two-page interview in Okaz newspaper, he says there's nothing in Islam that bans men and women from mixing in public places. Public mixing, a natural part of life, was customary during the prophet Muhammad's time, he says.

Responding to al-Gamdhi, Murphy writes, was cleric Sheikh Abdulrahman al-Barrak, who says one who allows men and women to work and study together is an apostate to whom the death penalty applies.

Al-Barrak is silent when asked if he means King Abdullah should be sentenced to death. Al-Barrak's website is blocked by the Saudi government.

Those who decry al-Ghamdi's stance say, "Segregation of sexes is the soul of the social fabric of Islam," writes Murphy, who quotes professor al-Fassi as saying there is no surprise to hear that "a part of society" is unhappy that some clerics like al-Ghamdi tell them they "were wrong and there's nothing wrong with (gender) mixing."

Al-Bakr says she is encouraged because while elimination of gender segregation was "unthinkable" in the past, "Now ... it (is) thinkable. Not doable at this stage. Just thinkable."

In a different world but in the spirit of fomenting change, retired Johns Hopkins University professor Naranhkiri Tith has spearheaded an uphill battle to get Cambodians to rethink old thoughts and old ways.

The country cannot survive because "the legacy of the past, especially the institution of the (Khmer) monarchy," combined with the "conservative nature" of the Khmer society, form the "main causes" for Cambodia's current "economic, institutional, legal, political, and social problems," Tith says.

Tith calls for "a progressive and systematic overhaul" of traditionally conservative Khmer society, which relies on belief in prophesies and a rigidity in social organization.

Whether Tith's call is heeded to bring about change for a new Cambodia, Tith is headed where Cambodians in general have dared not go: Changing old habits before the country collapses.

I am reminded of Shankar Vedantam's "Hoping Someone Else Fixes Everyone's problem," about how a "collective action" would benefit everyone, except that not everyone is willing to chip in to work toward the "public good."

Vedantam's example of the "free rider problem" comes to mind: On a street of 10 houses there's a giant pothole in the middle of the block that troubles all the residents. A repaired pothole would benefit everyone. But nobody wants to make phone calls and go through the hassle to get it fixed. Each resident has an "incentive to sit back and hope someone else will do the dirty work."

Public good that benefits everyone requires collective action.

A. Gaffar Peang-Meth, Ph.D., is retired from the University of Guam, where he taught political science for 13 years. Write him at peangmeth@yahoo.com.

CNN helps grad help Cambodians

9/24/07
By: Sam Choe
The Chronicle (Duke University, North Caroline, USA)

How do you make a difference in the lives of disadvantaged people? To Cassie Phillips, it means to go live with them and work for a change.

Chosen to be part of the CNN initiative "Be the Change," Phillips, Trinity '07, is currently working in Battambang, Cambodia, volunteering with nonprofit organization Homeland to aid downtrodden Cambodian children, including victims of abuse, the sex trade and HIV.

"Be the Change" is a CNN project about a group of volunteers who are trying to help people around the world through social action. The network has equipped six selected volunteers with cameras and laptops.

The subjects' blog and video posts about their experiences helping people around the world are available on the project's Web site. The project went live this month and will last one year.

"I didn't really know much about the program or other participants when I agreed to participate," Phillip wrote in an e-mail from Battambang. "Because it's a new project, I expect it will morph and change as the year goes on."

The goal of "Be the Change" is to inform people what volunteers go through when working in foreign countries.

"It's a project that involves six fairly young people-young, technologically savvy people, who are going off to various projects throughout the world to help out people and communities," David Lindsey, the project's producer, said.

Through the initiative, the volunteers are expected to file blogs and video diaries regularly about how they are adjusting in foreign countries, how their projects are progressing, what kinds of people they are meeting and what they are feeling for one year in their designated areas.

It was the Sanford Institute for Public Policy's Hart Leadership Program that connected Phillips with "Be the Change."

"We started with a long list of organizations that we thought may fit the bill," Lindsey said. "We narrowed it down and narrowed it down, and the Hart Leadership Program became one of the top organizations we were interested in."

During her time at Duke, Phillips was active in the Center for Race Relations as an assistant director for Common Ground and as codirector of the Peer Facilitation Training Program.

A seasoned traveler, Phillips spent a summer studying in Spain and traveled to Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. She also volunteered at the Leave a Little Room Foundation in Gulu, Uganda while she was an undergraduate.

Seema Parkash, Trinity '06, the Hart Fellows Program coordinator, wrote in an e-mail that Phillips is a very thoughtful person.

"Her involvement in 'Be the Change' precipitated deep reflection on how to be true to the authenticity of her experiences without violating the privacy of her subjects, even before she left for Cambodia," Parkash said.

She added that Phillips has an ability to be honest, with herself and to others, about her shortcomings and fears.

"Cassie's thoughtfulness and honesty serve her well in her constant striving to learn and grow, particularly when she is outside of her comfort zone," Parkash said.

Phillips said taking part in "Be the Change" has been a new experience for her that made her uncomfortable at times.

"I was not entirely comfortable with the camera myself when I started and I'm still working on that," she said. "So it's been a slow process of trying different things and learning about how the camera affects me and the people I'm with."Her thoughtfulness and honesty have been useful for viewers as well.

"She's experiencing some things she has never experienced before," Lindsey said. "And we can watch her do it."