Sivhuoch Ou

The United Nations (UN) introduced multiparty elections to Cambodia in 1993 in the hope of bringing about democracy in that country. Ironically, the two-and-a-half decades of uninterrupted elections have led to an ever-more authoritarian government under Prime Minister Hun Sen and the Cambodian People's Party (CPP). Authoritarianism under the single-dominant party system began in 1997, but has intensified since 2017 with the ban on the leading opposition party. While concurring that repetitive elections have consolidated authoritarianism, this paper argues that elections are not merely tools that authoritarian leaders deploy to hold on to power. Elections are arguably mechanisms that have compelled the CPP to offer several extraordinary economic concessions since 2013; this is the first argument of the paper. The developments have created a win-win scenario for the rulers and the ruled—the authoritarian leaders prolong their rule, and the masses have more disposable income, amon...

The trajectory of the liberal peacebuilding project has encountered a fundamental critique of its failure to deliver the expected sustainable peace. This paper questions the approach with which it has been, and largely still is, pursued. We reflect on a more communicative, nuanced, contextual and time-bound approach. In particular, we identify the failure of the liberal peace to localise peace and to make it a part of everyday life in Cambodia. Nevertheless, we claim that liberal peace has unintentionally created space for progress, while a ‘local turn’ has proved significant. We demonstrate empirically that certain forms of local and everyday peace have emerged for the ‘wrong’ reason, and may evolve further. Hence, a local peace has gradually sunk in, although its liberal foundations remain virtual.

The rights-based approach (RBA) to development emerged as a new and relatively authoritative
paradigm, starting from the late 1990s. At its core is the argument that human rights and
development converge and, unless the socio-economic rights of the poor are attained, poverty
cannot be alleviated. Its approach is to shift NGOs’ strategy from providing charity to
empowering the poor politically so that they are able to claim their rights. Recently, major
bilateral and multilateral donors and international non-government organisations have been
gradually adopting the approach. Significant resources are channelled to support RBA. The
influential trend has swept the Global South widely, including Cambodia; several donor agencies
and international NGOs in the country have increasingly implemented RBA. Thus far, there is
thin literature documenting the potentials and pitfalls of the approach, specifically for NGOs
in Cambodia. This paper, using the concept of power, provides feasible suggestions for the
adoption of RBA. It takes seriously that power is entrenched in Cambodian administrative,
social and international donor structures. Therefore, for a long-term perspective, an adjusted
version of RBA is advocated. It needs to consider seriously deep-rooted power, adopting a
gradual rather than a radical approach of attempting hastily to remove power from the state
and give it to the poor. The paper then challenges a stream of RBA debates pressing local
NGOs and their donors rapidly to adopt purely politicised projects and abandon conventional
service provision. Local NGOs and their donors should not disregard service delivery swiftly
but integrate rights into services. The analysis is based upon consultation with a wide range of
comparative literature and interviews conducted between 2009 and 2013.

Peacebuilding is rarely delivering to expectations. Instead, high-strung ambitions tend to mix with local dynamics triggering complex processes. In particular, the liberal peace approach has been criticised for operating with simplified world-views, mismatching with realities. In this article, we take a long-term perspective and assess the outcome of peacebuilding efforts in Cambodia two decades after the massive UN-operation was concluded. We apply the notion of ‘friction’ between interveners and intervened in order to illuminate the ‘hybridity’ that has, we claim, been the key outcome of both peace and democratisation attempts. We trace several key development processes in some detail in order to illuminate how the particular kind of ‘friction’ that came with this particular kind of peacebuilding. We conclude that although progressive development and deepened peace have emerged, inevitably a hybrid society has been created with remaining deep-seated tensions and severe questions on progressive long-term development.