Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
democratic project had produced a mirage on the Mekong, an illusion of Western demo-
cratic forms behind which the country operated much as it always had.
This mirage was everywhere. It hung over Cambodia's courts and parliament. It in-
fused the Constitution and laws that Cambodia had enacted to placate foreign aid donors.
It shimmered on the streets of Phnom Penh, with their fine restaurants and refractions of
First World prosperity. It was especially blinding on that day in June 2013 when Chhouk
Bundith was convicted of shooting three young women, only to disappear, like a human
mirage, when it came time to enforce his sentence. In Hun Sen's Cambodia, accountabil-
ity and change always lay on the horizon. But what seemed tangible from a distance, on
closer inspection very often melted into thin air.
The first half of this topic describes the origins and history of Hun Sen's Cambodia,
arising from the ashes of the Khmer Rouge regime in 1979 and navigating through the
hostile years of the Cold War. Then, in the early 1990s, Cambodia joined the wider world,
and schemes of a rights-based universalism collided with the realities of a poor postcon-
flict society, burdened with a long history of autocratic rule. An important part of the story
is the rise of Hun Sen, the figure who has done the most to shape the country's recent
destiny and push back against the norms imported during the UN years. The image that
emerges is of a strong leader of a weak nation—a figure who is flexible, adaptable, highly
strategic, adept at the manipulation of foreign interests. As the years went by, Hun Sen
became a skilled illusionist, conjuring up mirages of democracy behind which he ruled in
the traditional way, through an iron fist and a canny manipulation of his country's history
and culture.
The second half of the topic examines the country that has emerged under Hun Sen.
While the CPP has presided over peace and stability, it has left many of the country's
poorest and most vulnerable citizens behind. The gale force of Cambodian capitalism has
swept thousands off their land, stripped the country of its natural resources, and left many
stranded on the rim of Hun Sen's economic revolution. In this sense, Cambodia's story
will always be that of the Cambodian people themselves, of people like Bun Chenda and
her family, and how they have experienced and responded to their country's recent evol-
utions. In a rapidly changing country, they, too, find ways to persist.
