The nature and role of ideology in the modern Cambodian state

Journal of Southeast Asian Studies

Volumn 37, Issue 3, 2006, Pages 375-395

  Slocomb, Margaret ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF QUEENSLAND   (Australia)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

GEOPOLITICS; POLITICAL IDEOLOGY; STATE BUILDING;

ASIA; CAMBODIA; EURASIA; SOUTHEAST ASIA;

EID: 33748294115     PISSN: 00224634     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0022463406000695     Document Type: Article

References (72)

1. The Khmer People's Revolutionary Party, founded in 1951, was renamed the Communist Party of Kampuchea at the Third Party Congress in 1963 when Pol Pot was declared its leader. A brief Party Congress was held in Memot on 5 Jan. 1979, just two days before the overthrow of the Pol Pot regime, to reorganize the party, now re-named Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party. However, references to the 'CPK' continued to appear regularly, even on official documents, throughout the early years of the PRK.
2. Serge Thion, 'The pattern of Cambodian politics', International Journal of Politics, 16, 3 (1986): 128.
3. Raoul M. Jennar, The Cambodian constitutions (1953-1993) (Bangkok: White Lotus, 1995), pp. 2 (preoccupations) and 3-4 (long quote).
4. During the drafting of the 1981 constitution, persistent efforts were made to involve the people in the process. On 4 Mar. 1981, for example, the People's Revolutionary Council announced (No. 2SPrK) that it was disseminating copies of the draft constitution 'in order that cadres, staff, workers, and youth serving in the KPRAF as well as all the people throughout the country can discuss and make contributions...'. Handwritten notes testify that this mass participation did take place with questions such as whether monks could vote and whether women students should be sent to study abroad. See the documents attached to 'Panhha piseng piseng dael ban leuk laung pi pieksa sdei ampi kumrong prieng rodththoamanon' [Various issues raised in discussion concerning the draft outline of the new constitution], 28 Feb. 1981, in State Archives [henceforth ANC], Phnom Penh, PRK files, unsorted. During the drafting of the present (1993) constitution, the Women's Sectoral Group, for instance, representing both government and non-government organizations were encouraged to - and indeed did - submit their opinions. Rights gained by women under the previous revolutionary regimes were retained in that charter.
5. Theda Skocpol, 'Cultural idioms and political ideologies in the revolutionary reconstruction of state power: A rejoinder to Sewell', Journal of Modern History, 57 (1985): 91.
6. Douglas Kellner, 'Ideology, Marxism and advanced capitalism', Socialist Review, 42 (1978): 44, 50, 53.
7. Milton Osborne, Politics and power in Cambodia, the Sihanouk years (Camberwell, Vic.: Longman, 1973), p. 4.
8. Le Monde, 8 Oct. 1963, reproduced in Le Sangkum: Revue politique illustrée, 1 (Aug. 1965). Translations from French and Khmer are by the author.
9. Lotte sangkumneyum Puttsasana robas yeung [Our Buddhist Socialism], copy held in ANC, Box 319, 1965.
10. ANC, Box 269, Politique économique du SRN, official communiqué of the Sangkum Reastr Niyum and the Royal Government, 1961.
11. Ibid.
12. Ibid.
13. ANC, Box 592, Considérations sur le socialisme khmer (Phnom Penh: Ministère de l'Information, 1961).
14. Ibid.
15. Ibid. For a full discussion of how the ideology of the Sangkum was translated into economic action, see Rémy Prud'homme, L'économie du Cambodge (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1969).
16. Osborne, Politics and power, p. 116.
17. Elizabeth Becker, When the war was over: Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge revolution (New York: Public Affairs, 1986), p. 114.
18. Justin Corfield, Khmers stand up!: A history of the Cambodian government 1970-1975 (Clayton, Vic.: Monash University Centre of Southeast Asian Studies, 1994), p. 82.
19. Ibid., p. 106.
20. Becker, When the war was over, p. 128.
21. For a chronology of events for the Khmer Republic, see ANC, Box 601, The struggle continues, 1, 8 (Feb. 1975):4-7. Lon Nol invited the Khmer Rouge to negotiate without prior conditions on 30 Nov. 1974; the invitation was, unsurprisingly, ignored.
22. Agence Khmère Presse, No. 7005, 23 May 1970, reproduced in Bulletin bi-hebdomadaire, Chambre Mixte de Commerce et d'Agriculture, 26 May 1970, p. 1. Copies of this periodical are in ANC, Boxes 144ff.
23. Becker, When the war was over, p. 128.
24. ANC, Box 357: Speeches on the occasion of the declaration of the Khmer Republic: 9, 10, 11 October 1970 (Phnom Penh: Ministry of Propaganda, 1970).
25. Sim Thai Pheng, 'Notre opinion: L'économie cambodgienne au tournant', Bulletin bi-hebdomadaire, Chambre Mixte de Commerce et d'Agriculture, 16 Oct. 1970.
26. Becker, When the war was over, p. 132.
27. Corfield, Khmers stand up!, p. 132, quoting from the New York Times, 19 Mar. 1972.
28. Ibid., p. 162.
29. ANC, Box 357, Maréchal Lon Nol, Néo-Khmerisme (Phnom Penh, undated)
30. Corfield dates its publication to late 1972 (ibid., p. 162).
31. Ibid.
32. Ibid.
33. Some key works for the history of this period include David Chandler, The tragedy of Cambodian history: Politics, war and revolution since 1945 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991)
34. Michael Vickery, Cambodia 1975-1982 (North Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 1984)
35. Stephen Heder, 'Kampuchea's armed struggle: The origins of an independent revolution', Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 11, 1 (1979): 2-24
36. and Ben Kiernan, How Pol Pot came to power: A history of Communism in Kampuchea, 1930-1975 (London: Verso, 1985).
37. Kate Frieson, 'The political nature of Democratic Kampuchea', Pacific Affairs, 61, 3 (1988): 407 (ideological exclusiveness), 408 (striking impressions), 409 (legitimate Communist party).
38. 'A short guide for application of Party statutes', in Communist Party power in Kampuchea: Documents and discussion, ed. Timothy Carney (Ithaca: Cornell University Southeast Asia Program, 1977), p. 56.
39. 'Report of activities of the Party Center according to the general political tasks of 1976', in Pol Pot plans the future: Confidential leadership documents from Democratic Kampuchea, 1976-1977, ed. and tr. David Chandler (New Haven: Yale Southeast Asia Studies, 1988), pp. 182-3.
40. Frieson, 'Political nature', p. 409.
41. FBIS, 29 Sept. 1978, quoted in ibid., p. 410.
42. Vietnam Courier, 1 (1979): 8.
43. Ibid.
44. Ibid., p. 10.
45. Ibid.
46. Ibid.
47. ANC, PRK files (unsorted), 'Sekkedei thlaengkar robas Renakse Samakki Kosang Karpie Miettophum Kampuchea' [Declaration of the Solidarity Front for the Construction and Defence of the Kampuchean Motherland], 1981.
48. For the history of this period, see Margaret Slocomb, The People's Republic of Kampuchea 1979-1989: The revolution after Pol Pot (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2003) and Evan Gottesman, Cambodia after the Khmer Rouge: Inside the politics of nation building (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003).
49. and Evan Gottesman, Cambodia after the Khmer Rouge: Inside the politics of nation building (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003).
50. ANC, PRK files (unsorted), 'Kosang aoy roeng muam Pak Marx-Lenin koechie koddar komnot ney cheychumneah robas padewat Kampuchea' [Building the strength of the Marxist-Leninist Party is the key factor in the success of the Cambodian revolution], study document for the Party Plenary Congress, CPK Central Committee, 3 Apr. 1981.
51. David Chandler, 'How to slice a century of Cambodian history', Phnom Penh Post, 24 Dec. 1999-6 Jan. 2000, p. 14.
52. By the end of 1981, Pen Sovann had fallen out with the Vietnamese over matters of sovereignty, particularly in relation to the new PRK armed forces. His Khmer Vietminh faction, trained in Vietnam, lost out to the former Khmer Rouge faction whose key political leaders were Chea Sim and Hun Sen. He was charged with treason (for having contact with the Thai military, perhaps as a prelude to defection) and imprisoned in Hanoi until the end of 1991. He formed the Khmer Sustaining Party, which contested the 1998 election and narrowly missed gaining a seat in the National Assembly.
53. Quoted in Murray Hiebert, 'Rising from the ashes', Far Eastern Economic Review, 12 Jan. 1989, pp. 16-17.
54. Ibid.
55. Jennar, Cambodian constitutions, p. 8.
56. The United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia, which oversaw preparations for and the process of the multi-party elections.
57. On 28 Jan. 1999, Hun Sen withdrew from the post of commander-in-chief, which was transferred to General Ke Kimyan. During the ceremony he said that 'the effort to promote neutralization of the national armed forces of Cambodia is an important context for liberal pluralistic democracy.... For this reason, I called it an imperative political reform.' The quotation is from a copy of his speech, provided by a source in Cambodia.
58. 'Development of democracy in Cambodia', Phnom Penh Post, 24 Dec. 1999-6 Jan. 2000, pp. 6, 14.
59. Jennar, Cambodian constitutions, pp. 3-4.
60. The so-called 'coup' of July 1997 effectively ended this arrangement. The nominal executive rule with two prime ministers continued, however, until the 1998 elections returned the CPP to power in its own right.
61. Lor Chandara, 'CPP strategy goes from gifts to achievements', Cambodia Daily, 5 Oct. 2001.
62. Paul Mus, L'angle de l'Asie (Paris: Hermann, 1977), p. 82.
63. Kellner, 'Ideology, Marxism', p. 53.
64. Pin Sisovann and Michael Cowden, 'PM defends judiciary, blasts int'l pressure', Cambodia Daily, 16 Aug. 2005, referring to the sentencing in the military court of opposition National Assembly deputy Cheam Channy on charges of attempting to form a 'shadow army'. The opposition Sam Rainsy Party claims it was merely forming a shadow cabinet along the lines of Western democracies that follow the Westminster parliamentary system.
65. 'PM speaks against corruption' - edited comments, Phnom Penh Post, 26 Aug.-8 Sept. 2005.
66. William Shaw, 'PM paints positive picture at UN summit', Cambodia Daily, 17-18 Sept. 2005.
67. The Khmer People's National Liberation Front was nominally led by Son Sann but consisted of several factions.
68. Kay Kimsong, 'PM: Coalition will provide stability for Cambodian investors', Cambodia Daily, 12 Aug. 2005.
69. Lee Berthiaume and Prak Chan Thul, 'Iron fist court reform seizes one of its own', Cambodia Daily, 19 Aug. 2005.
70. 'Hun Sen moves ahead', Asiaweek, 21 May 1999.
71. General population census of Cambodia 1998: Final census results (Phnom Penh: National Institute of Statistics, July 1999), p. xi.
72. Milton Osborne, Politics and power, p. 112.