Cambodia in 2015: Accommodating Generational Change

The 14th of January 2015 marked thirty years of Hun Sen’s rule as Cambodian Prime Minister, making him one of the longest-serving leaders in the world, and the longest-serving leader in Southeast Asia. Seven days earlier, 7 January 2015 marked thirty-six years since the fall of the Khmer Rouge. With a rule this long, Hun Sen and his ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP), whose legitimacy is rooted in the defeat and demise of the Khmer Rouge, faces a new set of long-term political challenges. The majority of the Cambodian population that the sixty-three-year-old authoritarian leader is overseeing is no longer the generation of traumatized Khmer Rouge genocide survivors, but a much more demanding population, of which at least sixty per cent are half his age or less.¹ The July 2013 elections was not only a turning point in Cambodia’s political history, but, more importantly, it captured the “coming of age” of a new generation of Cambodians — some already in their thirties — that is gradually reshaping Cambodia’s political, economic and social dynamics, as well as the nation’s long-term democratization prospects.

The year 2015 gave witness to the continuing trend of a generational shift moving towards a critical mass. The Cambodia of 2015 was different from the Cambodia of 2005, and vastly different from the Cambodia Hun Sen knew when he first assumed power three decades ago. In addition, as Cambodia’s own “Millennial” generation — or perhaps more correctly termed “post–Khmer Rouge baby-boomers” — are coming of age politically during the information revolution era, they are transforming popular expectations.² Compared to their parents they are more educated and connected, and increasingly form the core of engaged citizens demanding democratic space and social accountability, rule of law, and human rights. Arguably, they pose the only real long-term challenge to the country’s most powerful institution, the CPP, and its established system of patronage and a party structure that has changed little over the past three decades.

The opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) has been capitalizing on the momentum of this demographic change and accompanying discontent. But following a year-long deadlock that saw large street protests and parliamentary boycotts, the CNRP reached a landmark agreement with the CPP in July 2014. The preceding months of political compromise culminated in the two main political rivals — Prime Minister Hun Sen and CNRP President Sam Rainsy — attempting an unprecedented “culture of dialogue” in April 2015. The supposedly novel concept initially appeared to be a promising step away from Cambodia’s culture of “old politics”, but by the end of the year relations had spiralled downward leading to a breakdown of the political truce and a rise of tensions in November.

Despite relative political stability throughout the year, the CPP has consistently taken steps to further limit the activities of civil society and democratic space, with the introduction of a number of new pieces of legislation. The most controversial is the NGO law, which allows the government to regulate the large numbers of NGOs present in Cambodia and is likely to pre-empt any possible fallout of continuing social changes that might undermine the CPP’s prospects of victory in the elections in 2017 and 2018.

A young population has also been a selling point for the Cambodian economy, which in 2015 continued to experience growth on the heels of relative political stability and robust domestic consumption. There is also both immense excitement and anxiety about the coming ASEAN integration, from which, overall, Cambodia stands to reap significant economic benefits.

In foreign policy, Cambodia continued to see strengthening relations with China, as well as relatively stable relations with Thailand and the United States, while relations with Vietnam sank to their lowest ebb in many years due to domestic politics and Cambodia’s increasingly cosy relations with China.

From Democratic Progress to Regression

Since the UN-held elections in 1993, Cambodian multiparty politics has been characterized by mistrust, violence and a general lack of political will to build a truly democratic culture as enshrined in...