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Time to break up with the international community? Rhetoric and realities of a political myth in Cambodia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 December 2020

Katrin Travouillon Open the ORCID record for Katrin Travouillon [Opens in a new window]  and
Julie Bernath
Katrin Travouillon*
Affiliation:
Department of Political and Social Change, Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs (ANU), Acton, Australia
Julie Bernath
Affiliation:
Center for Conflict Studies, Marburg, Germany
*
*Corresponding author. Email: katrin.travouillon@anu.edu.au
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Abstract

The international community is as ubiquitous as it is elusive and its universalist pretensions remain unchallenged in political and academic discourse. In response, this article turns to Bottici's work on political myths. Against the notion of myths as falsehoods, we argue that they create their own sphere of shared social and political reality. The analysis centres on the case of Cambodia, a country that served as an experiment of liberal interventionism. It draws on archival and field research on two consecutive international interventions, a review of public statements by international actors, and interviews with Cambodian actors and activist. We argue that to understand the ideas actors use to orient themselves as they press for change, it is necessary to consider how decades of engagement with the myth have shaped the political imaginary. Our empirical analysis points to three different phases in the use of the myth: Its production during UNTAC, the reinforcement of its narratives through subsequent legal, aid and development interventions, and finally its contemporary use in a post-liberal context. We observe that Cambodian actors increasingly engage the myth to question the terms of transnational cooperation for democracy. Our work has implications for assessments of the legacies of liberal peacebuilding.

Keywords

CambodiaInternational CommunityPeacebuildingPost-liberal
Type
Research Article
Information
Review of International Studies , Volume 47 , Issue 2 , April 2021 , pp. 231 - 250
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the British International Studies Association

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Footnotes

†

The original version of this article was published with the incorrect received date. A notice detailing this has been published and the error rectified in the online and print PDF and HTML version.

References

1 More than three thousand representatives of over eight hundred NGOs registered for the conference. See UN Press Release, ‘Fifty-Second Annual DPI-NGO Conference to Take Place at Headquarters from 15 to 17 September’ (9 September 1999), available at: {https://www.un.org/press/en/1999/19990909.note5572.doc.html}.

2 UN Press Release, SG/SM/7133, ‘Kofi Annan, Secretary-General Examines “Meaning of International Community” in Address to DPI/NGO Conference’ (15 September 1999), available at: {https://www.un.org/press/en/1999/19990915.sgsm7133.doc.html} accessed 10 April 2018.

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6 Interview (Julie Bernath) with leading member of a human rights organisation, Phnom Penh, 30 November 2018.

7 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with Ou Virak, president of Future Forum, Canberra, 5 July 2019.

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27 Bottici, A Philosophy of Political Myth; See also Kaczmarska, ‘The powerful myth of the international community’.

28 Bottici, A Philosophy of Political Myth, p. 8; Hans Blumenberg, Arbeit am Mythos (Frankfurt, 1979).

29 Bottici, A Philosophy of Political Myth, p. 100.

30 Ibid., p. 127.

31 Michael Loriaux and Cecelia Lynch, ‘Mythography: No exit, no conclusion?’, in de Guevara (ed.), Myth and Narrative in International Politics; Nicolas Lemay-Hébert and Stefanie Kappler, ‘What attachment to peace? Exploring the normative and material dimensions of local ownership in peacebuilding’, Review of International Studies, 42:5 (2016), pp. 895–914.

32 Gromes, Thorsten, ‘Probleme der Komplexität, Koordination, Konsistenz und Beendigung von Interventionen’, in Interventionskultur: Zur Soziologie von Interventionsgesellschaften (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 2010), p. 178Google Scholar.

33 Bottici, A Philosophy of Political Myth, p. 179.

34 Kaczmarska, ‘The powerful myth of the international community’, p. 135.

35 ‘Compte-rendu de la réunion du Secrétaire général avec les représentant de partis politiques cambodgiens’. UNTAC protocol of meeting on 8 April 1993, original French.

36 Akashi Interview 1, News Magazine, no. 8 (17 August 1992).

37 Programme broadcast, Radio UNTAC, 29 March 1993.

38 LDP representative, UNTAC Roundtable Discussion, December 1992, original transcript in Khmer.

39 Programme 56, Radio UNTAC, prod. A. Z. Rijal, broadcast 8/9 April 1993.

40 UNTAC Roundtable Discussion, Democratic Party representative, December 1992, original transcript in Khmer.

41 Programme 22, Radio UNTAC, prod. Roy Head, undated document.

42 Ibid.

43 Programme 27, Radio UNTAC, prod. Roy Head, 10 March 1993.

44 Dialogue No. 9, Radio UNTAC, 29 July 1992.

45 Programme 35, Radio UNTAC, 18 March 1993.

46 Programme 60, Radio UNTAC, prod. Amadou Moctar Gueye, 12/13 April 1993.

47 Telephone interview with Lt Col Healy, UNTAC Headquarters, 4 May 1993.

48 Hun Sen Discusses Khmer Rouge, Other Issues, FBIS document, 30 November 1993, p. 7.

49 Tom Martin, ‘Cambodia after UNTAC: The domestic limits to international intervention’, Policy, Organisation and Society, 13:1 (1997), p. 18.

50 Interviews (Julie Bernath) with former CNRP district councillor, Kandal province, 22 May 2018; Boeng Kak lake activist, Phnom Penh, 10 February 2018; former CNRP commune councillor, Kratie, 7 May 2018; leader of civil society advocacy organisation, Phnom Penh, 7 February 2018.

Interview (Julie Bernath) with former CNRP district councillor, Kampong Thom, 21 May 2018.

51 Interview (Julie Bernath) with former CNRP district councillor, Kandal province, 22 May 2018.

52 Interview (Julie Bernath) with community representative from Rattanakiri province, Phnom Penh, 9 February 2014.

53 Interview (Julie Bernath) with Boeng Kak lake activist, Phnom Penh, 11 February 2018.

54 ‘Khmer word that designates a foreigner, European, or French person’ (as quoted in Ovesen, Jan, and Trankell, Ing-Britt, Cambodians and their Doctors: A Medical Anthropology of Colonial and Post-Colonial Cambodia (Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2010), p. xiGoogle Scholar.

55 Among many interview encounters, this came up for instance during the interviews with two representatives from Rattanakiri conducted by Julie Bernath, Phnom Penh, 9 February 2014; and the interviews with members of the Boeng Kak community conducted by Katrin Travouillon, Phnom Penh, 19 November 2012.

56 Interview (Julie Bernath) with community representative from Rattanakiri province, Phnom Penh, 9 February 2014.

57 Authors’ interview with independent political analyst, Phnom Penh, 6 and 10 February 2018.

58 1995 quote from Michael Kirby, UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Cambodia from 1993–6. As quoted in Hughes, Caroline and Pupavac, Vanessa, ‘Framing post-conflict societies: An analysis of the international pathologisation of Cambodia and the post-Yugoslav states’, Third World Quarterly, 26:6 (2005), pp. 873–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

59 ECCC, ‘An Introduction to the Khmer Rouge Trials’, Information booklet, 3rd edn (2008), available at: {www.eccc.gov.kh/sites/default/files/publications/an_introduction_to_Khmer_Rouge_Trials_3th.pdf} accessed 20 July 2020.

60 Excerpt from the 16 May 2000 Letter from John Kerry to Hun Sen, as quoted in Gidley, Rebecca, Illiberal Transitional Justice and the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan), p. 197CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

61 Hughes, The Political Economy of the Cambodian Transition, pp. 85, 202.

62 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with Kem Veasna, leader of the League for Democracy Party, Phnom Penh, 17 July 2018.

63 See, for example, Duncan McCargo, ‘(No) country for old men?’, Asian Survey, 54:1 (January/February 2014), pp. 71–7.

64 Laura McGrew and Scott Worden, ‘Lessons from Cambodia's Paris Peace Accords for political unrest today’, USIP Peace Brief 224 (May 2017), p. 4.

65 Kimseng Mem, ‘Rainsy calls on international community to intervene in Cambodia’, VOA Khmer (17 June 2016), available at: {www.voacambodia.com/a/rainsy-calls-on-international-community-to-intervene-in-cambodia/3380918.html} accessed 13 September 2019.

66 See Request to reconvene the Paris Conference on Cambodia, in light of the Cambodian government's dismantling of democracy (23 October 2017), available at: {https://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/supporting_resources/joint_open_letter_cambodia_france.pdf} accessed 14 August 2020.

67 UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in Cambodia, A/HRC/39/73/Add.1, ‘Human Rights and the 2018 National Elections’, Addendum 1 to the Report to the UN Human Rights Council (7 September 2018), available at: {https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G18/270/69/PDF/G1827069.pdf?OpenElement} accessed 13 April 2019.

68 See, for example, Frederick Z. Brown and David G. Timberman (eds), Cambodia and the International Community: The Quest for Peace, Development and Democracy (New York: The Asia Society, 1998).

69 McGrew and Worden, ‘Lessons from Cambodia's Paris Peace Accord’, p. 4.

70 Barma, Naazneen H., The Peacebuilding Puzzle: Political Order in Post-Conflict States (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), p. 3CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

71 Kaczmarska, ‘Reification in IR’, p. 357.

72 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with three leading CNRP activists, Melbourne, Australia, 1 February 2020; Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with leading CRNP activist, Washington, DC, 11 and 12 March 2020.

73 See, for example, Michael Dickinson and Tran Techseng, ‘Rainsy fails to board flight to Bangkok’, Voice of Democracy (7 November 2019), available at: {https://vodenglish.news/rainsy-fails-to-board-flight-to-bangkok/} accessed 14 August 2020.

74 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with three leading CNRP activists, Melbourne, Australia, 1 February 2020; Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with leading CRNP activist, Washington, DC, 11 and 12 March 2020; Fieldnotes and observations (Katrin Travouillon) of a public event of the Minnesota section of the CNRP, 7 March 2020 in Minneapolis. At this event, the former members of the Cambodian parliament Eng Chhai Eang (Co-Vice President of the CNRP) and Long Ry were in attendance, as well as CNRP activists who had participated in Sam Rainsy's attempt to return to Cambodia on 9 November 2019.

75 Interview (Julie Bernath) with former CNRP district councillor, Kampong Thom, 21 May 2018.

76 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with leading CRNP activist, Washington, DC, 12 March 2020.

77 Sophal Ear, as quoted in Andrew Nachemson, ‘Cambodia: From pet project to problem child’, The Phnom Penh Post (27 November 2017), available at: {https://www.nationthailand.com/opinion/30332655} accessed 15 September 2019.

78 Interview (Julie Bernath) with leader of civil society advocacy organisation, Phnom Penh, 7 February 2018. Conversation (Katrin Travouillon) with head of policy research institute, Phnom Penh, 5 July 2019.

79 Interview (Julie Bernath) with leading member of a human rights organisation, Phnom Penh, 30 November 2018.

80 Kheang Un, Cambodia: Return to Authoritarianism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019).

81 de Guevara and Kühn, ‘The international community needs to act’, p. 137.

82 Prime Minister Hun Sen, ‘Selected Off-the-Cuff Speech at the Ground-Breaking Ceremony to Rebuild National Road 3 from the Chaom Chao to Kompot City [unofficial translation]’, Cambodia Vision (7 May 2018), available at: {http://cnv.org.kh/rebuild-national-road-3/} accessed 23 June 2020.

83 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with Ou Ritthy (youth leader), Phnom Penh, 6 July 2019.

84 Two interviews (Katrin Travouillon) with two Cambodian union leaders, Phnom Penh, both 9 July 2019; interview (Katrin Travouillon) with a group of four representatives of garment factory workers, Phnom Penh, 30 June 2019.

85 Ben Sokhean, ‘Minister bans foreigners from returning with Sam Rainsy’, Khmer Times (25 July 2019), available at: {www.khmertimeskh.com/50627078/ministry-bans-foreigners-from-returning-with-sam-rainsy/} accessed 15 September 2019; Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with senior EU official, 2019; informal conversations and field observations (Katrin Travouillon), Phnom Penh, June and July 2019.

86 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with Yang Saing Koma, President of Grassroots Democratic Party, Phnom Penh, 11 July 2019.

87 Field observations (Katrin Travouillon), Phnom Penh, July 2019.

88 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with Sam Inn, secretary general of Grassroots Democratic Party, Phnom Penh, 21 July 2018.

89 Interview (Katrin Travouillon) with Yang Saing Koma, president of Grassroots Democratic Party, Phnom Penh, 11 July 2019.

90 Interviews (Katrin Travouillon) with two civil society leaders, Phnom Penh, 2 and 11 July 2019.

91 Walker, Rob, Inside/Outside: International Relations as Political Theory (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. 141Google Scholar.

92 Loriaux and Lynch, ‘Mythography’.

93 Bliesemann de Guevara, ‘Introduction: Myth and narrative in international politics’, in de Guevara B. (ed.), Myth and Narrative in International Politics, p. 16.

94 UN Press Release, SG/SM/7133, ‘Kofi Annan, Secretary-General Examines “Meaning of International Community” in Address to DPI/NGO Conference’, 15 September 1999, available at: {https://www.un.org/press/en/1999/19990915.sgsm7133.doc.html} accessed 10 April 2018.