CAMBODIAN ELECTIONS: LESSONS LEARNED AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS A Post-Election Conference Report National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (original) (raw)

Understanding the 2013 Elections in Cambodia

the surprisingly strong showing of the opposition coalition in the 2013 national election in Cambodia shocked both external observers, the ruling party, and, apparently, Cambodians themselves. The mood in Cambodia since the election has been one of rising excitement at the prospect of political change. In fact, analysis of elections since 1993 shows that the distribution of votes in 2013 among parties was not particularly unusual, if national elections are treated as different from local elections and there are good reasons for doing this. The significance of the 2013 elections may not be so much that they reveal a surprising distribution of political support amongst the electorate than that they reveal cracks in the ruling party's ability to dominate the electoral scene.

The Failure of Democratisation by Elections in Cambodia

Contemporary Politics, 2017

This article questions the explanatory power of the theory of democratisation by elections. This approach to democratisation argues that elections in authoritarian regimes constitute part of a metagame between ruling elites and opponents, which involves a competition for votes inside a larger competition over the nature of political power. The cumulative effect is that even flawed elections raise the costs of repression and lower the costs of toleration in ways that eventually bring about democracy. When applied to the most likely case of Cambodia, however, electoral democratisation has resoundingly failed to occur. Instead, this article argues that neopatrimonialism inhibits the transformative power of elections by preventing the emergence of resolute democratic ideals, reform-minded elites and pro-democratic institutions. In this way, the distribution of party-state patronage constitutes a method of co-optation; and flawed elections represent a mechanism to renew and reinforce the historical roots and structural basis of state authority. Using the case of Cambodia, this article develops an account of neopatrimonialism in authoritarian elections and explores the implications of the Cambodian experience for the democratisation by elections theory more broadly.

Cambodian Democratization and its challenges

This paper intends to address the political situation in Cambodia. It focuses on the democratization process and its challenges. It examines the political willingness of leaders, knowledge of people as well as corruption, and the problem of separation of power and democratic institutions. The paper utilizes the delegative democracy approach to explain the difficulties faced by Cambodia in its democratization process. With respect to this, the paper also explains how democracy influences the political situation of the country and the living conditions of Cambodian people. In order to promote democracy, the paper demonstrates that people participation and social media could play a very important role to improve democracy in Cambodia. Keywords: Cambodia, Democracy, Democratization, Delegative- Democracy, and Political Situation