Cambodia votes: democracy, authority and international support for elections 1993–2013

Extract

Authoritarianism has a very long history in south-east Asia. Traditional states in the region were top-down affairs, as were the colonial administrations which supplanted them. Nationalist revolutions in the twentieth century promised but, for a multiplicity of reasons, failed to deliver popular sovereignty. Ethnic divisions, conflicts between rival nationalist camps and the escalating violence of the Cold War interfered with the rollout of elections and representative government. Nationalist idiom frequently finished the job; the leaders of post-independence states were all too often construed as patriarchs who held the authority to speak and act on behalf of nascent national collectives. In some countries, political sentiment was forcibly channelled in support of one-party rule. In others, kakistocrats and status quo elites simply took over the business of government. Everywhere, constitutional rhetoric and electioneering theatricals were belied by developments on the ground—the promotion of state and nation-building efforts to the detriment of full-spectrum politics.