Sihanouk: Prince of light, prince of darkness

NOTES FROM
SIHANOUK: PRINCE OF LIGHT, PRINCE OF DARKNESS


Chapter 1: All in one lifetime

Sihanouk’s mood swings between strident insistence on his correctness of his policies and his solutions and the readiness to threaten withdrawal from office, or even from the country, when he was opposed, were two sides of the same personality trait. Backed too often by sycophantic advisers who would not, or dared not, contradict his decisions, Sihanouk in his heyday seemed set endlessly to dominate Cambodian politics both domestically and in the international sphere.

Yet while Sihanouk’s personal life has been colorful in Western terms, it is well to remember that this has not, in itself, been the preoccupation for his compatriots. For most of them, his alliances, both brief and sustained, with many women were not a cause for criticism. What did come to worry the official classes of Phnom Penh was the free rein Sihanouk later gave to his most favored consort, Monique, for the greed she and her family clique displayed in the late 1960s played an essential part in Sihanouk’s overthrow in March 1970.

Soon after he was placed on the throne in 1941, the French Resident Superior in Cambodia, Gautier, pressed him to marry a wealthy commoner. Apparently, Gautier and the governor-general of Indochina, Admiral Decoux, thought that such a marriage would ensure that Sihanouk would follow the subservient model provided by the Vietnamese ruler, Bao Dai, who had married the daughter of a rich southern Vietnamese landowner and showed no inclination to question French control of his country.

Although he has seldom been close to any of his male children, his affection for some of his daughters has been important. He doted on Kantha Bopha, a daughter who died in the early 1950s and whose death reinforced Sihanouk’s determination to devote himself to continuing a political career. His affection for Bopha Devi and Botum Bopha was clearly real: it has lasted with the former and it heightens his passionate dislike of the Khmer Rouge who killed the latter.

Very importantly, Sihanouk had been ready until the early 1960s to heed the wise advice given him by his elder advisors. But by 1965 the Cambodian “oasis of peace”, which he constantly proclaimed his country to be, was sliding towards increasing involvement in the war being fought next door in Vietnam. At the same time the first public sign s were emerging of leftist political dissent that ultimately climaxed in the Khmer Rouge’s coming to power a decade later.

In Cambodia’s case the prince’s passion for film-making did matter, for it came at time when the Cambodian state was poised to slide into disaster. The conservative politicians who had seen their interest protected by their alliance with Sihanouk were no longer convinced that his policies served those interests. The men and women of the left, after years of being hounded by Sihanouk’s security police, were planning a move into full-scale resistance. And peasant discontent with a range of Phnom Penh’s policies led to outbreaks of major unrest.

His speech became more and more gloomy until, in April 1967, he made a fateful statement: “I act according to my conscience which is absolutely clear. Let those who disapprove of me come and take my place or do away with me.” Three years were to pass before his opponents on the right took him at his word.

Sihanouk reacted to reports of rebellion and disaffection in the harshest fashion. The politically conscious people in Phnom Penh was not greatly surprised when Sihanouk announced that he had personally call for the mass execution of the hill people in the northeastern Cambodia who had allied themselves with the growing communist-led insurgency in that region. And they had no doubt that Sihanouk had approved of another harsh order. This was an instruction that resulted in loads of severed heads being from Battambang province to Phnom Penh as evidence that the peasant rebellion in the northwest of the kingdom was being suppressed.

In the most honest of all his writings, Sihanouk has revealed the psychological trauma of his years as a prisoner of the Khmer Rouge after Pol Pot came to power, when, never sure whether he would live or die, he watched his brutish guards amusing themselves by torturing monkeys to death outside the house in which he was confined.

Sihanouk was not nor is Cambodia, but for a lifetime he has remained the principal actor on his country’s stage. Others have sought to share that position with him, but their roles have never matched his for longevity. Yet some of those other players deserve more attention than they have usually received and the cast is enormous when one reviews the prince’s more than 50 years as a public figure. Son Ngoc Thanh, for instance, was an early campaigner for Cambodian independence in the 1930s. After wartime exile in Japan he was briefly prime minister of Cambodia before the French reasserted control over the kingdom in 1945. His career later included time spent as a law student in France, as a leader of an anti-Sihanouk rebel force along the Thai-Cambodian border and, ultimately, as one of the plotters who overthrew the prince in 1970.

Assorted members of the royal family parade as near-permanent figures in Cambodia’s continuing drama. Sihanouk’s father, Suramarit, never came to the fore, despite his period as king following Sihanouk’s abdication in 1955. But Kossamak, his mother, was always a major influence on him and a powerful figure in her own right. She was venerated by her son, and the suggestion in a Western news magazine that she profited form brothels built on royal land she owned led to one of Sihanouk’s more pyrotechnic displays of rage. Prince Sirik Matak, Sihanouk’s cousin, who was once a trusted ally and then became a dedicated political opponent, deserve particular mention as one of the key figures in the 1970 coup.

Sons such as Naradipo and Ranariddh moved in and out of their father’s favor, but only his daughters seem to have managed to hold his affection for prolonged periods.
For years, until his downfall in 1970, a group of senior advisors was closely associated with Sihanouk. In the 1950s and 1960s their names recur in cabinet after cabinet: Penn Nouth, who stood by Sihanouk in good times and bad for more than 30 years; Son Sann, the courtly advisor on economic affairs who fell out with Sihanouk in the late 1960s; Nhiek Tioulong, the bluff Sino-Cambodian whose devotion to Sihanouk led to his agreeing to play the part of an ageing roué in Sihanouk’s first feature film, Apsara; General Lon Nol, the man who commanded Sihanouk’s armed forces before overthrowing the prince and then, crippled, militarily incompetent and in thrall to astrologers and mystics, lost the war against the Khmer Rouge; Kou Roun, Sihanouk’s sinister minister of the interior who controlled the secret police and ended his career as a night watchman on Paris.

Yet how much of Sihanouk’s career has, in fact, been an illusion, a series of dramatic episodes in which his energy and flamboyance have hidden the fact that he could rarely shape events rather than react to them? A dispassionate view bolsters the conclusion that Sihanouk was only rarely able to choose courses of action rather than trims his sails to winds he could not control. What is remarkable is the extent to which he has made the most of limited opportunities and in so doing remained in power for so long.


Chapter 2: Unexpected king

During the early decades of the 19th century it was scarcely that, as Thailand and Vietnam contended for dominance over the pitifully weak Cambodian court, Vietnam gaining the ascendancy in the 1830s.

The memories of this period has remained deeply impressed in Cambodia consciousness, for while the Vietnamese exercised control over the kingdom, ruling for a time through a puppet queen, they sought to transform the country into an approximation of their own. The prerogatives of the royal family were attacked, an attempt was made to substitute the Vietnamese style of provincial administration for the existing Cambodian structure, and Cambodian officials were ordered to dress in the same manner as Vietnamese mandarins.

Finally, as the Vietnamese exercised control over Cambodia they acted against Buddhism, the national religion which commanded the respect of prince and peasant alike. By desecrating pagodas and persecuting monks, the Vietnamese struck at a central element of Cambodian identity.

The harshness of the regime the Vietnamese imposed on Cambodia sparked a major rebellion in 1840, which for a time seemed likely to threaten Vietnam’s control.

Between 1841 and 1848, Thailand gradually asserted its influence over Cambodia, backing the accession to the throne of its chosen nominee, King Ang Doung. He was the last Cambodian to rule free of direct foreign control until 1953.

Although Cambodia chroniclers and historians have celebrated Ang Doung’s rule as a period of high achievement, his actions were still constrained by his dual vassalage to the Thai and Vietnamese courts. His awareness of these constraints led him to make tentative efforts to secure assistance from France to bolster his country’s independence. These efforts led eventually to the imposition of a French protectorate over Cambodia in 1863, three years after Ang Doung’s death.

Poorly informed though they were about much in the weak kingdom, the French knew enough to be aware that Norodom, the man named to be Ang Doung’s successor, was a prince who had spent much of his life as a part-guest, part-hostage at the Thai court in Bangkok.

Largely in response to French pressure, and still concerned not to anger the Thai king, Norodom signed a protectorate treaty with France in August 1863. Under the treaty’s terms, Norodom ceded control of his country’s foreign relation to France in return fro French protection of Cambodia, recognition of the king’s sovereignty, and a pledge to assist him to maintain order within the kingdom.

Norodom was to reign 40 years and to found the Norodom branch of the Cambodian royal family. Unbiased commentators testified to his lively intelligence and his deep sense of the dignity of kingship. But for most of the French officials who dealt with Norodom throughout his long reign the king was an oriental despot.

Time and again in his succeeding years Sisowath demonstrated his willingness to work with the French to advance their aims. Yet it was not until 1897 that he was given a firm promise that he would succeed Norodom.

The best evidence suggests that Norodom opposed such an outcome, hoping that one of his sons would succeed him. The likelihood of this happening was diminished by the outspoken anti-French activities of two of those sons, Doung Chacr and Yukanthor, each of whom was sent into exile as punishment.

The lives lived by the king and his officials, The French administrators, and the Chinese merchants who dominated commerce in the capital was sharply different from the lot of the peasants in the countryside.

What can be said with certainties is that for many peasants their daily existence involves a harsh grind of long physical labor, indebtedness to Chinese rice merchants and the ever-present risk of being robbed or murdered by the bandits who roamed the countryside.

Not only the French knew little peasant life. Few members of the large royal family knew or cared about events outside the capital.

Kossamak, Sihanouk’s mother, was more interested in her son and became a major influence in his adult life.

Sihanouk lived in a world in which the word and comforting presence of women was a dominance feature.

Sihanouk also noted wryly that he saw King Monivong handling, or failing to handle, affairs of state. The picture he leaves of Monivong is a graphic one. The king, in his 60s, surrounded himself with the women of his household and his many offspring. He took no interest of the details of administration. He signed the paper brought to him for validation without bothering to read them while lying in a hammock. His predecessors, Sihanouk recalls, were nothing more than parrots trained by the French to say “yes”.

As the 1930s drew to a close the French were once again debating who should succeed to the throne. Although other names were considered, the French authorities increasingly directed their attention to the merits of Sihanouk’s father, Suramarit, and his uncle, Monireth.

By the mid-1930s, Suramarit was under consideration as a successor to King Monivong. As debate about the desirability of once more having the Norodom on the Cambodia throne continued among senior French officials, Suramarit met this requirement.

Those French officials who favored Monireth’s candidacy argued for his worthiness as a French–trained officer with a reputation for being straightforward, even blunt. In the light of the contending claims put forward on behalf of the two princes, the French minister of the Colonies, George Mandel, summoned both of them to Paris so that could choose between them. Having met them, there is no firm evidence that he made a choice; instead he postponed the decision.

Both Norodoms and Sisowaths claimed there had been attempts to bribe French officials and a strong oral tradition persisted that there was a falling out between King Monivong and his son Monireth because of the latter’s choice of a wife. (Monireth had married a vivacious and handsome Rosette Poc, the daughter of a senior official, who had previously had been the mistress of a number of Frenchmen.)

In his defense of his wartime actions, Decoux writes of the reasons of “high policy” that he took into consideration in supporting Sihanouk’s selection for the throne. Although not elaborated further, these words can only be taken to mean the concerns the governor-general had for the maintenance of France’s position in Indochina.

Easiest to assess and dismiss as having no major importance is Sihanouk’s own suggestion that he gained the throne because Decoux’s wife found him charming.

Did Decoux really believe that a prime reason for choosing Sihanouk was to end the rivalry between Norodoms and Sisowaths that had existed since the 19th century?

A considered answer would take account of the following points. A concern to have an easily controlled youth on the Cambodian throne, rather than have even the marginal risk of an older man who might stand in the way of the implementation of some French policies, was without doubt the main reason for the choice of Sihanouk.


Chapter 3: Marechal, nous voila

Without question, Son Ngoc Thanh and his close associates, Pach Chhoeun and Sim Var, represented the first stirrings of modern nationalism in Cambodia.

Thanh’s father was an ethnic Cambodian; his mother has been variously described as Vietnamese or Sino-Vietnamese.

A measured assessment of Sihanouk’s life during the war years (Second World War) needs to balance his subservience to the French against the opportunities they gave him to have more contact with his countrymen than any other Cambodian ruler had ever enjoyed. The motives of the French in encouraging Sihanouk’s exposure to the Cambodian population were self-serving, but in pursuit of their own interests they further reinforced the symbolic importance of the Cambodian monarchy.

Among the demands placed on Cambodia’s rural population by the French administration during the war was the requirement that, beyond conserving the absolute minimum for the own use, the peasantry had to sell all of the fish oil they produced to the government. Equally, they had to sell their entire production of kapok to the administration so it could be exported to Japan. Sihanouk’s protests against these measures were of no avail. Equally unavailing were his protests against continuing efforts by the French to promote the Romanization of the Cambodian writing system and the substation of the Gregorian calendar for the traditional Cambodian calendar, in which the New Year begins in April.

Sihanouk’s account of his protests against these proposed changes are quite believable, including his claim that, in relation to the Romanization issue, he thought seriously of abdicating. He was dissuaded from doing so by his parents, who reminded him of past French readiness to exile fractious members of the royal family who had opposed the colonial power.

Ranking first among Sihanouk’s pleasures were women. Rejecting the urgings of the French that he follow Bao Dai’s example and marry a solid bourgeois, he readily found distraction within his own court.

Charles Meyer, Sihanouk’s longtime French advisor, provided a catalogue of the women who have borne Sihanouk’s acknowledged children. The first was a commoner, Moneang Kanhol, who was mother to Princess Bopha Devi (borne 1943) and then prince Rannariddh (1944).

Next was princess Monilessan, who as a member of the frequently intermarried Cambodian royal family was Sihanouk’s aunt. She became the mother of Naradipo (1946), whom Sihanouk was later to name as his successor. Another princess and aunt, Pongsanmoni, became the mother of four of Sihanouk’s sons, Yuvanath (1943), Ravivong (1944), Chakrapong (1945), and Khemnurakh (1949). Their daughters were Soriyaraingsey (1947) and Botum Bopha (1951).

A Laotian woman, Mam Manivann, was mother to another two daughters, Sucheatvateya (1953) and Arunrasmey (1955). But the most enduring of Sihanouk’s relationship has been the one with Monique Izzi, the Eurasian beauty who bore him two sons, Sihamoni (1953) and Narindarapong (1954). None of these women ranked as official consorts under traditional Cambodian law. This title was reserved for Princess Thavet Norleak, a cousin of Sihanouk who was largely hidden from public view throughout his years in power and who bore him no children.

This catalogue of consorts and children is far from complete. The important point once again is that Sihanouk’s rabbit-like behavior was not in itself a cause for criticism by his compatriots, most certainly not in his early years on the Cambodian throne.

By the standards of his royal predecessors, Sihanouk’s enthusiasm for women has been restrained. His great-grandfather, Norodom I, maintained a female establishment in the hundreds, though not all of these women shared his bed. Monivong, Sihanouk’s immediate predecessor, was said to have had 60 wives. The fact of royal polygamy has never troubled Cambodians.

Only when Sihanouk’s amatory life became entangled with politics, as happened many years later, would whom he took to bed become important.

The young king set about clearing the palace of the seemingly innumerable members of the royal family and their servants and retainers who had turned its buildings and grounds into something resembling a vast transit camp. On his orders the provision of opium to members of the royal family and to some senior officials was terminated, so ending a practice which the French had encouraged from the time of Norodom I onwards.

On March 9, 1945, in a brief and largely bloodless coup de force the Japanese disarmed the French military and interned them and French civilian officials. Four days later Sihanouk, acting under Japanese tutelage, proclaimed the emergence of his country from French “protection” as the independent state of Kampuchea.

And Sihanouk was ill-prepared indeed for his new role. The nearly four years that had passed since he was designated king had brought no notable development of political maturity and the knowledgeable, if critical, long-time advisor Charles Meyer is not alone in arguing that some years were still to pass before Sihanouk seriously engaged himself in affairs of state rather than making the pursuit of pleasure his dominant concern.

Any study of the prince will fail to understand adequately the ebb and flow of Sihanouk’s emotions and his almost pathological inability to accept criticism.

Apparently attracted to the idea of Cambodia’s regaining its independence at the time of the coup de force, Sihanouk’s most significant political decision was to ask the Japanese to permit Son Ngoc Thanh to return to Cambodia from his exile in Japan. Given the later bitter enmity between Sihanouk and Thanh, the irony of his request needs no emphasis, not least since Sihanouk and Thanh were at odds before the end of 1945. David Chandler could well be right in suggesting that Sihanouk may have acted as he did because of urgings from his father Suramarit, who had been on friendly terms with Thanh during the 1930s.


Chapter 4: The return of the French

The months following the Japanese coup de force were profoundly important for the future course of Cambodian’s political history, but despite his later self-justificatory accounts, there is real difficulty in assessing Sihanouk’s role during this period. When all the evidence is reviewed, a strong impression remains that he was swept along by events rather than helping to shape them.

After the Japanese coup, Sihanouk assumed the tile of prime minister in addition to continuing his role as the monarch.

One of Sihanouk’s first acts in the new order was to match action to his earlier complaints about Gautier’s Romanization of the Khmer alphabet and introduction of the Gregorian calendar. On 14 March, Sihanouk revoked these measures.

Little that Son Ngoc Thanh did within Cambodia survived his subsequent overthrow and, strikingly, his domestic program was not marked by any dramatic measures aimed against the monarchy. Although he clearly believed that as prime minister he had the right to determine the political course of Cambodia, he showed no intention of converting Cambodia to a republic and, as already noted, he urged Sihanouk not to abdicate. But in preparing to oppose France’s return to Indochina Thanh placed himself in sharp opposition to the many members of the Cambodian elite who felt strongly that their interests and that of Cambodia as a whole would be better served by cooperation with France. Men such as Monireth, who held a commission in the French army, and Khim Tit, Son Ngoc Thanh’s minister for defense and an unquestioned Francophile, became increasingly concerned as Thanh sought to establish links with the emerging communist-dominated regime in Vietnam. The suggestion that Cambodians might join with Vietnamese to oppose the French return by force was anathema to conservative forces in Phnom Penh. Of equal concern to these forces was the extent to which Thanh appeared ready to rely on the support of Vietnamese resident in Phnom Penh. The fact that Thanh was reputed to be half Vietnamese himself added to the growing sense if unease his actions generated.

On October 8, Khim Tit suddenly left for Saigon with Gallois. Once there he held discussions with the head of the French military mission, General Leclerc. A week later Leclerc flew from Saigon to Phnom Penh, personally arrested Thanh, and took him back to Saigon. Tried as “traitor” in 1947, Thanh was sentenced to twenty years imprisonment, a sentence that was soon commuted to exile in France. For the next four years Thanh lived comfortably in France, completing the law studies he had begun many years before.

Within Cambodia, the balance of power had clearly moved back in favor of the conservatives epitomized by King Sihanouk’s uncle, Prince Monireth, who favored cooperation with the French rather than confrontation. Monireth assumed office as prime minister in Thanh’s place on 17 October, certainly with the French backing and, as best can be determined, without opposition from Sihanouk, who seemed to have played an essentially passive role at this critical time.

By January 1946, the French and Monireth had agreed to a modus vivendi. Writing of this agreement, Sihanouk has been at pains to distance himself from it, describing his uncle as “having taken it upon himself” to sign the document in company with General Leclerc.

The high point of Sihanouk’s visit to France in 1946, he makes clear in his memoirs, was his “private” visit to Charles de Gaulle at Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises, when Madame de Gaulle herself served the afternoon tea. De Gaulle, recounts Sihanouk, “scarcely spoke of Cambodia’s independence”, but rather of the need for leaders to assure that national unity was achieved in their countries.

As it was, there was enough in the modus vivendi to give temporary satisfaction to both the negotiating sides, if not to those who rejected the basis on which discussions had been joined. Under the terms of the agreement, France was to return to a Cambodia that was no longer styled a protectorate, but rather an autonomous kingdom within the French union. Although France was to control the key areas of defense and foreign affairs, the modus vivendi document recognized that the king had authority in internal affairs. Importantly, the agreement stipulated that further negotiations needed to take place. To this end, a Franco-Cambodian commission was to be set up to draft a constitution and seek the restitution to Cambodia the western provinces seized by Thailand in 1941.

The second of these tasks was achieved before the end of 1946, largely thanks to pressure by the United States on a Thai government anxious to show its repentance for having sided with Japanese through much of the war. Establishing a satisfactory constitution was another matter altogether, and a review of the maneuvering that accompanied its formulation makes dusty reading. Yet the detail of what took place cannot be disregarded, for it holds clues to the failures of Sihanouk and his supporters and opponents to find a political system that could accommodate their conflicting interests.

For the moment, the issue of Cambodia’s independence became less important in the world of Phnom Penh politics than the problem of reaching agreement on the kind of political system Cambodia should have.

Among key features of the initial draft were provisions for a limited male suffrage; this would elect an advisory assembly whose power would be subordinate to those of the king.

If the conservatives were ready to accept a constitution cast in these terms, the same was not true of a number of young, energetic Cambodians who now began to exercise an influence on the developing political process. Chief among them were a member of the Sisowath branch of the royal family, Prince Youthevong, and a young school teacher, Chheam Van. Both held French university degrees, Youthevong a doctorate in science and Van a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts, and as a result of long residence in France they were better acquainted than most of their fellow Cambodians with the theory and practice of democratic government. For Youthevong and those who grouped about him, the proposed constitution was not acceptable because of the power it left in the hands of the king. The system, to which Cambodia should aspire, they argued, was a constitutional monarchy with real power vested in an elected parliament. It was in this atmosphere of increasing politicization that King Sihanouk entered the fray. In April 1946 he promulgated two key amendments to the draft constitution.

In 1946 the number of dissidents was small. This was true both of those dedicated to opposing arrangements that allowed the French to return and of those who combined opposition to the French with adherence to left-wing policies.

Dissidents of both right and left laid claim to the title Khmer Issaraks. Initially, just as their numbers were small, so was their influence. And whether of the left or right, they depended for their existence on supports from foreigners. In the case of Prince Norodom Chantaraingsey, early support from Thailand was important.

For those on the left, linkage with the much stronger Vietnamese communist movement was of great importance and among those who emerged as leaders of left-wing bands part-Vietnamese parentage was common.

The extent to which nationalist and leftist groups joined in common cause to oppose the return of the French is still a matter for argument. Certainly there were some alliances, but many of these seem to have been tactical rather than strategic, and essentially of limited duration. Moreover, what passed for political dissidence was often little more than banditry cloaked in political justification.

In his view of the early postwar years, Charles Meyer characterizes Sihanouk as temporarily moved by “youthful ardor” in his search for ways to apply a democratic system to his country, but as devoting “the greatest part of his time to worthless activities and above all his affairs of the heart”. The evidence for the latter assertion is hard to ignore. By 1946, still only 24 years old, Sihanouk had fathered six acknowledged children.

His uncle Monireth firmly opposed any effort to achieve a sudden break with France. Like many of his generation, he did indeed see France as capable of playing protector’s role, most particularly against the ambitions of Vietnamese revolutionaries, but also against Thailand. Other, non-royal advisors, of whom Penn Nouth was to emerge as of one of the most important, were equally cautious and conservative.

Facing problems for which there was no immediate solution, Sihanouk time and again has withdrawn from confrontation. Frequently he has done so expecting that those opposing him would come to their senses and bend to his will.

But for long periods, he was content to turn his back on the world of politics and to find solace in women, sports, and cinema. The attraction of the last, dating as it did from early childhood, suggests a personality deeply attracted to idealized solutions, which right triumphing over wrong and the hero over the villain, and with everything ending happily.


Chapter 5: From the chrysalis, slowly

For the subterranean growth of the radical left was the counterpoint to the dominant theme of Cambodia’s modern history: the failure of open politics to provide stable government, which led, ultimately, to the terrible years of the Pol Pot tyranny.

In 1946, of the three parties that contested the election, only one, the Democrats, could lay claim to anything like party organization and a party platform. That it could do so was due in large part to the energy and intellect of Prince Sisowath Youthevong, but his abilities were supported by those of a few other able men, particularly Sim Var and Ieu Koeuss, a scholarly and energetic figure originally from Battambang. Youthevong is one of the major “might-have-been” of modern Cambodian history, a fact that has not endeared him to Sihanouk. More than 30 years after Youthevong’s untimely death in 1947, Sihanouk chose to disparage him when he looked back at this period in his memoirs, apparently unable to abide the thought that there was a richly talented man who proved able to garner support at a time when he, as king, spent much of his time on the political sidelines. Curiously mean-spirited in his view of any of his compatriots who might be seen as more talented than himself, Sihanouk has been consistently resentful of this long-dead member of the royal family – a Sisowath, to add further offense – whose formal academic achievements were substantial and whose talents had been recognized by the French government.

The contrast between the social breadth of the support given the Democrats and that given the other two parties contesting the September 1946 election was sharp. Like the Democrats, the Democratic Progressive Party and the Liberal Party were also led by princes, but princes of a very different stripe from Youthevong. The Democratic Progressive Party was led by Prince Norodom Montana, while Prince Norodom Norindeth headed the Liberal Party. Despite their names, both these parties were essentially conservative in outlook and there was little in their policy programs to separate them. Both called for the eventual introduction of a constitutional monarchy. In the case of Norindeth’s Liberals, this was accompanied by a call for the maintenance of links with France – not surprisingly, since the French were secretly giving Norindeth financial support. To some extent Montana’s party could be regarded as linked with, if not actually representing, the commercially important Sino-Cambodian families in Phnom Penh.

The much greater appeal of the Democrats in comparison to the other parties was strikingly illustrated in the 1946 election. With universal adult male suffrage and with 60 percent of the electorate voting, the Democrats won 50 out of the 69 positions in the contest.

The landslide result seemed to assure the Democrats of a key role in determining how Cambodia would be governed in the years ahead. More immediately, Youthevong and his followers seemed poised to dominate the continuing discussion about the form of Cambodia’s constitution with the goal of reducing the king’s power. Yet none of this was to be. Within six years hopes for a parliamentary system had faded as political power passed firmly into Sihanouk’s hands. How did this happen?

View with the hindsight of nearly 50 years, and with the salutary record of the rejection of Western constitutional models by other former colonial states, the failure of the 1946-47 Cambodian constitution to provide a basis for stable government is not surprising. Most fundamentally, the constitution assumed that a population that had never experienced anything remotely like democracy could quickly adopt the attitudes and practices of a largely alien system. Complicating this fundamental problem were the inherent weaknesses of some of the constitution’s key provisions. On the model of the French Fourth Republic, power was divided between the executive and the legislature, but the legislature retained the right to bring down the executive should there be disagreements on policy. This arrangement resulted in protracted instability in France, an instability that was to be matched in Cambodia.

Further undermining the possibility of Cambodia’s experiencing a smooth transition to electoral politics were those provisions of the constitution relating to the appointment of ministers. With France once again as the model, the king was to designate the prime minister, and the prime minister to choose his ministers. None of these ministers needed to be members of the legislature, yet the cabinet so formed had to be approved, and even more importantly could be voted out of office, by the legislature. Put baldly but accurately, the system could only work if the king, his ministers, and the legislature were all of one mind on any major issue.

Sihanouk’s conservative advisors were concerned by what they saw as inherent risks in the kind of constitutional monarchy advocated by Prince Youthevong. With an eye to preserving their own influence, and attached to the ideal of a powerful monarch, they successfully called for provisions in the constitution that allowed the king to dissolve parliament on the advise of his prime minister.