Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

The Civilizing Vision of an Enlightened Dictator: Norodom Sihanouk and the Cambodian Post-Independence Experiment (1953–1970)

2015; Springer Nature; Linguagem: Inglês

10.1007/978-3-319-13638-7_7

2191-6578

Helen Grant Ross,

Vietnamese History and Culture Studies

In the short fifteen-year period following independence in 1953, Cambodia underwent a complete social and economic transformation and saw the emergence of all fields of artistic expression as well as the construction of hundreds of buildings, new towns, urban extensions, and infrastructure designed in an innovative style called "New Khmer Architecture." A phenomenon like this is rare in any society and one questions what socio-political context enabled Cambodia to achieve so much in so short a time. This essay will address the political dynamic behind this ambiguous and unusual experiment in which nationalism and modernization as well as tradition worked together on a basis of religious ethics. Who were the major players in this unusual experiment? What forces were at work to encourage not only the construction of thousands of buildings to serve society's needs, but also the emergence of an authentic and unique architecture movement?