Between NEI and WAI: An Anthropological Analysis of the Rise of Chinese Entrepreneurship After the Demise of Khmer Rouge in Cambodia

Abstract

This article explores the place and function of Chinese businessmen, in the social structure of Cambodia, and analyzes how they have embedded their own community into the local social structure, adapted and consolidated their present status, and proposes an “intermediary sphere” model of Cambodia-based Chinese businessmen. The author believes that Chinese businessmen have promoted two transformations in the Cambodian history: enabling Cambodia to achieve economic transformation from relying on agriculture to thriving on maritime trade; and seeing that Westerners adapted to the indigenous market when Cambodia became a French protectorate. After the tumult of the 1970s and 1980s, Chinese entrepreneurship experienced two revivals, related to two stages of historical transformations: Chinese businessmen established a “regional trading system,” integrating the Cambodian economy into the wider world; then they focused on developing a land-centered economy, allowing new outsiders to adapt to the local community. The “intermediary sphere” model of Chinese businessmen is intertwined with Cambodia’s cultural mores and social structure. Chinese businessmen in Cambodia, the indigenous community and the wider world recognize each other as “others.” Chinese entrepreneurs understand and identify with different social and cultural mechanisms, integrate into them, and detach themselves from such arrangements.