An Economic History of Cambodia in the Twentieth Century <\/a>(2010). This, according to Slocomb, \u201cmight have supplemented French needs should the American Civil War interrupt trans-Atlantic trade.\u201d Cambodian forests and the mountains containing gold, lead, copper, and iron also caught his attention.<\/p>\nIn 1860, during Mouhot\u2019s travels in the region, the Khmer king died. In the fight for succession, Siam took advantage and Cambodia succumbed once more. \u201cThe head of the Catholic mission in Cambodia, Bishop Miche, urged French intervention to restore order,\u201d says Slocomb. The French, however, were more interested in securing access to the Mekong, which would allow entry into southwest China.<\/p>\n
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![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/1_Centime_-_French_Protectorate_of_Cambodia_-_Scott_Semans_01.jpg\")
A coin issued by the French colonial government in Cambodia (Wikimedia Commons)<\/p>\n
The French expedition for the Mekong set out from Saigon in June 1866 to find a route to the Chinese province of Yunnan. However, this would prove disappointing. Slocomb notes that \u201cThe French ambition of \u201cestablishing a dominion in the eastern peninsula of Asia that would go far to rival in wealth and power the empire which the British have founded in Hindustan\u201d was dashed by the findings of the commission. Unlike the Ganges which had led the British \u201cto wide, rich, and populous countries in the interior,\u201d the Mekong conducted the \u201cweary travellers within the jaws of unsoundable gorges, overhung by Alpine precipices \u2026 or loses itself in a labyrinth of islets, of weeds\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
They thus turned to Cambodia, more by compulsion than choice. A member of the expedition, Louis de Carn\u00e9, wrote: \u201cCambodia is a country of magnificent natural resources, and has a noble river \u2014 the Mekong \u2014 flowing through its midst. It produces dye-woods, ebony, rice, cotton\u2026 \u201call useless for want of enterprise and capital.\u201d The French are anxious to supply these wants; and considering the position they hold, no doubt they will succeed in having their own way.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thus, the French representative at the court of Oudong in Cambodia concluded a protectorate treaty in August 1863.<\/p>\n
Under the French protectorate<\/p>\n
From the signing of the 1863 treaty, French administrators began encroaching upon Norodom\u2019s powers. In 1884, according to Au, the French regional governor Charles Thomson \u201cforced the king to sign a treaty greatly expanding the power of the French protectorate over the country.\u201d She asserts that the treaty practically turned Cambodia \u201cinto a full-fledged colony.\u201d The first article of the treaty, for instance, stated that the King would accept all administrative, judicial, and financial reforms that the Government of the Republic might deem useful for facilitating the accomplishment of its Protectorate.<\/p>\n
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Article 3 noted that Cambodian officials would continue, under control of the French authorities, to administer the provinces except in the matter of taxes, customs, indirect taxes, public works. While Article 6 declared: Cambodia would carry the cost of the administration of the kingdom and the protectorate.<\/p>\n
Contrary to what the French anticipated, a countrywide revolt erupted after this treaty. The protectorate was forced to seek the assistance of Norodom to stop the revolts. Using both threats and incentives, the French representative persuaded the king to bring peace. The king did the needful, and French administrators temporarily vested him with powers.<\/p>\n
For the next two decades, the French remained helpless. With the death of Norodom in 1904, however, they became hopeful. Au noted in her interview that the ascension of his half-brother Sisowath, chosen by the French, increased colonial involvement in Khmer society. It was during the Sisowath years (1904-27) and those of his son Monivong (1927-41) that the French economic and political reach into the Cambodian countryside grew rapidly.<\/p>\n
![\"Funeral](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/640px-The_procession_of_His_Majesty_King_Norodoms_body_1906.jpg\")
Funeral procession of King Norodom in 1906 (Wikimedia Commons)<\/p>\n
By 1884, France had claimed the lower Mekong Delta. By 1893, it had obtained control of Laos, central Vietnam, and northern Vietnam, and proclaimed the five \u201cstates\u201d of Annam, Cambodia, Cochinchina, Laos, and Tonkin as French Indochina. The r\u00e9sident sup\u00e9rieur du Cambodge (RSC) governed from the new capital city of Phnom Penh.<\/p>\n
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Cambodia was further divided into several districts, each administered by a French representative, the district r\u00e9sident. \u201cPerhaps the most significant administrative reform of the Protectorate was the creation of the commune,\u00a0khum\u2026to form the administrative link between the moral law of the village with its selected chief\u2026 and the bureaucratic commands of the\u00a0chauvay srok, the district chief,\u201d says Slocomb.<\/p>\n
France was also to represent the country in its international affairs and advise on domestic policies, but domestic governance was to remain a native matter. \u201cIn reality, the colonial government quickly encroached on all fronts in Cambodia: domestic, international, economic, and administrative,\u201d concludes Au.<\/p>\n
Independence for Cambodia<\/p>\n
The disputed border between Thailand and Cambodia was formally demarcated by the French in 1904. Charnvit Kasetsiri, Pou Sothirak, and Pavin Chachavalpongpun, in their jointly edited book,\u00a0Preah Vihear: A Guide to the Thai-Cambodian Conflict and Its Solutions\u00a0(2013), write: \u201cThe force of colonial politics pressured Siam [Thailand] to conclude a treaty with France in 1907.\u201d Consequently, Siam ceded the Cambodian territories of Battambang, Sisophon, and Siem Reap to the French.<\/p>\n
\u201cGenerally speaking,\u201d reckons Slocomb,\u00a0 \u201cthe struggle for independence was not a widespread or mass movement.\u201d King Norodom Sihanouk claimed that it was a series of diplomatic measures that won political and military independence for Cambodia in November 1953. According to the Constitution, \u201cCambodia is a Kingdom with a King who shall rule according to the Constitution and to the principles of liberal democracy and pluralism. The Kingdom of Cambodia shall be independent, sovereign, peaceful, permanently neutral and non-aligned.\u201d<\/p>\n
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![\"French](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/French_Architecture_1502270555.jpg\")
French architecture in Cambodia (Wikimedia Commons)<\/p>\n
Scholars opine that French rule in Indochina suffered from inconsistencies. While the French Protectorate had a major impact on the founding institutions of modern Cambodia, \u201cthis impact stopped short of the mass of the people, the villagers who had little contact with the French and who went out of their way to avoid them,\u201d notes Slocomb. They regarded the French as oppressive tax-gatherers and threats to their culture.<\/p>\n
While dykes were dug, maps drawn, railroads built, and ports opened, the Protectorate failed in building a connection with the masses in healthcare services, agriculture, and industry. In agriculture, the vast majority was still engaged in subsistence rice cultivation; Industry also lagged far behind agriculture. Outside urban areas, the French colonial government did not effectively improve nutrition, ensure clean water, or educate the masses. Slocomb writes, \u201cFrench officials like Paul Collard were captivated by the charm of rural Cambodian life and seemed reluctant to affect it in any fundamental way\u201d. Development, according to her, \u201cwas reserved for the benefit of French investors and almost deliberately confined to isolated, gated spaces like the rubber plantations of the eastern plateaux.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, speaking of French remnants in Cambodia, Au noted: \u201cInfrastructure and bureaucratic\/judicial institutions resemble the French mode. Even surnames. In Cambodian society, it wasn\u2019t that widespread to have a family name.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the really interesting things is that the older generation, like my parents\u2019 generation, all speak French. And now, everyone younger than me, doesn\u2019t speak French. And that is really an artifact of colonialism and French colonial influence in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n
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References<\/p>\n
\n- \n
Mixed Medicines: Health and Culture in French Colonial Cambodia (2011) by Sokhieng Au<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
- \n
An Economic History of Cambodia in the Twentieth Century (2010) by Margaret Slocomb<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of the conflicts drawing global attention in 2025 is the dispute between the Southeast Asian neighbours \u2014…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":310885,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5309],"tags":[113571,35151,113572,2000,299,36,113573,731,2150],"class_list":{"0":"post-310884","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-france","8":"tag-border-clashes","9":"tag-cambodia","10":"tag-cambodia-thailand-war","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-europe","13":"tag-france","14":"tag-preah-vihar-temple","15":"tag-thailand","16":"tag-vietnam"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114956981158787315","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/310884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=310884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/310884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/310885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=310884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=310884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=310884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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