Doing NGO Work

The politics of being ‘civil society’ and promoting ‘good governance’ in Cambodia

Bibliographic Data

ID8383079
AuthorsTim Frewer (The University of Sydney, corresponding author)
Year2013
Volume44
Issue1
Pages97-114
Publication date2013-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAustralian Geographer (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0004-9182 • E-ISSN: 1465-3311
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00049182.2013.765350
OpenAlexW1966050010
LanguageEN
Citations received17
References cited27

Two fundamental pillars of what it is to be a contemporary NGO and ‘do’ development work are being a part of and promoting civil society, and extending ‘good governance’. This article will provide insights into how supposedly universally applicable concepts and models for NGOs to ‘improve’ post-conflict ‘developing countries’ are incorporated into different social and cultural landscapes. Ethnographic fieldwork highlights some of the particularities of governance, as well as everyday challenges of doing NGO work in a remote province of north-eastern Cambodia. In the context of an authoritarian government, where kinship relations cross-cut all aspects of society, NGOs can be understood as embedded in neo-patrimonial networks rather than as a separate and autonomous realm of society as classic liberal theory understands ‘civil society’. Fear also plays a significant role in configuring peoples’ attitude towards authority and is rarely acknowledged in the project of ‘good governance’ which simplistically tends to see post-colonial governments situated on a linear trajectory which will eventually, with significant NGO interventions, reach advanced liberal democracy status

Authoritarianism · Civil society · Context (archaeology · Corporate governance · Democracy · Economics · Government (linguistics · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Realm · Situated · Sociology · Work (physics · Asian Geopolitics and Ethnography · Cambodian History and Society · Law · Public Administration · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies