Colonial Law Making: Cambodia under the French

Colonial Law Making explores the structural forces and contingent exchanges that shaped colonial law in Cambodia, comparing it to other regions, and examining Cambodia's post-independence colonial legacy. It argues that non-elite Cambodians influenced colonial law through resistance, resulting in a blend of Cambodian and French notions of patronage and royal power as the source and authority for law.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 272 pages
Publication date: 30 November 2023
Publisher: NUS Press

Colonial Law Making is a significant case study in the history of law under colonialism, delving into the structural forces and contingent exchanges that shaped colonial law in Cambodia. It draws comparisons across the region and examines Cambodia's post-independence colonial legacy. In the French colonial imagination, the court of King Norodom and the temples of Angkor Wat became orientalist icons, perpetuating an image of the Protectorate (1863-1953) as special and worthy of preservation. This exceptionalism influenced the colonization of the Kingdom, including through law.

Sally Low presents a comparative case study of French approaches to colonial law, jurisdiction, and protection, utilizing previously unexamined archival material. While the voices of non-elite Cambodians are largely absent from the archives, their influence on colonial law is evident as they resisted efforts to regulate their lives and land. Low argues that the result was a set of state legal institutions and an indigenous jurisdiction that blended Cambodian and French notions of patronage and royal power as the source and authority for law.

This work is a case study of colonial law as an instrument of control and administration in an indirectly ruled colony, adding depth to our understanding of the impact of European colonial law and the significance of different forms of colonial rule. It is accessible for non-lawyers and is a must-read for those interested in the recent past of Southeast Asia and the countries that were previously colonized as French Indochina.

Dimension: 229 x 152 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9789813252448