The Protectorate Begins
By the mid-nineteenth century, Cambodia's independence was in serious jeopardy. The once-powerful Khmer kingdom had lost substantial territory to both Siam (Thailand) and Vietnam over the previous centuries. In the 1850s, King Ang Duong faced continued pressure from both neighbors and sought help from an unexpected source: France.
France had already established control over parts of Vietnam and saw Cambodia as strategically valuable. In August 1863, King Ang Duong's successor, Norodom, signed a treaty with France. The agreement seemed straightforward: France would provide protection against Thai and Vietnamese expansion in exchange for rights to explore and exploit Cambodia's mineral and forest resources. Cambodia became a French protectorate, keeping its monarchy while accepting French "advisors."
The arrangement grew increasingly one-sided. In 1867, France and Siam signed a treaty that temporarily cost Cambodia its northwestern provinces, including the ancient capital of Angkor. In 1884, under pressure from a French gunboat anchored in the river, King Norodom agreed to a new treaty imposing sweeping reforms: abolishing slavery, establishing private land ownership, and allowing French residents in all provincial cities. Local elites, particularly those who benefited from the old system, rebelled throughout 1885. Though the rebellion was suppressed, Cambodians used passive resistance to delay implementing these changes for years.
In October 1887, France formally incorporated Cambodia into the Indochina Union alongside three Vietnamese territories (Tonkin, Annam, and Cochinchina). Cambodia's highest-ranking French official, the resident general, reported to the Indochina governor general in Hanoi rather than to Cambodian authorities. The final step came in 1897 when the French resident general simply took over the king's powers to issue decrees, collect taxes, and appoint officials. Cambodian monarchs retained their palaces and their role as patrons of Buddhism, but real governance belonged to France.
Puppet Kings and Limited Sovereignty
When King Norodom died in 1904, the French demonstrated their control by passing over his sons and installing his more cooperative brother, Sisowath. The French appreciated Sisowath's willingness to work within colonial structures. When Sisowath died in 1927, his son Monivong inherited both the throne and the role of what historians call a "pliant instrument of French rule." Neither king could make meaningful decisions about Cambodia's future.
There was one bright spot in this period. In 1907, France successfully negotiated with Thailand to return the northwestern provinces of Battambang and Siem Reap to Cambodia. This meant that Angkor Wat and the other ancient temple complexes were again Cambodian territory. The French began restoring these monuments, and while this effort primarily served French prestige and scholarly interests, it had an unintended consequence: awakening Cambodian pride in their cultural heritage and historical achievements.
Economic Exploitation
The French developed Cambodia's economy, but overwhelmingly for French benefit. They built a railroad from Phnom Penh through Battambang to the Thai border and constructed limited roads, but infrastructure investment remained minimal compared to other colonial possessions. The primary goal was extracting resources and generating revenue for French Indochina.
Cambodians paid the highest taxes per capita anywhere in French Indochina. In 1916, tens of thousands of peasants marched to Phnom Penh to petition the king for tax relief in what became a mass nonviolent protest. The French, who had assumed Cambodians were too passive to organize such demonstrations, were shocked. Taxes remained a bitter grievance throughout the colonial period.
For those who could not pay cash taxes, there was corvée service, essentially forced labor. Poor peasants owed up to ninety days per year of unpaid work on public projects like road building. This was an enormous burden on families who needed every hand for rice cultivation.
Even more devastating was widespread usury. Poor and middle-class peasants faced effective interest rates of 100 to 200 percent on loans. When they could not repay these debts, moneylenders foreclosed on their land, forcing families into sharecropping or becoming landless agricultural laborers. Though France had abolished debt slavery, the economic reality for many rural Cambodians was hardly better.
The prosperous provinces of Battambang and Siem Reap became the "rice baskets of Indochina," producing surplus for export. French companies established rubber plantations. When international demand for these commodities was high in the 1920s, the colonial economy grew substantially. When the Great Depression hit after 1929, however, Cambodian farmers suffered terribly as prices collapsed and debts became even harder to repay.
The French created what scholars call a "plural society." Rather than educating and employing Cambodians in the colonial bureaucracy, they imported Vietnamese to work as clerks, administrators, and laborers on rubber plantations. Vietnamese immigrants also became fishermen and small business operators. Chinese merchants and bankers, who had lived in Cambodia for centuries, continued to dominate commerce. The French placed no restrictions on Chinese economic activities, and Chinese commercial networks extended throughout Indochina and beyond. This arrangement left Cambodians largely excluded from the modern sectors of their own economy and created ethnic resentments, particularly toward the Vietnamese, that would persist for generations.
The Seeds of Nationalism
Cambodia remained politically quiet far longer than neighboring Vietnam. Most Cambodians lived in villages, had low literacy rates (which the French made little effort to improve), and believed that as long as a king sat on the throne, the traditional order continued. National consciousness developed slowly and primarily among a tiny urban elite.
Prior to 1953, Cambodia had only one high school for local students: Lycée Sisowath in Phnom Penh. In 1931, just seven students graduated. A fortunate few Cambodians studied in France itself. Ironically, these foreign-educated students returned as a "new intellectual elite" who began questioning French rule. Among them were individuals who would later become both nationalist heroes and, eventually, leaders of the Khmer Rouge.
The first stirrings of organized nationalism came from Khmer Krom — Cambodians living in what had become French Cochinchina (southern Vietnam). In 1936, two Khmer Krom intellectuals, Son Ngoc Thanh and Pach Chhoeun, began publishing Nagaravatta (Angkor Wat), the first Khmer-language newspaper. Its editorials mildly criticized French policies, the usury plaguing rural areas, foreign economic dominance, and the lack of opportunities for educated Cambodians. Much of the paper's criticism, however, targeted the Vietnamese for monopolizing civil service positions.
In July 1942, French authorities arrested Hem Chieu, a prominent politically active Buddhist monk, and defrocked him. The editors of Nagaravatta led a demonstration demanding his release. The protest failed; the French arrested the demonstrators and sentenced Pach Chhoeun to life in prison. Son Ngoc Thanh fled to Tokyo. This incident marked an important moment: Cambodian nationalists had publicly challenged French authority, even if unsuccessfully.
World War II and Brief Independence
World War II transformed Cambodia's situation. After France fell to Germany in 1940, Japan moved forces into Indochina while allowing the Vichy French colonial administration to continue functioning. Thailand invaded Cambodia in January 1941, seizing Battambang and parts of Siem Reap province. Then, in mid-1941, Japanese troops entered Cambodia. Japan mediated a settlement forcing France to cede the invaded territories to Thailand. Cambodians deeply resented this loss, particularly of Angkor.
When King Monivong died in April 1941, the French selected his eighteen-year-old great-grandson, Norodom Sihanouk, expecting a pliable young monarch. They underestimated him. On March 9, 1945, as Japan's defeat became inevitable, Japanese forces overthrew the French colonial administration throughout Indochina. Four days later, they urged King Sihanouk to declare Cambodia independent within Japan's Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. Sihanouk proclaimed the independent Kingdom of Kampuchea on March 13, 1945.
Son Ngoc Thanh returned from Tokyo in May 1945 to serve as foreign minister. When Japan surrendered in August, he briefly became prime minister. For six months, from March to October 1945, Cambodians experienced independence, even though real power remained with Japan and then briefly with no foreign control at all. This taste of sovereignty was intoxicating. When French forces returned in October 1945 and arrested Son Ngoc Thanh for collaborating with Japan, the idea of true independence had taken hold.
The Struggle for Full Independence
France wanted to reestablish its Indochina empire after the war, but conditions had changed. Cambodians who had experienced even nominal independence between March and October 1945 were not interested in returning to full colonial control. France offered limited self-government within a "French Union," but this satisfied few Cambodians.
Some of Son Ngoc Thanh's supporters fled to Thailand-controlled areas of Cambodia and joined the Khmer Issarak, a guerrilla resistance movement. The Khmer Issarak was diverse, including nationalists, leftists allied with Vietnamese communists, bandits, and various factions pursuing independence through armed struggle.
The French allowed political parties to form in 1946. Elections for a Consultative Assembly produced a dominant Democratic Party that drafted a constitution modeled on France's Fourth Republic. This new constitution made King Sihanouk a constitutional monarch with limited powers, concentrating authority in a National Assembly. The Democrats consistently opposed the king and French proposals, creating political deadlock.
In 1952, Sihanouk took dramatic action, dismissing his cabinet, suspending the constitution, and assuming control as prime minister. In March 1953, he traveled to France to demand full independence, then embarked on what became known as his "royal crusade for independence," visiting the United States, Canada, and Japan to publicize Cambodia's cause. When the French refused to budge, Sihanouk went into self-imposed exile at his villa near Angkor in Siem Reap Province, declaring he would not return until France granted independence.
Sihanouk was gambling. France could have replaced him. However, the French military position in Indochina was collapsing under Vietnamese communist pressure. On July 3, 1953, France declared its readiness to grant independence to Cambodia, Vietnam, and Laos. Sihanouk demanded full control of defense, police, courts, and finances. The French conceded. Cambodia gained control of its police and judiciary in August 1953 and its military in October. On November 9, 1953, Cambodia celebrated independence. Sihanouk returned to Phnom Penh as a national hero.
The colonial period had profoundly shaped Cambodia. Ninety years of French rule had preserved the monarchy and territory but left the country with minimal infrastructure, widespread poverty, few educated citizens, and deep ethnic tensions. The educated elite who would lead independent Cambodia had little administrative experience. The brief taste of independence in 1945 and the armed resistance of groups like the Khmer Issarak had established patterns of political conflict that would continue. Most importantly, Sihanouk's success in gaining independence through his personal crusade gave him enormous political legitimacy that would shape Cambodian politics for the next two decades.