Power from the Grassroots : Strategies and Resilience of Cambodian Land and Environmental Activists

This thesis examines the strategies of Cambodian land and environmental activists in navigating repression, building resilience and amplifying civil society voices. It is situated within a context in which Cambodian civil society faces an increasingly repressive political environment, while land and natural resource conflicts have intensified, affecting local communities and heightening the need for organized grassroots responses. By analyzing power relations produced by neoliberal, extractivist development under authoritarian rule, and activists’ strategic forms of resistance to them, the study bridges Social Movement scholarship and Development Studies. It develops a broad understanding of civil society organizations’ operation by examining mobilization processes, adaptation, sustainability, partnerships and donor relations, repertoires of contention, construction of alternatives and the factors shaping these choices. The research is grounded in a dialogical, co-constructive approach to knowledge production that centers activists’ lived experiences and everyday struggles. The qualitative data consist of semi-structured, in-depth interviews with Cambodian activists, complemented by organizational documents that reflect their public advocacy messaging and action framing. These materials were analyzed using the method of qualitative content analysis and interpreted in dialogue with literature on social movements, resistance and Global South perspectives, centering participants’ insights. The findings show that in authoritarian, postcolonial settings shaped by interconnected global influences, resistance takes reactive, adaptive and multidimensional forms. Activist groups employ hybrid forms of contention that balance sustaining the movement, transformative action and widespread mobilization. Beyond protest and opposition, innovative and resilient movements also resist dominant systems by constructing more just and sustainable alternatives themselves. Participants emphasized collective action, solidarity, empowerment and local ownership as central to fostering strong movements. This underscores the need for unified, more equal and less dependent structures within transnational advocacy networks. This thesis contributes to increasing debates on alternative understandings of resistance, recognizing low-visibility, constructive and hybrid forms across shifting scales, arenas and repertoires of action. It challenges rigid distinctions between civil society organizations understood as either politically transformative or humanitarian, demonstrating how grassroots movements in Cambodia are driven by community responsibility, accountability systems and survival, while operating in continuous struggle for autonomy and existence.

Grantor dc:publisher

Helsingin yliopisto

Year dc:date.issued

2026

Author dc:creator

• Nikander, Sohvi

• Cambodia
• social movements
• activism
• resistance
• civil society organizations
• land rights
• resilience

Statement dc:rights

• CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10138/628419

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:helda.helsinki.fi:10138/628419