Dossier

Profiles of Courage

Cambodia continues its transformation still processing a complex historical past. Since 1993, the Heinrich Boell Foundation has established a multi-faceted presence in the country, strengthening the development of higher education, fostering dialogue and supporting grassroots and indigenous peoples. All of this through partnerships within civil society and government institutions.

This dossier, "Profiles of Courage," offers a collection of remarkable stories from our partners and the communities they work with. These narratives are deeply rooted in the core tenets of the Foundations work in Cambodia: Ecology and Environmental Sustainability, Feminism and Social Justice, Democracy and Social Inclusion, and Active Citizenship.

Through these powerful illustrations and stories, we acknowledge our partners' unwavering dedication, courage, and achievements. Their commitment is the driving force behind our endeavors in Cambodia´s development process. It is our sincere hope that these diverse stories will serve as a source of inspiration and motivation for all readers to co-create sustainable futures and to advocate for peace and prosperity in Cambodia and beyond.

Ecology and Environmental Sustainability

Out At Sea Protecting Cambodia’s Marine Ecosystems

Out at Sea Protecting Cambodia’s Marine Ecosystems

Cambodian environmental activists have long decried the destruction of the country’s forests, natural resources and rivers. This activism has seeped into everyday Cambodian conversations where young people are emboldened to advocate against deforestation and its impact on communities.

Chea Lincheat

Saffron Wrapped Activism

Cambodia faces a slew of environmental issues like rampant deforestation in its dense evergreen forests, air and water pollution affecting critical lifelines like the Tonle Sap and Mekong River and dying ecosystems of flora and fauna.

Crunchy Crickets

Solar Powered Crunchy Crickets

Gov Huyngim is studying food science at the Institute of Technology of Cambodia in Phnom Penh. She studies chemistry, microbiology, nutrition and food engineering in her classes. But little did she expect her bachelor's degree would get her an internship where she could use her knowledge of food sciences and combine it with the use of clean energy and sustainable practices to improve farmers' livelihoods.

Safe Disposal To Battery Waste

Battery Low: Safe Disposal to Battery Waste

As awareness about food and plastics waste percolates among Cambodian communities, there is still a lot to be done about electronic and other hazardous waste. A growing consumer economy and the affordability of products has increased the number of appliances and electronics in our homes — made worse by the rapid cycles of updates and new products on offer.

Leaf

Making Documents Accessible: Empowering Indigenous Advocacy

Phnom Luong lies in the center of a community of Indigenous majority villages in Preah Vihear province. Kuy people in these villages have had a symbiotic relationship with the mountain and forest surrounding it, using it for agriculture and forestry products.

Teng Kao stands on his land

A Bittersweet Victory

Teng Kao sits at a stilted house in Koh Kong province’s Sre Ambel district. A thunderstorm passes through the village, dousing the area in Monsoon rain. Three police officers sit just outside the meeting room, recording and monitoring the village residents — an unfortunately routine occurrence for the community.

Feminism and Social Justice

Parenting

Frank Conversations on Good Parenting, Gender-Based Violence

Nai Moeun still remembers how her parents dealt with her as a child. Small transgressions would result in an angry or violent reaction, and she would repeatedly be told about so-called mistakes she made. These interactions were normally antagonistic.

Myth

The Unseen Victims of Sexual Abuse

It is not very hard for misconceptions and myths — such as ideas about child sexual abuse — to spread through a society and are often entrenched into a community’s understanding of the issue. This misinformation process is acute when talking about boys who have faced abuse, with little to no discussion on how sexual abuse affects Cambodia's boys.

Men doing housework

Lean In: Conversation about Gender Norms

Misogynistic social norms and gender roles heavily favor men in Cambodia, a sad trend that transcends many parts of the world. These norms can be so entrenched and hard to change that even frank discussions around changing attitudes towards gender equality, gender-based violence and empowerment of marginalized groups can be fraught.

Storytelling process by KDK

Out of the Darkness: One Story at a Time

As Cambodia closes in on 50 years since the fall of the Khmer Rouge regime, generational trauma persists in many households and the country continues to maneuver the legacy of the mass atrocities committed during the 1970s.

Democracy and Social Inclusion

Kruy Phal walks in her community at Boeng Tompun.

The Boulevard Of Broken Dreams

Kruy Phal sits at a small store on a dusty road right next to a massive condominium development in southern Phnom Penh, selling snacks, groceries and bright colored ice cream popsicles. Village residents stop at her store, buy a pink or purple or bean filled popsicle, not far from the boulevard that dissects the fast-disappearing Boeung Tompun lake.

A Boeng Tamok residents' home

Filled In and Pushed Out

For the last three years, residents in northern Phnom Penh have seen a steady stream of construction trucks ferrying rubble into the waters of Boeung Tamok lake. After each truckload is dumped into the water and the cloud of dust settles, the lake they have lived next to for decades slowly disappears.

Indigenous Hands

Rhythms Of Resilience: Fighting For Indigenous Identities

The Cambodian state has failed to put in place concrete legal protections for Indigenous groups in the country and instead wiped out their mention in laws and regulations around environmental governance and land management.

Bormeychan

Debating Issues Out in the Open

Vy Chhailim and Hok Pich sit under a tree at the Institute of Technology of Cambodia in Phnom Penh. The two are sipping drinks near a university cafe, as other students discuss their assignments and homework.

Shooting

Indigenous History in a Bowl of Erhaang Soup

Chan Khamsing’s camera follows Boeung Eak into a stream in Ratanakiri province. The 65-year-old Indigenous woman walks through the flooded waters and starts hacking away at a cluster of bamboo, harvesting the tender shoots.

Chhang Kheang braids her daughter’s hair

Damned If You Migrate, Damned If You Don’t

Chhang Kheang first went to Thailand in 2008. The migrant worker who lives in Kampong Cham province moved to the neighboring country to work as an undocumented construction worker, earning around $5 a day. This was a meager salary, but it was just enough to support her family in Cambodia, including a young son and daughter, she had to leave with the child’s grandmother.

Cambodia’s Centre for Human Rights - LGBTIQ radio show

Confronting Prejudice with Honest Conversations

Cheng Sambath sits to the left of Hun Heim and Lim Borin, who is hosting the radio show. The Kampong Cham resident is talking to them about coming out as gay to their parents. He talks about how the experience nearly ended his parent’s marriage and ruptured his relationship with his family.

Active Citizenship—Supporting Change From the Ground

An infographic by Dosslab on the safety of using condoms.

Let’s Talk About Sexual and Reproductive Health

Talking about sex, pregnancy, abortions or menstrual health is rarely handled well in our homes or society and is often dealt with as an uncomfortable or stigmatized experience that everyone would rather ignore than deal with. In Cambodia, some of these moral and societal norms come from traditional diktats like chbap srey which sets out a code of conduct for women and explicitly shames their sexual activity.

A scene from NCA's "Cinderella Not a Fairy Tale" performance from 2021. (Photo Credit: NCA)

Fusing The Traditional With The Contemporary: Projecting Female Strength Through Dance

Classical Khmer dance dates back more than a millennia to royal courts where a performance was believed to be a bridge between the gods and kings — a link between the spiritual and natural worlds.

A Pride tuk-tuk and participants of the Pride race in front of hbs office.

Sketching a Pride Future

Cambodians from the LGBTQIA+ community face stigmatization and discrimination, and do not have access to the legal protections they are entitled to under universal human rights which are endorsed by the Cambodian government.

Installations and exhibits at the ‘From Disability to Visibility’ exhibition at The Factory in Phnom Penh.

From Disability to Visibility

Art plays a central role in raising awareness of social inequalities and injustices and can be used to advocate for disenfranchised people and communities where power structures suppress dissent or activism.

An edjai

Horns and Headlamps: Cleaning Cambodia’s Recyclable Trash

It is not an unusual sight to see narrow beams of light scanning the streets around markets every evening in Phnom Penh. The beams of light move from one pile of trash to another, occasionally stopping to see if there is any plastic, aluminum or recyclable waste.

Phina So

“My Parents Are Women”

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Kamsort Khoeun, a poet, visited children and families living around the Stung Meanchey dump site in Phnom Penh. Interacting with the community gave him a better understanding of the challenges faced by families who relied on picking waste from the dump site.

SafeSpaceBTB founder Thida Chhuon, seated in the front row, with the rest of the organization’s team. (Photo Credit: SafeSpaceBTB)

Creating Safe Spaces

Creating safe spaces for queer people is critical in the fight for equality and for them to have a voice. It took a police crackdown at the Stonewall Inn — one of the few bars in New York’s Greenwich Village that welcomed the queer community — for members of the community to stand against the violence they faced, demand an end to discrimination and spark the global Pride movement.

Po Sakun

Advocating for the Arts

The Cambodian people have seen massive shifts of the pendulum when it comes to their art, architecture and music.

cuts fresh vegetables and other ingredients to make delicious samlor korko soup.

Just One More Bite of Korko

Samlor korko probably exemplifies the best of Cambodian cuisine. The scent from a boiling pot of korko wafts daily through most neighborhoods or villages, leaving residents salivating at the prospect of a delicious lunch or dinner.

Nature

More Climate Action Now

The United Nations’ sustainable development goals (SDGs) unequivocally call for “urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts.” Cambodia has committed to implementing the SDGs and has, so far, allocated 1.7% of available resources in 2023 to achieve the climate action goal, according to the United Nations.

Trash incinerator

Destroying Waste Without Destroying the Environment

Cambodia produces more than 10,000 tons of waste every day, totaling more than 4 million tons over a year. A large part of this trash goes uncollected as most provinces do not provide collection services, even though it is the responsibility of local administrations.

Leng Dei

From Dirt to Earth: Composting Away Our Waste

Phnom Penh has seen rapid development in the last decade. While high-rise buildings and swanky office space are changing the city’s skyline, Phnom Penh’s civic infrastructure and amenities that service citizens have struggled to keep up.

A plate of grilled pork and rice, a typical Cambodian breakfast, with pieces of a credit card sprinkled on it to illustrate the presence of microplastics in the food we consume.

A Plate of Grilled Pork, Rice and Pickled Plastic

Aok Sochenda walks through Toul Tom Poung market in Phnom Penh, holding a plate of beloved grilled pork and rice. But this plate of traditional Cambodian breakfast has an additional topping: cut-up pieces of a credit card.

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