POLITICAL OF CAMBODIA

The Kingdom of Cambodia is a unitary state that is governed within the

framework of a constitutional monarchy, in which the monarchserves
as the head of state, while the prime minister is the head of
government. The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 had set in motion
events that led to withdrawal of the Vietnamese armed forces that had
established their presence in the country since the fall of the Khmer
Rouge in 1979.[1] The 1993 constitution, which is currently in force,
was promulgated as a result of the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements,
followed by the elections organized under the aegis of the United
Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia. The constitution
proclaims a liberal, multiparty democracy in which powers are
devolved to the three arms of the state: the executive, thejudiciary and
the legislature. Furthermore, the governing charter declares Cambodia
to be an "independent, sovereign, peaceful, permanently neutral and
non-aligned
State.
Executive power is exercised by the Royal Government, which
constitutes of the Council of Ministers, headed by the Prime Minister.
The Prime Minister is aided in his functions by members of the Council
such as deputy prime ministers, senior ministers, other ministers and
secretaries of state. Legislative power is vested in a bicameral
legislature composed of the National Assembly, which has the power to
vote on draft law, and the Senate that has the power of review. Upon
the passage of legislation through the two chambers, the draft law is
presented to the King for signing and promulgation. The judiciary is
tasked with the protection of the rights and liberties of the citizens, and
for being an impartial arbiter of disputes. The constitution provides for
the independence of the judiciary and prohibits the delegation of its
powers to the executive or the legislature. The Supreme Court is the
highest court of the country and takes appeals from lower courts on
questions of law. A separate body called the Constitutional Council is
established to provide interpretations of the constitution and to resolve
disputes related to the election of the members of the legislature.
 The Cambodian People's Party has dominated the political landscape
since the 1997 armed clashes in Phnom Penh. Other prominent
political parties include the royalist FUNCINPEC and the
erstwhile Cambodia National Rescue Party that was dissolved by the
Supreme Court in 2017. The Economist Intelligence Unit has called the
system of government "authoritarian" in its 2017 Democracy
Index. This is a revision from the results published in the 2016 index
that characterized the regime type as "hybrid".
The Prime Minister of Cambodia is a representative from the ruling
party of the National Assembly. He or she is appointed by the King on
the recommendation of the President and Vice Presidents of the
National Assembly. In order for a person to become Prime Minister, he
or she must first be given a vote of confidence by the National
Assembly.
The Prime Minister is officially the Head of Government in Cambodia.
Upon entry into office, he or she appoints a Council of Ministers who
are responsible to the Prime Minister. Officially, the Prime Minister's
duties include chairing meetings of the Council of Ministers
(Cambodia's version of aCabinet) and appointing and leading a
government. The Prime Minister and his government make up
Cambodia's executive branch of government.
The current Prime Minister is Cambodian People's Party (CPP)
member Hun Sen. He has held this position since the criticized 1998
election, one year after the CPP staged a bloody coup in Phnom
Penh to overthrow elected Prime Minister Prince Norodom Ranariddh,
president of the FUNCINPEC party.
SOCIAL OF CAMBODIA
Social strata in pre-communist Cambodia may be viewed as
constituting a spectrum, with an elite group or upper class at one end
and a lower class consisting of rural peasants and unskilled urban
workers at the other end. The elite group was composed of high-
ranking government, military, and religious leaders, characterized by
high prestige, wealth, and education or by members one of the royal
ornoble families. Each one of the subgroups had its own internal
ranking system. Before the ousting of Sihanouk in 1970, the highest
ranks of the elite group were filled largely by those born into them.
Somewhere in the middle of this social spectrum was a small middle
class, which included both Khmer and non-Khmer of medium prestige.
Members of this class included businessmen, white-collar workers,
teachers, physicians, most of the Buddhist clergy, shopkeepers, clerks,
and military officers of lower and middle rank. Many Chinese,
Vietnamese, and members of other ethnic minorities belonged to the
middle class. The Khmer were a majority only among the military and
among the civil servants.
The lower class consisted of rural small farmers, fishermen, craftsmen,
and blue-collar urban workers. The majority of Cambodians belonged
to this group. Most of the members of the lower class were Khmer, but
other ethnic groups, including most of the Chams, Khmer Loeu, some
Vietnamese, and a few Chinese, were included. This class was virtually
isolated from, and was uninterested in, the activities of the much
smaller urban middle and upper classes.
Within the lower class, fewer status distinctions existed; those that did
depended upon attributes such as age, sex, moral behavior, and
religious piety. Traditional Buddhist values were important on the
village level. Old age was respected, and older men and women
received deferential treatment in terms of language and behavior. All
else being equal, males generally were accorded a higher social status
than females. Good character—honesty, generosity, compassion,
avoidance of quarrels, chastity, warmth—and personal religious piety
also increased status. Generosity toward others and to the wat was
important. Villagers accorded respect and honor to those whom they
perceived as having authority or prestige. Buddhist monks and nuns,
teachers, high-ranking government officials, and members of the
hereditary aristocracy made up this category. Persons associated with
those who possessed prestige tended to derive prestige and to be
accorded respect therefrom.
Social mobility was played out on an urban stage. There was little
opportunity among the majority of the rural Cambodians to change
social status; this absence of opportunity was a reflection of traditional
Buddhist fatalism. A man could achieve higher status by entering the
monkhood or by acquiring an education and then entering the military
or the civil service
 ASSIGNMENT
IN
INTRODUCTION TO CRIMINOLOGY 1

TIME/DAY
(10:30-12:00/WS)

Submitted to:
Mr. Jose Pepito Fabi Escito

Submitted by:
Lagunzad, Phoebe U.
BS-CRIM. 1st yr.
 ABOUT THE BIG CON
The classic 1940 study of con men and con games that Luc Sante
in Saloncalled “a bonanza of wild but credible stories, told concisely
with deadpan humor, as sly and rich in atmosphere as anything this
side of Mark Twain.”

“Of all the grifters, the confidence man is the aristocrat,” wrote David
Maurer, a proposition he definitely proved in The Big Con, one of the
most colorful, well-researched, and entertaining works of criminology
ever written. A professor of linguistics who specialized in underworld
argot, Maurer won the trust of hundreds of swindlers, who let him in on
not simply their language but their folkways and the astonishingly
complex and elaborate schemes whereby unsuspecting marks, hooked
by their own greed and dishonesty, were “taken off” – i.e. cheated—of
thousands upon thousands of dollars.

The Big Con is a treasure trove of American lingo (the write, the rag,
the payoff, ropers, shills, the cold poke, the convincer, to put on the
send) and indelible characters (Yellow Kid Weil, Barney the Patch, the
Seldom Seen Kid, Limehouse Chappie, Larry the Lug). It served as the
source for the Oscar-winning film The Sting.