Contents
List of figures
Notes on contributors
Preface
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
1 Grasping discourses, researching practices investigating civil society in Vietnam and Cambodia
PART I
Framing the contemporary civil society in Cambodia and Vietnam
2 In search of a civil society state- society relations in Cambodia
3 Bringing past models into the present identifying civil society in contemporary Vietnam
PART 2
Advocacy and political space
4 Civil society networks in Cambodia and Vietnam a comparative analysis
5 Civil society and political culture in Vietnam
6 Enclosing women's rights in the kitchen cabinet? Interactions between the Vietnam Women's Union, civil society and state on gender equality
7 Civil society engagement in the fight against the HIV/ AIDS epidemic in Cambodia
8 Changing gendered boundaries in rural Cambodia community-based organizations as a platform for empowerment
9 Mobilizing against hydropower projects multi-scale dimensions of civil society action in a transboundary setting
PART 3
Traces and tendencies
10 Tracing the discourses on civil society in Vietnam a narrative from within
11 NGOs and the illusion of a Cambodian civil society
12 Proto civil society pagodas and the socio-religious space in rural Cambodia
13 Voluntary or state-driven? Community-based organizations in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam
14 Competitive discourses in civil society pluralism in Cambodia's agricultural development platform
15 Conclusion the civil society gaze

As developing countries with recent histories of isolation and extreme poverty, followed by restoration and reform, both Cambodia and Vietnam have seen new opportunities and demands for non-state actors to engage in and manage the effects of rapid socio-economic transformation. This book examines how in both countries, civil society actors and the state manage their relationship to one another in an environment that is continuously shaped and (re)constructed by changing legislation, collaboration and negotiation, advocacy and protest, and social control. Further, it explores the countries' divergent experiences whilst also uncovering the underlying basis and drivers of civil society activity that are shared by Cambodia and Vietnam. Crucially, this book engages with the contested nature of what civil society is and means, by looking at contemporary discourses and manifestations of civil society in the two countries, national-level NGOs and agencies, and translocal networks that operate in a variety of sectors, such as gender, the environment and health...