Public Security and Trust-Building in Cambodia

This chapter examines how Cambodia has been adapting its efforts to ensure public security during the post-truth era. Considering the period characterized by the onslaught of misinformation, emotionally charged narratives, and drops in institutional trust, Cambodia's governance efforts centered around social cohesion and public order management are faced with challenges from the public order through ungoverned security threats. Given the socio-political realities of the country, the chapter outlines the legal frameworks and the reforms in digital governance, and civic overt activities and the cross-border civic-overt cooperation in the region and their implications on the management of civil information and trust in civil institutions and trust in governance, and information provenance. It argues that expressed social security, accompanied by trust in information governance and civil institutions, information transparency is the key to public and social order management in the 21st century and the sustainable socio-economic development of the state.