Presentation short abstract

This paper discusses the anticipatory (geo)-politics of the planned 180-kilometer, US$1.7 billion, Chinese funded, Funan-Techo Canal (FTC) that the government of Cambodia has endeavoured to excavate between Phnom Penh, and the Gulf of Thailand.

Presentation long abstract

In this paper, we engage with the 180-kilometer, US$1.7 billion, Chinese funded, Funan-Techo Canal (FTC) that the government of Cambodia has endeavoured to excavate between Phnom Penh, and the Gulf of Thailand. We discuss the anticipatory (geo)-politics this project that has yet to come has put in motion, hence contributing to a body of literature that interrogates how infrastructure “come to matter before they become ‘matter’”. International media coverage has portrayed the FTC as a materialization of China’s geopolitical ambitions in South-East Asia. Lack of information regarding the design of the FTC and contradictory announcements about its purpose spurred American and Vietnamese anxieties that the canal be used for logistical support to an existing joint Cambodia-China naval base in the Gulf of Thailand, and disrupt water movement in the transboundary Mekong delta floodplains, negatively impacting an agriculture and aquaculture sector that is of prime importance to Vietnam. But the FTC is not only about geo(political) anticipation, it is also mobilized for the purpose of regime strengthening in Cambodia and to both spur and remedy a deep seated ‘sovereign anxiety’ over perceived threats over Cambodia’s autonomy, territorial integrity and collective identity. That the canal is linked to patriotism has tangible consequences: It carries a threatening undertone that constrains how people can express and act on their concerns and anxieties, and spurs speculative (non)economies whereby many livelihood activities are suspended and land transactions multiply, in a context of general distrust over compensations promises informed by earlier lived experiences or stories heard.