The social capital is considered as a essential factor of economic development that consist of community’s trust, norms and participation which enhance efficiency of a society. This study aims to measure the social capital in the Cambodia rural comm...
The social capital is considered as a essential factor of economic development that consist of community’s trust, norms and participation which enhance efficiency of a society. This study aims to measure the social capital in the Cambodia rural community and its accumulation process in the Saemaul community development project.
The study was carried out using One-way ANOVA and theoretical framework of the social capital. In the Cambodia Tbong khmum province community, Khmer tribe had 3.775 and Cham tribe had 3.776 score of the overall social capital(trust, norm, participation). However, Cham tribe(3.54) had significantly higher score of participation than Khmer tribe(3.13) which can be interpreted from the group worship culture with discussion that held every Friday in the Cham tribe community. Cambodia rural community is considered as a homogeneous society consist of Cham and Khmer tribe. Particularly, Cham tribe has exclusive culture that can be determined as a community which has high regionality and ideology. Accumulation process of the social capital was founded through linking functions of the social capital components with community development projects. Participation were strengthened from expanding authority of community based organization, norms were accumulated through democratic process of decision making and trust were observed through trade relations in community projects.
Community development requires a certain level of the social capital for sustainable development. The result of this Cambodia case suggests that the community’s local characteristic and behavior pattern which related to conceptual components of the social capital are needed to be considered in the community development project to achieve sustainable development.