ABSTRACT
Perhaps more than most other countries, Cambodia’s education system is a product of its turbulent past. Cycles of rise, prosperity, decline and/or destruction have left a country with a millennium-old civilization inheriting an educational infrastructure that is just three decades old. As with the economy itself, impressive revival of the education system has occurred, but the legacy of history has been expressed through quality deficiencies, especially in tertiary education. These deficiencies include inadequate funding, which, combined with poor regulatory oversight, has led to corruption and widespread cheating as well as disregard for ethics and contracts. This environment has made it hard for transnational education to take root, and indeed, attempts as documented by one case study have met with little success. Yet, as shown by the second case study, success is possible with a model in which the foreign party exerts the dominant influence.
