The People’s Republic of Kampuchea 1979-1989 – The Revolution after
Jul 24th, 2004 by Jinja
The Revolution after
Pol Pot
Title: The People’s Republic of Kampuchea 1979-1989 – The Revolution after
Pol Pot (2003 – 369 pages)
Author: Margaret Slocomb
Publisher: Silkworm Books, 104/5 Chiang Mai – Hot Road, M.7, T. Suthep,
Muang, Chiang Mai 50200, Thailand
ISBN: 974-9575-34-2
*****
>From the back page cover:
When the Khmer Rouge troops entered Phnom Penh on 17 April 1975, it seemed
that the Cambodian revolution had been secured. During the following four
years, Cambodian society was dramatically transformed at great cost in
terms of human misery and death. Despite its outward display of total
power, the regime of Democratic Kampuchea was deeply fragmented along
factional lines within the Communist Party of Kampuchea which eventually
ripped it apart. On the morning of 25 December 1978, a huge military force
of the People’s Army of Vietnam spearheaded a counter attack by the
Kampuchean Front for National Salvation, led by a former KR commander, Heng
Samrin. They found a country in ruins, the economy shattered and the people
shocked and dispirited.
This book examines the Cambodian revolution before and after Pol Pot and
attempts to explain the reasons for its ultimate failure. In particular, it
traces the efforts of the post-DK regime, that of the People’s republic of
Kampuchea, to rebuild both the state and the revolution. Many factors
intervened to defeat their efforts to restore revolution. Nevertheless, the
PRK did rebuild the state and the economy, and it helped return people’s
lives to the conditions of pre-revolutionary days.
Margaret Slocomb has a doctorate in history from the University of
Queensland, Australia. She has lived and worked in Cambodia since
1988.
