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Violence from another angle

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posted on 2023-06-10, 06:14 authored by Caroline BennettCaroline Bennett
Even in 2020, in Southeast Asia the ongoing effects of the Cold War are inescapable. Wars fought in the East as part of the ideological conflict against communism caused mass death across many countries, and the ongoing consequences continue to affect understandings of kin, religion, politics, and sociality in many areas. In Cambodia, the Cold War contributed to the rise of the Khmer Rouge, a millenary Maoist regime that between 1975 and 1979, caused the death of an estimated 1.7 million people, through starvation, exhaustion, disease, and execution. The ongoing effects of that genocide are still felt today, not least in the political sphere, where impunity and a hybrid, or illiberal, democracy, have enabled an autocratic rule by the current ruling party and the Prime Minister, Hun Sen. Drawing on moments in my research when political violence became evident, and later considering the way I altered my practice in response to the same challenges, I consider how one of the ongoing legacies of the Cold War in Cambodia is a political sphere of distrust and insecurity, of violence and repression. Using Kuan-Hsing Chen’s urge to re-centre stories of the Cold War as part of the deimperialization project in Asia, I consider how this legacy is a result of both internal and external influences, that have yet to be fully untangled. Thus they continue to have an influence on contemporary Cambodia. As researchers in Asia, it is our duty to bring these entanglements to the fore, and show how the wounds of the cold war are still weeping in Cambodia.

History

Publication status

  • Published

File Version

  • Published version

Publisher

Rowman & Littlefield

Page range

43-64

Pages

314.0

Book title

Methods, Moments, and Ethnographic Spaces in Asia

Place of publication

London

ISBN

9781786612489

Department affiliated with

  • Anthropology Publications

Full text available

  • No

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Editors

Nayantara S Appleton, Caroline Bennett

Legacy Posted Date

2023-02-15

First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date

2023-02-15

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