Geographic Education as Genocidal Policy under the Khmer Rouge

James A. Tyner, Professor of Geography, Kent State University

It is well-established that the Khmer Rouge, upon assuming power in 1975, set out to destroy the existing societal infrastructure: health, education, commerce, religion, family. However, what is less discussed is that the Khmer Rouge intended to construct an entirely new state and society. The objective of Pol Pot, Ieng Sary, Khieu Samphan, and other leaders of the CPK was to make an entirely new, modern, and productive communal society. This goal of the Khmer Rouge was in fact two-fold: to first erase all vestiges of the previous society and, second, to erect an entirely new, socialist-based society. It was with this understanding that Cambodia ceased to exist, replaced by Democratic Kampuchea (as the country was renamed by the Khmer Rouge). Indeed, it was Pol Pot who declared, “There are no schools, faculties or universities in the traditional sense, although they did exist in our country prior to liberation, because we wish to do away with all vestiges of the past.”[1]
In this chapter I suggest that organized mass political violence―genocide―was explicitly adopted by the Khmer Rouge as an instrument of post-conflict political construction. Furthermore, I maintain that a geographic-based education, as manifest in a political textbook[2] produced by the Khmer Rouge, was a key to the CPK’s post-war project. As such I provide a needed corrective to our understanding of both post-conflict societies and the ‘causes’ of genocide.

Genocide as Post-Conflict Reconstruction
Although the close association between ‘war’ and ‘genocide’ is well-documented, the form of this relationship remains open to debate. Genocides, for example, frequently occur during, or in the immediate aftermath, of war. This is clearly seen in the Armenian genocide of 1915, the Nazi-perpetrated Holocaust of the Second World War, and in the Rwandan genocide of 1994. Scholars assert that the upheavals and uncertainties associated with war contribute to the conditions that make possible the targeting of ‘enemy’ civilians. The common understand is that genocide is extension of war. However, there remains the possibility that genocide may be approached as a political instrument of post-conflict (re)construction. In the case of Cambodia, genocide was perpetrated during a period in which the war was believed over. Indeed, for the Khmer Rouge, the date of their military victory marked ‘year zero’―a tangible clue that signaled their understanding of war’s end. The Cambodian genocide followed in the wake of civil war; the termination of conflict however did not bring about peace as this concept is normally understood.
On April 17, 1975, thousands of war-hardened Khmer Rouge soldiers poured into the streets of Phnom Penh, Cambodia’s capital city. Coinciding with the cessation of the broader Indochina War that engulfed neighboring Vietnam and Laos, the Cambodian Civil War (1970-1975) was over. In five bloody years, the Khmer Rouge had defeated the US-supported Republican forces of the Lon Nol government. In the process, tens of thousands of people had died; many hundreds of thousands found themselves refugees in their own land—what we would now describe by the innocuous term ‘internally displaced persons.’ But for the majority of Cambodians, post-war society was anything but peaceful.
The victory of the Khmer Rouge would mark the termination of years of military conflict but not the end of widespread violence. In the weeks and months that followed, the cities and towns of Cambodia were evacuated, their inhabitants forced onto agricultural collectives in the countryside. Hospitals, factories and schools were closed; money and wages were abolished, and monasteries were emptied.
Upon assuming power, the Communist Party of Kampuchea sought to transform Cambodia into a modern, communal utopia. As such, Party members attempted to replace what they saw as impediments to national autonomy and social justice with revolutionary energy and incentives. In their attempt to create—not recreate—a utopian society, the leadership of the Khmer Rouge embarked on a massive program of social and spatial engineering.
Rather than reconstructing a war-devastated society, the Khmer Rouge explicitly attempted to erase time and space to construct (in their minds) a new and pure communal society. This is seen most clearly in the Khmer Rouge’s decision to forcibly evacuate Phnom Penh and all other urban areas of Cambodia. But it is also seen in the justifications for the mass violence of all facets of daily life—including the promotion of education.

(Geographic) Educational Policies of the Khmer Rouge

The Khmer Rouge understood the importance of education in their post-conflict construction of Democratic Kampuchea. Indeed, education was vital to their revolutionary project in that it would provide support and legitimacy for associated political and economic programs. When the Khmer Rouge stood victorious on the streets of Phnom Penh on April 17, 1975, they constituted neither a centralized, efficient political party nor military force. Having achieved ‘military victory’, the Khmer leadership understood that they would have to centralize power and ‘build socialism’.
With such a tentative hold on the populace―and its own political power―the Khmer Rouge leadership sought to solidify their position through various means. On the one hand, the Khmer Rouge utilized a practice of state-terror. Within Democratic Kampuchea, for example, the public display of torture and execution served to reify the authority of the Khmer Rouge. Moreover, the systematic violence and the killing of its own populace were understood by the Khmer Rouge as a prelude to the construction of a moral and properly ordered post-war society.
On the other hand, the Khmer Rouge turned to education―generally considered a ‘positive’ peace building exercise―as a means of establishing both legitimacy and political control. However, education under the Khmer Rouge included both destructive and constructive practices (see Clayton 1998). First, and in conformance with other practices, the Khmer Rouge sought to dismantle the pre-existing educational infrastructure. Prior to the Khmer Rouge’s rise to power, for example, Cambodia was home to 5,275 primary schools, 146 secondary schools, and 9 institutes of higher education (see Clayton 1998: 5).
Under the direction of the CPK, however, this infrastructure was literally ‘smashed’ or demolished. Teachers were ‘smashed’, as anywhere from 75 percent to 90 percent of all teachers at all levels were killed during the genocide. Most school buildings were destroyed; libraries were emptied and books were burned. Those buildings left standing were often converted to other uses. The Royal University was turned into a farm. Perhaps most symbolic, a former high school (Tuol Svay Prey) was converted into a detention and torture facility; at this site, now known as Tuol Sleng prison, approximately 14,000 people were detained, tortured, and eventually killed.
Along side these destructive practices, the Khmer Rouge forwarded a number of (in their view) constructive practices. This marked the second phase of the CPK’s educational agenda: the construction of Democratic Kampuchea. Simply stated, the Khmer Rouge leadership proposed a new educational system, one that was intended to promote a national political consciousness and in turn provide legitimacy to Khmer Rouge rule. In fact, the Khmer Rouge explicitly sought to justify their political and economic programs through education.
Education in general, but geographic education specifically, is far from a neutral activity. Indeed, with respect to the latter, it is now well-understand that the teaching of geography is important in the development of a political consciousness. Geographic instruction, firstly, provides students with basic knowledge about people and places: the ‘facts-and-figures’ of geography, or the traditional ‘capes-and-bays’ form of knowledge that appear on maps and in text-books. However, there is also a ‘hidden curriculum’ (or subtext) in the teaching of geography. Indeed, geographic education may facilitate the construction of ‘national identities.’ This is seen, for example, in the re-drawing of political maps following war. And, in fact, following the victory of the CPK, a new map appeared, one that symbolically spoke to the new state of Democratic Kampuchea. The Khmer Rouge’s map portrays the administrative divisions of Democratic Kampuchea. At the broadest scale, Democratic Kampuchea was divided into seven geographic zones, identified by cardinal compass directions: North, Northeast, East, Southwest, West, Northwest, and Center. These zones were apparently derived from military designations established by the Khmer Rouge during the war (1970-1975). These zones, significantly, did not conform to any pre-existing political division of Cambodia. The Northeast, East, and Southwest zones, for example, included the former eastern portion of Stung Treng province and the provinces of Ratanakiri, Mondulkiri, Prey Veng, Svay Rieng, eastern Kompong Cham, Kandal, southern Kompong Speu, and Kampot.
The political geography of Democratic Kampuchea as delineated on the map is very significant. Certainly, one sees evidence of the militarized society promoted by the Khmer Rouge. The fact that political divisions, for example, were derived from military necessity is certainly important. However, the map also reveals how the Khmer Rouge sought to erase previous regional identities, to be replaced by an imaginative geography that suppressed regionalism and provincialism in favor of a broader nationalism. The entire political geographic organization of Democratic Kampuchea was based on an abstract system composed of cardinal direction points and numbers and, in the process, the Khmer Rouge’s cartography signified ‘egalitarianism’ in that all regions were identical; there was nothing to distinguish one zone from the other.
The production of geographic knowledge, whether in the form of maps or school texts, thus assumes a primary place in post-conflict construction. State schooling practices, serve to establish and reinforce specific ideologies of nationalism. In turn, these practices may be used to justify and legitimate political processes and practices—including mass violence and genocide.

Political Geography under the Khmer Rouge
Apart from agricultural and industrial development, education was seen by the CPK to be of prime importance in the building of Democratic Kampuchea. In part, the importance of education is related to the place of children within the new society. A traditional saying in Cambodia holds that ‘clay is molded while it is soft.’ According to Henri Locard, this slogan was often used to signify that only young children could be selected by the CPK to become loyal servants of Angkar. This idea, in fact, was developed by Pol Pot, who said of the young: “Those, among our comrades, who are young, must make a great effort to re-educate themselves. They must never allow themselves to lose sight of this goal. You have to be, and remain, faithful to the revolution. People age quickly. Being young, you are at the most receptive age, and capable to assimilate what the revolution stands for, better than anyone else.”[3]
Given that education within Democratic Kampuchea was so important for the cultivation of a political consciousness, it is not surprising that the Khmer Rouge produced school texts. Text-books for the CPK imparted an authority to which students were expected to respect without question, and thus complemented the role performed by the secretive ‘Angkar’. In Democratic Kampuchea, the Khmer Rouge was known to have published at least three text-books, including two books on geography.[4] The first, a general geography text, was intended for first-grade use; the second, a text on political geography, was designed for second-grade use. It is the latter text that occupies my focus for the remainder of this paper.
In 1977 the Ministry of Education published a second-grade text entitled “Political Geography of Democratic Kampuchea.” Numbering 72 pages in length, the text is composed of twelve ‘lessons’ or chapters. The first chapter provides an overview of the nation and people of Democratic Kampuchea; the second chapter details the organizational structure of Democratic Kampuchea, including its provinces, regions, zones, and districts. Lessons three through eleven cover the various provinces of Democratic Kampuchea. Between 1975 and 1979, the state of Democratic Kampuchea (as administered by the Khmer Rouge) was composed of 19 provinces; these were further divided into 112 districts, 1,160 communes, and innumerable villages. These provinces were also aggregated for administrative purposes into larger regions and zones.
The text, in effect, constitutes a fairly traditional regional geography of Democratic Kampuchea. Lessons Three through Eleven are identical in structure. Each lesson begins with a brief summary of the province(s), followed by a (repetitive) lesson summary and series of questions. Lesson four, for example, identifies Kandal Province as being “situated around the intersection of … four rivers” and having Takhmao as its provincial town” (page 21). These brief summaries give further elaboration on neighboring provinces and/or physical features. In short, each lesson begins with the basic ‘site-and-situation’ of the province. Next, the text informs students of the various districts which compose the provinces, along with specific communes. Stung Treng Province, for example, consists of four districts, including Siem Bok; this latter district is further composed of three communes. Lesson chapters are illustrated with photographs. As a regional geography, however, the text is far from idiographic; rather, it is normative in approach, commanding students to learn not only the political (i.e., administrative) divisions of the country, but also the politics behind the establishment of Democratic Kampuchea.
Having established the basic political boundaries of each province, lessons subsequently inform students of the relevancy of each location to the overall revolution. Thus, with respect to Kandal Province, students learn that Democratic Kampuchea’s “poor peasants at all revolutionary strongholds in Kandal Province stood up to struggle against the secret agents, soldiers, police, and the exploitative class of all forms, who infiltrated, repressed, and slaughtered our brothers and sisters” (page 22). Likewise, students learn that for both Siem Reap Province and Oddar Meanchey Province, “our people … [but] particularly the poor peasant farmers, joined the rest of the people in the country in the revolutionary struggles against the American imperialist, its puppets, and the traitorous Lon Nol clique with bursting energy and enthusiasm” (page 53). Chapters conclude with ‘lesson summaries’, in which the main points of the preceding relevancy sections are repeated, followed by ‘suggested’ questions for discussion. One question, for example, asks students: “During the period of over five years of revolutionary war, how did our people in Preah Vihear province participate in the struggles?” (page 62).
Lessons are brief, direct, and repetitive. They entail basic geographic concepts (i.e., site and situation), followed by political lessons designed to promote a particular geographic imaginary of both the revolutionary struggle and the contemporary state of Democratic Kampuchea.
Significantly, these lessons provide insight into the establishment of citizenry for Democratic Kampuchea. Students learn who was to be included within the state, and for what reasons; likewise, students learned who was to be excluded—or ‘smashed’. Consequently, these lessons could be applied in the students’ everyday lives, as a means of providing justification and legitimacy to other Khmer Rouge practices, such as detentions, forced labors, and executions.
The Khmer Rouge understood the construction of Democratic Kampuchea’s ‘new’ geography from its ‘old’. As indicated in the political geography text book:
“Over the past two thousand years under the administration of the feudal and capitalist class and the iron yoke of the old and new colonialists and the foreign imperialists, our Kampuchean nation has nothing remained but an empty shell and a mere label. The true nature and essence of the national unit were entirely shattered. For the nation suffered territorial losses and the country and people became subservient to foreigners. Furthermore, everything associated with the national identity from politics, economics, culture, arts, literature, and traditions to social order, attitude and behavior, language, clothing fashion, and so on were foreign imports or were transformed by foreign influences” (page 2).

Lesson One, therefore, is quite clear as to whom was to be included (and thus allowed to live) in Democratic Kampuchea. The lesson explains that the “people of Kampuchea are Kampucheans of all ethnic origins, including the Khmers and all ethnic minorities who are based in regional localities and other areas throughout the country and who were born and have earned their livelihood from farming in the territory of the Democratic Kampuchea since a long time ago” (page 3). However, the text also notes that the ‘nation’ consists of “people of all ethnic backgrounds who are collective laborers and peasants who have a long history of audacious struggles against the oppression and exploitation of the feudal and capitalist reactionaries and the invasion of foreign imperialists and colonialists of the old and new kinds” (page 1). According to this ‘second-grade’ text book, here is a clear political statement as to who was to be included or excluded from Democratic Kampuchea. In other words, we may view the political geography text as providing a lesson in citizenship.
The lesson is brutally self-evident. The Khmer Rouge ideologues were not content with reconstructing Cambodia, but rather in construction a new Democratic Kampuchea. The CPK believed itself to be justified in its planned and deliberate actions, through the use of genocide as a post-war political tool of construction. The transformation of Cambodia into Democratic Kampuchea was, from the perspective of the CPK, literally to ‘smash’ all pre-existing histories, geographies, and societies.
Citizens—as students were taught—were to be economically and/or politically useful; citizens were to live only for the state. The Khmer Rouge saying ‘If you live there is no gain. If you die, there is no loss’, approaches this conception of the sovereign’s right over life and death. This is the lesson that was taught in the second-grade text-book.
The killings that were sanctioned and justified by the Khmer Rouge were designed, in part, to centralize authority; likewise, the tortures, forced confessions, and executions were enacted to justify and legitimize the sovereignty of the CPK. Hence we see in Democratic Kampuchea, that genocide had a clear and distinct post-conflict purpose: a systematic eradication of persons who did not conform with the imagined geographies of a sovereign Democratic Kampuchea.

Conclusions
When fighting ceases, it is often assumed, peace is at hand, and a process of reconstruction begins. Unfortunately, the reality is decidedly more complex. Through an examination of a second-grade political geography text-book produced by the Khmer Rouge, I have argued that the Khmer Rouge used genocidal policies in order to construct a new nation-state following the termination of war. The Khmer Rouge justified their actions and condoned the death of millions of their own citizens. These deaths occurred via both direct violence (e.g., murder and execution) and structural violence (e.g., starvation, inadequate health facilities).
In the aftermath of war, the Khmer Rouge proposed and implemented a geographic-based pedagogy, an educational curricula designed to formulate a specific geographical imagination and political consciousness. I maintain that the political geography text-book, while traditional in orientation with an emphasis on regional geography, was explicit in forwarding the Khmer Rouge’s justification and legitimacy of both its political rule and organized mass violence. In other words, the text-book itself is an admission on behalf of the Khmer Rouge that it acknowledged, recognized, and condoned the brutal practices that led to the death of approximately two-million people.

END.

[1] Quoted in T. Clayton (1998) “Building the New Cambodia: Educational Destruction and Construction Under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-1979,” History of Education Quarterly 38(1): 1-16; at 3.
[2] The text is entitled Political Geography of Democratic Kampuchea and was published in 1977 by the Ministry of Education, Democratic Kampuchea. I sincerely thank Mr. Youk Chhang for making this document available and Mr. Bou Lim for his exceptional translation work. A longer version of this paper appears as J. Tyner, (2010) “Genocide as Reconstruction: The Political Geography of Democratic Kampuchea,” in Reconstructing Conflict: Integrating War and Post-War Geographies, edited by Scott Kirsch and Colin Flint (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate).
[3] H. Locard (2004) Pol Pot’s Little Red Book: The Sayings of Angkar (Chiang Mai, Thailand: Silkworm Books)
[4] A math text was also produced.

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