Learning resource

A History of Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979)

A History of Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979) is a textbook on the Khmer Rouge years published by the Documentation Center of Cambodia (DC-Cam).[1] Khamboly Dy wrote the first edition, published in Phnom Penh in 2007 for high school students and equally suited to adults.[2][3]

History

Khamboly Dy wrote the book over two years of research at DC-Cam. He drew on a wide range of English-language secondary sources, including work on ethnic minorities, and on the archival collections held by the center.[4][5] By 2002 the subject of Democratic Kampuchea had disappeared from Cambodian textbooks, and young Cambodians knew little of it in detail. Historical experts reviewed the drafts, and the historian David Chandler helped the author improve the text. Cambodian government authorities also commented on the text and shaped its wording in a few places.[5] DC-Cam calls it the first such text written by a Cambodian.[4]

The text went to the Government Working Commission to Review the Draft of the History of Democratic Kampuchea. On January 3, 2007, the commission decided that it could serve as supplementary discussion material for teachers and as the basis for a high school history lesson.[4] The government agreed to make sure that teachers would have access to the book.[5] The Open Society Institute of the Soros Foundation and the National Endowment for Democracy funded the project.[2]

DC-Cam published a second edition in 2020, with Pheng Pong-Rasy, Sopheak Pheana and Christopher Dearing as authors. It adds chapters on justice after the genocide, with information and stories from the proceedings and decisions of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), and explains how the ECCC was set up, organized and run. A committee of the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport reviewed it in July 2020. GIZ, the Civil Peace Service, BMZ and Sida funded the edition, and a grant from the Peace Building project of the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs supported its translation. The book is dedicated to Khmer Rouge survivors.[1]

Contents

The book is mainly a political history, told in order from the rise of the Khmer Rouge to the establishment and rule of Democratic Kampuchea and its fall.[5] It traces the movement to the struggle against French rule in the 1940s and follows the Communist Party of Kampuchea, which took control of Cambodia on April 17, 1975, and ruled until January 1979.[5][2] Chapters cover administration, economic policy, daily life, security, Tuol Sleng prison in Phnom Penh and foreign relations. The chapters on daily life, security and Tuol Sleng draw on personal accounts from Cambodians of different regions and ethnic backgrounds, and the book discusses resistance to the regime, particularly by Cham Muslims.[5]

The book sets out the different estimates of deaths under the regime and how each was reached.[5] Its own account gives nearly two million Cambodian deaths from disease, starvation, execution and overwork.[2] Footnotes and a bibliography accompany the text.[5]

Use in teaching

The book gives teachers and students a way to study Cambodia's past, and DC-Cam intends its material to be taken into new classes and lessons for Cambodian students and the public. DC-Cam holds that genocide education is genocide prevention, and it links the book to human rights education.[1]

Editions

  • First edition (2007), by Khamboly Dy: 125 pages in Khmer and 80 pages in English; ISBN-13 978-99950-60-04-6.[4][2] An Internet Archive copy runs to 73 pages.[3] The first edition is available in Khmer, English, French, Vietnamese, Chinese and Japanese.[1]
  • Second edition (2020), by Pheng Pong-Rasy, Sopheak Pheana and Christopher Dearing: Khmer and English.[1]

DC-Cam recognizes only the English and Khmer versions as authentic originals.[1]

Access

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 Documentation Center of Cambodia, A History of Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979)
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Documentation Center of Cambodia, A History of Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979), first edition (2007)
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Internet Archive, A history of Democratic Kampuchea, 1975-1979
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 DC-Cam Library, A History of Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979)
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7 Genocide Watch, review of A History of Democratic Kampuchea (April 22, 2007)
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This page was last edited on 27 September 2026, at 06:00.