List of Illustrations Preface The Thirty Years War A Desperate Time After the Peace Documenting Mass Murder Centralized Terror Terror in the East Digging in the Killing Fields The Persistence of Impunity The Politics of Genocide Justice Challenging the Culture of Impunity Notes Bibliography Index
"How did the Khmer Rouge get away with genocide? Craig Etcheson's After the Killing Fields answers this deceptively simple question. Etcheson has mapped killing fileds, interviewed the killers themselves, and his decades of empirical research in Cambodia have endowed him with refreshing common sense. After the Killing Fieldsshould be mandatory reading for anyone interested in Cambodia and international law." -- Peter Maguire, author of Law and War: An American Story and Facing Death in Cambodia "Etcheson's absorbing study reflects almost a quarter century of sustained and fruitful work on Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia (1975-1979) and on what has happened in Cambodia since then. Etcheson draws on extensive field-work, archival research and his own analytical skills to bring the horrors of the Khmer Rouge into focus and to make readers aware of the many faceted, saddening aftermath of that murderous regime. At a time when trial for at least some of the Khmer Rouge leaders seems finally in sight, After the Killing Fields is a timely and sobering study of the vitality of realpolitik, the need for justice in Cambodia, the pains of memory, and the fragility of reconciliation." -- David Chandler, Author of Voices from S-21: Terror and History in Pol Pot's Secret Prison
CRAIG ETCHESON is a Research Associate at the Institute for Transnational Studies at the University of Southern California where he teaches research methodology and international relations theory.
More than 25 years after the fall of the Khmer Rouge regime, those
responsible for genocide and human rights violations in Cambodia
have yet to answer for their crimes. Why has justice for the
Cambodian people been so elusive? Etcheson argues that a culture of
impunity persists in Cambodia, and that national reconciliation and
healing will require a properly conducted war crimes tribunal,
perhaps overseen by the UN. The author describes the efforts of the
Documentation Center of Cambodia in amassing proof that the leaders
of the Khmer Rouge ordered mass executions throughout Cambodia
during the 1975-79 regime. But the abuses began earlier and
continue to the present. Moreover, no one in Cambodia's political
elite is completely untainted. Etcheson's historical and legal
concerns are intertwined, since the evidence from documents,
interviews, and eyewitness accounts, backed up by physical evidence
from mass graves, is meant to combat the denial syndrome that is
part of Cambodia's tragic and apparently intractable situation.
These essays will appeal mainly to specialists in Cambodian
political history and international politics, as well as to other
readers interested in legal remedies for political violence and
genocide. Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students/faculty.
*Choice*
^IAfter the Killing Fields: Lessons from the Cambodian Genocide^R
is a thorough insider's description of the Documentation Center of
Cambodia's valuable work. More importantly, the book probes the
culture of impunity and enhances our understanding of this
extraordinarily complex issue. It is a major contribution to
genocide studies, as well as an eloquent tribute to the Cambodians
who suffered under the Khmer Rouge.
*H-Net: Humanities and Social Science Reviews Online --
H-Genocide*
[E]tcheson's great contribution is his orderly, detailed relating
of DC-Cam's postwar research into the organization and location of
mass murder as well as international legal efforts to bring
surviving perpetrators to account.
*MultiCultural Review*
After the Killing Fields is a thorough description of the
step-by-step accumulation of evidence of Khmer Rouge crimes.
*Times Literary Supplement*
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