The Tragedy of Cambodian History: Politics, War and Revolution Since 1945, and: Brother Number One: A Political Biography of Pol Pot (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 161 into so many small states, and citizenship ofthis type would have threatened their sovereignty. Thus, citizenship had to be tied to the institutions ofthe State. When Bismarck established the German Empire, he created an imperfect nation-state and therefore did not eliminate the dichotomy. The German State did not include all of the German Nation, and, in fact, included many people who were not part ofthe German Nation. Citizenship linked to such a state was a source offrustration for nationalists. Basing citizenship on descent was a step toward solving this dilemma. Citizenship of this type would include all of Germandom, reinforce the Germanness of the State, and move Germany closer to the ideal of the nationstate . The conclusions of this book regarding the national self-identities (the determining factor ofcitizenship laws) ofFrance and Germany help to illuminate their quite different reactions to the Maastricht Treaty. The decision of the Twelve to allow Community citizens to vote in local elections evoked strong reactions in France, leading the government to call a popular referendum. In Germany, there have been no strong reactions against Maastricht (at least not in this area), and the issue will be decided in Parliament rather than by popular vote. These opposite reactions are very understandable in the context of this book. Historically, France has had a very state-centered concept of citizenship. Rights, includingthe right to vote, guaranteed by the State are therefore considered sacred. Granting these rights to people who are not official French citizens devalues French citizenship because the principle ofexclusivity, expressed as ties to the institutions of the State, is violated. In Germany, on the other hand, citizenship is not tied to the State, but rather to the ethnocultural concept of the Nation. Therefore, civic rights can be extended to non-citizens without threatening the exclusivity principle of citizenship. The focus ofthis book, citizenship laws, effectively gives shape to a much more fundamental element of the nation-state: the concept of self-identity. Citizenship laws are a surface manifestation of this deeper characteristic. The explanatory powers of citizenship laws as tools of analysis is limited if a nation-state's selfidentity is not also considered. Together, they produce a much more powerful tool of analysis, which is able to go beyond explaining issues related exclusively to citizenship laws and on to a myriad of other issues, such as how states relate to one another and how states react to challenges to their sovereignty, as in the case of the Maastricht Treaty. The Tragedy of Cambodian History: Politics, War and Revolution Since 1945. By David P. Chandler. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991. 396 pp. $35/Hardcover. BrotherNumber One:A PoliticalBiographyofPolPot By David P. Chandler. Boulder: Westview Press, 1992. 254 pp. $24.95/Hardcover. Reviewed by Jeffrey M. Ritter, MA. Candidate, SAIS. In April of 1975, when the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) defeated the Lon NoI government and declared the establishment of Democratic Kampuchea 162 SAISREVIEW (DK), a spokesman for the new regime claimed that the revolution had brought two thousand years of Cambodian history to an end. During the DK era, which lasted until 1979, an estimated one million Cambodians, or one out ofeight, died as aresultofmalnutrition, disease, overwork, or deliberate execution. Most Americans know Cambodia only through the depiction of the DK period in the 1986 film The Killing Fields. In two recent books, David Chandler, a professor at Australia's Monash University, has undertaken to rescue Cambodia's pre-1975 history and place Democratic Kampuchea in its proper historical context. He has largely succeeded . The Tragedy ofCambodian History is Chandler's attempt to distill Cambodian politics since World War II into a coherent narrative. Beginning with the Japanese coup de force of 1945, which toppled the French colonial administration, Chandler traces Cambodian politics through all its twists and turns: the return ofthe French; the earlyrounds ofmultipartypolitics; Prince Norodom Sihanouk's struggle against the Democratic Party and his eventual monopolization of authority; the tensions which led to Sihanouk's ouster in the coup of 1970; the collapse ofthe hapless Lon NoI government; and the rise and fall of Democratic Kampuchea. Underlying Chandler's account are three interpretive themes which ascribe...