Ideologies of Khmer Rouge Family Policy: Contextualizing Sexual and Gender-Based Violence during the Cambodian Genocide

Abstract

Between 1975 and 1979 approximately two million men, women, and children perished during the Cambodian Genocide. These deaths are attributed to specific administrative policies and practices initiated by the senior leadership of the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK), all of which were geared toward the basic objective of increasing agricultural production. Many of these deaths resulted from starvation, disease, and exhaustion; for others, death resulted from torture, murder, and execution. Within this context, women and men both were subject to sexual and gender-based violence. Scholars understand that much sexual and gender-based violence is directly associated with broader CPK policies toward the family. Less attention, however, has addressed the historical context and ideological basis of CPK family policy. This paper provides a primary-sourced assessment of CPK ideologies of the family and evaluates these within the context of CPK economic planning. In so doing, the CPK’s ideology of revolutionary families is situated within the larger history of family policies of communist governments.