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Nation-Building or Nation-Destroying?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2011

Walker Connor
Walker Connor
Affiliation:
State University of New YorkBrockport
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Extract

Scholars associated with theories of “nation-building” have tended either to ignore the question of ethnic diversity or to treat the matter of ethnic identity superficially as merely one of a number of minor impediments to effective state-integration. To the degree that ethnic identity is given recognition, it is apt to be as a somewhat unimportant and ephemeral nuisance that will unquestionably give way to a common identity uniting all inhabitants of the state, regardless of ethnic heritage, as modern communication and transportation networks link the state's various parts more closely. Both tendencies are at sharp variance with the facts, and have contributed to the undue optimism that has characterized so much of the literature on “nation-building.”

Type
Research Article
Information
World Politics , Volume 24 , Issue 3 , April 1972 , pp. 319 - 355
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1972

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References

1 A representative sampling of the literature on integration theory might well include the following titles: (1) Almond, Gabriel and Coleman, James S., The Politics of Developing Areas (Princeton 1960Google Scholar); (2) Almond, Gabriel and Powell, G. Bingham, Comparative Politics: A Developmental Approach (Boston 1966Google Scholar); (3) Almond, Gabriel and Verba, Sidney, The Civic Culture (Boston 1963CrossRefGoogle Scholar); (4) Apter, David, The Politics of Modernization (Chicago 1965Google Scholar); (5) Beling, Willard A. and Totten, George O., eds., Developing Nations: Quest for a Model (New York 1970Google Scholar); (6) Deutsch, Karl W. and Foltz, William, eds., Nation-Building (New York 1966Google Scholar); (7) Finkle, Jason and Gable, Richard, eds., Political Development and Social Change (New York 1966Google Scholar); (8) Jacob, Philip E. and Toscano, James V., eds., The Integration of Political Communities (Philadelphia 1964Google Scholar) ; (9) Pye, Lucian, ed., Communications and Political Development (Princeton 1963Google Scholar); and (10) Pye, Lucian, Aspects of Political Development (Boston 1966Google Scholar). The inclusion of five readers on the list, with an aggregate of well over fifty separate contributions, substantially broadens the sample.

None of these ten works dedicates a section, chapter, or major subheading to the matter of ethnic diversity. By contrast, the roles of the military, the bureaucracy, social classes, personality, industrialization, urbanization, and transaction flows and other modes of communication are common entries in tables of contents. In instances in which the tables of contents contain categories that might be expected to include a serious discourse on the ramifications of ethnicity—categories such as “Internal Legitimacy” or “National Identity”—further investigation proved unrewarding.

The slighting of ethnicity is further evidenced by the indices. Six of the ten show not a single reference to ethnic groups, ethnicity, or minorities. Two make a single passing reference to ethnicity, and still another accords to all types of minorities less than two pages, limiting the discussion to their impact upon democracy. The tenth work, a collection of papers, represents only a partial exception. Discussion of the impediments that ethnicity, per se, poses to state-integration is limited to general comments in an introductory essay. Moreover, in this essay the author assumes that the matter is one of relatively short duration, in line with the second tendency described in this paper's introductory sentence.

It should be acknowledged that readers dealing with “nation-building” are apt to contain a few regional or country studies whose authors are well aware of the fissiparous impact of ethnic diversity therein. (In one of the above works, for example, a contribution on sub-Sahara Africa and another on Ceylon clearly demonstrate such an awareness.) But the significant fact is that the issue of ethnic diversity is not perceived by the editors as one that transcends the particular case(s). If the format of a book, as reflected in both its table of contents and index, fails to recognize the problem of ethnicity as more than a local phenomenon, the user of the book is hardly likely to do so.

The above ten works, as noted, are believed to be representative. But two decidedly nonrepresentative titles should be noted: The concept of ethnicity pervades Emerson, Rupert, From Empire to Nation (Boston 1960CrossRefGoogle Scholar); and an important segment of Anderson, Charles W. and others, Issues of Political Development (Englewood Cliffs 1967Google Scholar) is dedicated to a serious treatment of the issue.

2 The 132 units include all entities that were generally considered to be states as of January 1, 1971, with the exception of a few microunits such as Nauru and Western Samoa. However, East and West Germany, North and South Korea, and North and South Vietnam were treated as single entities in the belief that such treatment would minimize their distorting effects. It should not be assumed that the inclusion of all microunits would substantially alter the statistics in favor of homogeneity. In the case of Nauru, for example, despite a population of only 6,500, the largest elhnic element fails to constitute a majority.

3 See, for example, Rivkin, Arnold, Nation-Building in Africa (New Brunswick 1969Google Scholar). After reviewing a number of problems throughout Africa, many of which he readily acknowledges are essentially ethnic (e.g., pp. 35–37, 195, 196, and 226), the author concludes (p. 238): “Although the divided populations of Africa—of different tribes, ethnic origin (as the Watusi and Bahutu in Rwanda and Burundi), religions (Christian, Islamic, animistic, etc.), and historical background—pose serious and major problems for nation-building, compared to the Latin American divisions, developed over centuries, and involving an intermixture of race, social structure, and economic status, they seem relatively manageable and over time susceptible of solution.” No further details concerning a solution are offered, however, and the reader is therefore asked to accept this optimistic forecast solely on faith.

One of the most perplexing illustrations of a failure to confront a problem of ethnic diversity is offered by Pye, Lucian, Politics, Personality, and Nation Building: Burma's Search for Identity (New Haven 1962Google Scholar). Although the politically dominant Burmese have been involved in open ethnic warfare with that country's minorities almost uninterruptedly since that state achieved independence, and although this continuing struggle unquestionably represents that state's most visible and significant barrier to integration, a passing reference to some of the minorities is limited to a single page.

4 Nationalism and Social Communication: An Inquiry into the Foundations of Nationality (Cambridge, Mass.). The first edition was published in 1953 and the second, which contains no substantive changes, in 1966. All references to page numbers in this paper correspond to the second edition.

5 See, for example, p. 126: “Linguistically and culturally, then, members of each group are outsiders for the other. Yet technological and economic processes are forcing them together, into acute recognition of their differences and their common, mutual experience of strangeness, and more conspicuous differentiation and conflict may result.”

6 Ibid., 152.

7 Ibid., 188.

8 Ibid., 162, 163; emphasis added.

9 Ibid., 164.

10 Deutsch, Karl, “Social Mobilization and Political Development,” American Political Science Review, LV (September 1961), 501Google Scholar.

11 Ibid. It may be instructive that Deutsch offered negative examples of this phenomenon (e.g., the secession of the U.S. and Ireland from Britain), but no examples of ethnic groups submerging their identity because of effective government.

12 Karl Deutsch, “Nation-Building and National Development: Some Issues for Political Research,” in Deutsch and Foltz (fn. 1), 4–5.

13 Ibid., 8–9. It is worth noting that in discussing these prospective stages of assimilation, Deutsch cited several of his own works, including Nationalism and Social Communication, thereby indicating his feeling that that work was fully compatible with this view of the ultimate eradication of ethnic divisiveness.

14 Deutsch, Karl, Nationalism and Its Alternatives (New York 1969Google Scholar).

15 One indication of a change of attitude toward the problem of assimilation is that while it played a central role in Nationalism and Social Communication, the process of assimilation is allocated less than two pages in his most recent work and is treated in terms of its “dimensions” rather than its “components.” See pp. 25–27.

16 Deutsch (fn. 14), 27.

17 See above, pp. 323–24.

18 Deutsch (fn. 14), 73.

19 Another example of this tautology can be found on page 68, ibid. Referring to earlier cases of national integration, Deutsch concludes that “the combined processes of social mobilization and assimilation eventually turned them into consolidated peoples and nations.” If the italicized words are omitted, the statement is an evident truism in that it defines assimilation. Indeed, to the degree that social mobilization presupposes the industrial age and relatively modern transportation and communication networks, the statement as worded is false. The Chinese nation, and nearly all others, antedate the Industrial Revolution.

20 For a treatment of this trend as a global phenomenon, see Connor, , “Self-Determination: The New Phase,” World Politics, xx (October 1967), 30–53CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21 It is assumed that Ethiopia's very short period of domination by Italy in the 1930's does not invalidate its use as an example of a state without a colonial history.

22 For a more complete discussion of the relationship of communications distance to physical distance, see Connor, , “Myths of Hemispheric, Continental, Regional, and State Unity,” Political Science Quarterly, LXXXIV (December 1969), particularly 565Google Scholar–67.

23 For a fascinating account of how increased contacts have strengthened Lao identity, see Keyes, Charles F., “Ethnic Identity and Loyalty of Villagers in Northeast Thailand,” Asian Survey, vi (July 1966), 362CrossRefGoogle Scholar–69.

24 See the perspicacious comment concerning Ethiopia by a newspaper reporter: “Lack of communications helped hold this empire together. No w developing communications and the political awareness they encourage are straining its unity.” (Frederick Hunter in the Christian Science Monitor, January 8, 1970.) Problem areas include not just the rather recently acquired Eritrea, but also Bale and Gojam Provinces. See the New York Times, April 1, 1969Google Scholar.

25 Cases in point would include Afghanistan, Iran, and Liberia. Many of the Latin American States would also qualify. For a treatment of the latter, see Anderson and others (fn. i) , 45–56. For more details on growing ethnic awareness in Thailand and South Asia, see Connor, , “Ethnology and the Peace of South Asia,” World Politics, xxii (October 1969), 51–86CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

26 One piece of evidence that there are substantial distinctions in the pervasiveness of pre- and post-World War II intergrqnp, intrastate contacts is offered by American regionalism. As will be noted below, regionalism, in contradistinction to edinicity, does tend to evaporate in direct proportion to the intensity of interregional communication and transportation networks. Yet regionalism, as manifested in concepts like “states' rights” and in voting blocs and voting patterns, was still strong following World War II. Th e most enduring manifestation of American regionalism, “the Solid Soudi,” has shown symptoms of dying only in recent years.

27 The expression appeared as part of the Proclamation on the Polish Question, endorsed by the London Conference of the First International. The Proclamation noted “the need for annulling Russian influence in Europe, through enforcing the right of self-determination, and through the reconstituting of Poland upon democratic and social foundations.” Cited in Stelkloff, G., History of the First International (New York 1968), 85Google Scholar. For a reference to a still earlier use of the expression by Karl Marx in his Herr Vogt (1860), see Possony, Stefan, “Nationalism and the Ethnic Factor,” Orbis, x (Winter 1967), 1218Google Scholar.

28 United Nations Charter, art. I, par. 2.

29 The Worldmark Encyclopedia of the Nations [sic], 3d ed., I (New York 1967), 254Google Scholar–57, l's ts fifty intergovernmental organizations whose names begin with International. Not one of them has anything to do with nations.

30 Piano, Jack C. and Olton, Roy, The International Relations Dictionary (New York 1969Google Scholar).

31 See, for example, Organski, A.F.K., World Politics (2d rev. ed., New York 1968Google Scholar), 12: “The story we are about to tell is a tale of nations. Nations are the major characters, and it is with their actions, their goals and plans, their power, their possessions, and their relations with each other that we shall be concerned.” See also Deutsch (fn. 14), where, despite defining the word nation to mean a people (i.e., an ethnic group) in charge of a state (p. 19), the author refers to the multiethnic populations of Spain (p. 13), and of Belgium (p. 70), as nations. See, too, the concluding paragraph of Rustow, Dankwart, A World of Nations (Washington 1967Google Scholar) in which he notes that “more than 130 nations, real or so-called, will each make its contribution to the history of the late twentieth century.” The author had earlier (e.g., p. 36) differentiated between state and nation. For evidence that studies dealing specifically with the problems that ethnic diversity poses for state integration are also not necessarily immune from improper interuse of terminology, see Rothchild, Donald, “Ethnicity and Conflict Resolution,” World Politics, xxii (July 1970Google Scholar), particularly 597–98. “First, in spite of the oft-used distinction between a fairly coercive domestic order and a fairly noncoercive international order, the jockeying for power of ethnic groups within states corresponds markedly to that of nation and nation. . . . New and more productive 'decades of development,' with their presumed attempts at re-allocation, may be as indispensable to the comity among ethnic groups within the state as they are among the nations of the world.” (Emphasis added.) Examples abound of this tendency to use key terms improperly, so the authorities who are singled out in this and the following footnotes are not selected because they have been unusually uncircumspect in their terminology. On the contrary, they have been selected, in part, because they are acknowledged scholars.

32 See for example Paddleford, Norman J. and Lincoln, George A., The Dynamics of International Politics (2d ed., New York 1967), 7Google Scholar: “The actors in the international political system are the independent nation-states.” Or Halle, Louis J., Civilization and Foreign Policy (New York 1952), 10Google Scholar: “A prime fact about die world is that it is largely composed of nation-states.” And Elton Atwater and others, World Tensions: Conflict and Accommodation (New York 1967), 16Google Scholar: “Since there are some 120 different nation-states in the world . . .” Karl Deutsch also regularly refers to all states as nation-states. See, for example, Nationalism and Its Alternatives (fn. 14), 61, 125, and 176. For his description of the multiethnic states of Czechoslovakia, Rumania, and Yugoslavia as nation-states, see 62–63.

33 Meanwhile, expressions such as statism or etatisme, which should refer to loyalty to the state, have been assigned still other meanings that have little to do with loyalty of any sort.

34 See, for example, the section in Shils, Edward, Political Development in the New States (The Hague 1968Google Scholar), entitled “Parochialism, Nationality, and Nationalism,” 32–33. As used therein, parochialism refers to loyalty to the ethnic group, and nationality and nationalism refer to identity with, and loyalty to, the state.

35 One manifestation has been the grouping of the nationalism of Japan and Germany during the 1930's and early 1940's with that of Italy and of multiethnic Argentina and Spain under the single rubric of Fascism, a doctrine positing the superiority of the corporate state.

36 See, for example, Rothchild (fn. 31), 598. “Second, the interethnic confrontation raises questions about the unifying potential of nationalism. Although nationalism has effectively repulsed the claims of metropolitan hegemony in a number of crucial confrontations, it has still to demonstrate the ability to overcome ‘primordial sentiments’ and to foster a sense of common purpose.” By equating nationalism with loyalty to the state, Rothchild is unwittingly criticizing nationalism for not being able to overcome itself. Nonetheless, if his pessimism persisted, his basic analysis concerning the relative strength of ethnic and state loyalty would be sound. However, he later criticizes the authors of a number of books dealing with ethnic problems for emphasizing the depth of the cleavages rather than the positive possibilities for “ethnic balancing.” They represent “an all-too-general preoccupation with the nature of past cleavages and conflicts instead of with the evolving dimensions of the process of political integration” (p. 612). “They tell us more about cleavages than about links, more about conflict than about cooperation and reciprocity. Their details are sharply delineated; however, the complete picture requires somewhat greater attention to adjustment, interrelatedness, adaptation, and exchange” (p. 615). One suspects that the author might have been more likely to question whether he was not asking for answers to the unanswerable if he had been aware that nationalism was on the side of state-disintegration rather than state-integration.

37 Since the concept of the nation does not preclude significant internal divisions, it actually embodies two important levels of attitudes. Relative to intranational distinctions and similarities, the stress, when need be, is upon those traits that unite; relative to distinctions and similarities among nations, the ultimate stress is upon those that divide.

38 Still other examples would include the resurgence of Scottish and Welsh nationalism even among those who are linguistically assimilated to English.

39 The pioneering efforts of the late Hadley Cantril in the study of the stereotype images that one group holds of another are of great pertinence and value to the study of ethnic nationalism. Th e value of the work of Cantril and of those scholars most influenced by him is lessened only slightly because the objects described are the populations of countries rather than ethnic groups. When asked to select those adjectives that best describe the people of another country, it is probable that the respondent envisages the politically dominant ethnic group of that state (e.g., British is perceived as English, South African as Afrikaner, Czechoslovakian as Czech, etc.). A more important limitation lies in the fact that the responses are not tabulated according to the ethnicity of the respondents. There is still another factor: the adjectives which are usually employed in such studies cannot adequately convey the depth of irrational hatred which may be involved. Negative attributes, such as backward, domineering, conceited, and even cruel, are of a different order than are the unarticulated passions that can cause Cambodians to massacre huge numbers of unarmed Vietnamese civilians; Balinese, Javanese, and Malays to massacre Chinese; the Bahutu to massacre the Watusi; the Hausa, the Ibo; or the Turks, the Armenians.

40 For an example of a typical account, see Linda Charlton's article in the New York Times, August 15, 1969, in which she describes the crisis as “Irishman against Irishman” and “Prods” (Protestants) against Catholics.

41 Rose, Richard, The United Kingdom as a Multinational State (Glasgow 1970), 10Google Scholar.

42 The religious composition is 35 per cent Catholic, 29 per cent Presbyterian (Church of Scotland), 24 per cent Episcopal (Church of England), 10 per cent other Protestant, and 2 per cent other. Ibid., 13.

43 See the New York Times, January 24, 1971, for an account of a protest demonstra tion by Belfast women before a Catholic Bishop's house because he had given a sermon advising Catholics not to have anything to do with the outlawed Irish Republican Army.

Evidence that the basic driving force of Irish militancy has been not simply the desire for civil reform is offered by the fact that reforms promoted by the moderate government of Chichester-Clark were followed by greater militancy on the part of the Irish element.

44 A notable exception is Terrence O'Neill, the former, moderate Prime Minister. An awareness within Northern Ireland's political community that strong emotions are often associated with surnames caused his colleagues to presume that his name would prove a real asset in gaining the respect and trust of the Irish minority.

45 See the New York Times, April 30, 1970. See also the New York Times of two days earlier, where it was reported that order was restored in Belfast only after Scottish troops were replaced by English troops.

As is evident from the above-mentioned survey on national identification, the term Scotch-Irish is a misleading ethnic description. It simply refers to people whose Scottish ancestors emigrated to Ireland, but it need not indicate any Irish ancestry.

46 Wall Street Journal, August 16, 1969Google Scholar. A somewhat similar analysis appeared in the letter to the editor column of the New York Times on July 12, 1970, signed John C. Marley. “But the religious persuasions of the opposing elements are only incidental to the underlying political question, which is whether the six counties of Northern Ireland shall be ruled by a foreign power. The overwhelming majority of the Irish people, North and South, are united in their desire that the British get out of Ireland. The only exception to this view comes from a British ethnic group which constitutes a local majority, not in the entire six occupied counties, but in a small enclave within a thirty mile radius of Belfast.”

47 New York Times, July 10, 1970.

48 For descriptions of this tendency, see Morgenthau, Hans, “The American Tradition in Foreign Policy,” in Macridis, Roy C., ed., Foreign Policy in World Politics (3d ed., Englewood Cliffs 1967), 254Google Scholar, and Hoffman, Stanley, Gulliver's Troubles in the Setting of American Foreign Policy (New York 1968), 120Google Scholar–21.

49 As noted earlier, Karl Deutsch explicitly held this opinion in 1961.

50 Afro-Americans within the United States may offer a comparable case.

51 Particularly significant for the present discussion is the comment of Gabriel Almond: “This overt optimism is so compulsive an element in the American culture that factors which threaten it, such as failure . . . are pressed from the focus of attention and handled in perfunctory ways.” The American People and Foreign Policy (New York 1961), 50–51Google Scholar. See also Hartman, Frederick, The New Age of American Foreign Policy (New York 1970), 58Google Scholar.

52 Contrast, for example, the American practice of encouraging huge numbers of American troops to furlough in Bangkok, to the Soviet practice of minimizing the Russian presence in such states as the United Arab Republic. For a discussion of the impact of a foreign presence upon a guerrilla struggle, and the sharp contrast in awareness of this impact between the United States on the one hand, and China, the Soviet Union, and North Vietnam on the other, see Connor (fn. 25), 51–86.

53 See, for example, Karl Deutsch's comment, cited above on p. 322.

54 Particularly recommended for their incisiveness are the works of Norman Glazier, Milton Gordon, and Daniel Moynahan.

55 It is not implied that most Afro-Americans are black nationalists. The percentage is not known. An incisive study would have to learn also what percentage of black nationalists are separatists. It is highly probable that a substantial percentage of those who would be apt to identify themselves as black nationalists have not speculated concerning the precise goal they have in mind beyond a concept of true equality. Attitudes concerning the desirability of various forms of assimilation (schools, business, sports, marriage, etc.) would probably represent the best index as to whether or not one envisaged a separate nation. But it does not follow that attitudinal surveys can validly determine such attitudes. For a thoughtful critique of such surveys by an experienced practitioner, see Rose, Arnold, Migrants in Europe (Minneapolis 1969Google Scholar), 100 ad passim.

56 Government institutions and services (particularly schools), trans-ghetto communications media, advertising, and elections are but a few of the outside forces affecting the ghetto.

57 This aspect of size helps to account for the fact that professional people are often disproportionately represented among those desiring total separation. Belgium, Canada, and Ceylon all offer cases in point. Since goals in a less sophisticated society are apt to be of lesser magnitude, a smaller community may suffice in less modern situations.

58 The need to be fluent in the dominant tongue in order to obtain a decent position in the central bureaucracy is a common example.

59 This inverse relationship causes the use of the term regionalism to be a particularly dangerous and inappropriate substitute for ethnic nationalism.

60 Richard Rose is among those authorities. In 1964 he observed that “today politics in the United Kingdom is greatly simplified by the absence of major cleavages along the lines of ethnic groups, language, or religion. . . . The solidarity of the United Kingdom today may be due to fortuitous historical circumstances; it is nonetheless real and important.” Politics in England (Boston 1964Google Scholar), 10 and 11. But by 1970, the situation had changed so drastically that Professor Rose entitled a work The United-Kingdom as a Multi-National State (fn. 41). On page 1, Rose lists L. S. Amery, Samuel Beers, Harry Eckstein, Jean Blondel, and S. E. Finer as recent writers who have failed to detect the potential significance of ethnic divisions within the United Kingdom. These men were hardly unique in their failure to anticipate the great change in attitude about to manifest itself in Scotland and Wales. See, for example, Connor (fn. 20), 39n., in which this author acknowledged but underestimated the imminent power of the Scottish nationalist idea. See, also, Mackie, J. D., A History of Scotland (Baltimore 1964), 367Google Scholar–70, in which a scholar also fails to appreciate the submerged but emerging power of Scottishness among his own people.

61 For a number of illustrations of this tendency to confuse the absence of ethnic warfare with the presence of nation-states throughout Western Europe, see Connor (fn. 20). Those who have been confused include such notables as John Stuart Mill, Lord Acton, Ernest Barker, and Alfred Cobban; their errors extended inter alia to the United Kingdom, Belgium, Switzerland, and Spain. Similarly, the perspicacious Frederick Engels once wrote: “The Highland Gaels (Scottish) and the Welsh are undoubtedly of different nationalities to what the British are, although nobody will give to these remnants of peoples long gone by the title of nations, any more than to the Celtic inhabitants of Brittany in France. . . .” Cited in Rosdolsky, Roman, “Worker and Fatherland: A Note on a Passage in the Communist Manifesto,” Science and Society, xxix (Summer 1965), 333Google Scholar; emphasis added. In his most recent work, Nationalism and Its Alternatives (fn. 14), Karl Deutsch also employs Western Europe as a regional model of successfully integrated states. And in both editions of Nationalism and Social Communication (fn. 4), Deutsch describes the Bretons, Flemish, Franco-Canadians, Franco- and German-Swiss, Scots, and Welsh as totally assimilated.

62 This statement presupposes that the government is not prepared to take such extreme measures as coercive population transfers and forced intermarriages.

63 Potholm, Christian P., “Political Decay in Post-Independence Africa: Some Thoughts on its Causes and Cures.”Google Scholar Paper presented at the 1970 Annual Meeting of the New York State Political Science Association.

64 Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, Congo (Kinshasa), Ethiopia, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania (Zanzibar), Uganda and Zambia. Congo (Brazza-ville) also experienced open ethnic warfare on the eve of independence and Nkrumah suppressed Ashanti and Ewe separatist movements within Ghana early in his reign. Coups that took place in Dahomey and Sierra Leone were also justified as a means of avoiding ethnic warfare. Within Liberia, Tubman's government found an official guilty of treasonably attempting to start a civil, ethnic war. Ethnicity also plays an important role within the anti-Portuguese struggle in Angola and Mozambique, and ethnic violence has occurred in the French Territory of Afars and Issas.

65 Edward Feit has orally referred to African political parties as “the continuation of tribal warfare by other means.” See also his comment to this effect in “Military Coups and Political Development: Some Lessons from Ghana and Nigeria,” World Politics, xx (January 1968), 184Google Scholar.

68 Although not involving an African state, the overthrow of Norodom Sihanouk offers an instructive case concerning a very popular figure who for many years purposefully played the role of-and was popularly viewed by the Khmer people of Cambodia as-the foremost national (read “ethnic”) leader. Following the palace coup, it was essential for the coup's leadership that Khmer loyalty to Sihanouk be transferred rapidly to die new government. To this end, the new government publicized a number of charges against the character and record of Sihanouk, most of which were false or exaggerated. The most effective charge, however, was, in effect, that Sihanouk had been “soft on Vietnamese,” permitting die Viet Cong and other Vietnamese to violate the Khmer homeland with impunity. This charge, together witfi the unleashing of a general hate campaign against all ethnic Vietnamese, posed a dilemma for Sihanouk: How to maintain the mantle of Khmer nationalism while simultaneously acknowledging an alliance widi Hanoi and the Viet Cong-an alliance he needed if he were to counter the forces at the disposal of the new Cambodian government. The anti-Siha-nouk strategy was, therefore, to turn Khmer ethnic nationalism against its former foremost figure by depicting him as a traitor who was aiding the cause of an ethnic enemy of long standing.