As is well known, Cambodia was plunged into five years of internal warfare in 1970 and suffered under totalitarian state rule during the Pol Pot era of 1975-79.These historical facts evoke various images of social change. However, the reality of those changes has not been well researched until quite recently. This paper, based on long-term rural fieldwork, examines in detail the demise and reconstruction of a Cambodian village in the eastern region of the Tonle Sap Lake since 1970 and explores changes and continuities in the village as a geographical and organizational entity.
The research area fell under communist control in 1970, and in February 1974 most of the villagers were relocated to the provincial capital by Lon Nol government forces. After their return to the village following the communist victory in April 1975, they were categorized as “new people,” and most were not allowed to live in their own houses. By analyzing the history of each household compound and the villagers' accounts of their own relocation, the paper reveals differences in villagers' experiences before, during, and after the era of turmoil. In this way, this paper demonstrates how Cambodian village society is composed of people living together who once held various attitudes to the revolutionary state.
Moreover, this paper examines what drove the reconstruction of village society. After the Pol Pot period, survivors returned to their original villages and took ownership of their previous household compounds in the process of re-defining the local social order. This means that the continuity of village residents shaped the fundamental conditions for village reconstruction. In addition, although the socialist government in the 1980s denied private land ownership, the villagers could request and obtain new household compounds. This facilitated the expansion of the village's geographic scope. Furthermore, analysis of village organization from a diachronic perspective illustrates the uxorilocal residence pattern as a continuous organizational characteristic of village society.
In the historical processes since 1970, the village landscape changed and many lives were lost. However, the village has reconstructed itself based on continuity in both its residents and its organizational characteristics.
