Agrarian Change in Communist Laos 9789814376839

Citation preview

Occasional Paper No. 85

Agrar ian Chang e in Comm unist Laos

The Institute of Southeast Asian Studies was established as an autonomous organization in May 1968. It is a regional research centre for scholars and other specialists concerned with modern Southeast Asia, particularly the multi-faceted problems of stability and security, economic development, and political and social change. The Institute is governed by a twenty-two-member Board of Trustees comprising nominees from the Singapore Government, the National University of Singapore, the various Chambers of Commerce, and professional and civic organizations. A ten-man Executive Committee oversees day-to-day operations; it is chaired by the Director, the Institute's chief academic and administrative officer.

Agrarian Change • ID

CoDIDlunist Laos

Grant Evans La Trobe University

INSTITUTE OF SOUTHEAST ASIAN STUDIES

Cataloguing in Publication Data

Evans, Grant Agrarian Change in Communist Laos. (Occasional paper /Institute of Southeast Asian Studies; no. 85) 1. Agriculture and state -- Laos. 2. Laos -- Economic policy. Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. I. II. Title. Ill. Series. 1988 DS501 159 no. 85 ISBN 981-3035-16-1 ISSN 0073-9731

Published by Institute of Southeast Asian Studies Heng Mui Keog Terrace Pasir Panjang Singapore 0511 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electr nic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without th e prior consent of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.

e 1988 Institute of Southeast Asian Studies The responsibility for facts and opinions expressed in this publication rests exclusively with the author and his interpretations do not necessarily reflect the views or policy of the Institute or its supporters.

Printed and bound in Singapore by Kin Keong Printing Co Pte Ltd

Contents

11

Introduction

1

Laos 1975-79: "A Profound and Complete Revolution in the Countryside"

3

Ill

De-Centralized Socialism: A Lao NEP

51

IV

Socialism and Underdevelopment: The Party in Search of a Class

81

The Author

89

I

Introduction

The Lao People's Revolutionary Party (LPRP) came to power in December 1975, emerging victorious from a two-year coalition government and virtually thirty years of civil war. It took over one of the poorest and most sparsely settled countries in Southeast Asia -- its population of around 3.5 million being spread over an area of 236,775 square kilometres. Not only was this population fragmented into some 68 different ethnic groups (perhaps 40 per cent are ethnic Lao) but the country's topography added to the fragmentation. Mountains covered with tropical forests occupy two-thirds of the surface area and have made the construction of a national communications network difficult and costly. Thus Laos has one of the lowest densities of roads in Asia (0.04 per sq km) and therefore it has not really possessed an integrated polity, economy or society. The mountains are inhabited by various hilltribe groups practising slash and burn agriculture, while in the lowland alluvial plains along the Mekong River and other river valleys wet-rice fields are worked by ethnic Lao peasants. These lowland Lao rice growing peasants are the subject of the body of this survey. With over 80 per cent of its population dependent on subsistence agriculture for survival, most of whom have a low life expectancy, poor literacy and a low per capita income, Laos exhibits all the features of an underdeveloped country. Thus the Lao communists were confronted with the same problem faced by all new nationalist governments in the Third World -- how were they going to begin the process of economic, social and political development of their country. Like most communist governments before them collectivization of agriculture was accepted as the best strategy for revolutionizing the countryside socially and technologically. The Lao communists launched their collectivization drive in mid-1978, and suspended it one year later. The government in Vientiane remains committed to a collectivized agriculture, but the It was an prospect of a new campaign in the future is dim.

2

AGRARIAN CHANGE IN LAOS

accumulation of external, internal and natural factors which prompted the LPRP to launch the drive when it did. Deteriorating relations between Hanoi and its neighbours in Beijing and Phnom Penh, plus pressure on Laos from Thailand heightened the security fears of the Lao communists. Their reflex was to strengthen the state's hold, the hold of socialism, on the whole country. In this context the existence of a mass of independent peasants was seen as a potential security risk. If they were gathered into co-operatives the government's political and economic control would be strengthened. Successive bad seasons added a certain desperation to their fears about peasant discontent. Natural calamities also intensified the belief that modernization of agriculture was urgent, and ideology dictated that it could only be achieved through cooperatives. The campaign ultimately faltered because of the government's administrative incapacity, its inability to apply mass coercion, besides inherent difficulties in collectivized agriculture. Subsequently there was a radical re-thinking of economic policy and a modification of the role of agriculture and th e peasantry within it. The change, however, did not involve a retreat from the government's socialist objective, as Western descripti ns of economic 'liberalization' in communist countries like Laos sometimes imply. Instead we have the adoption of a socialist strategy which differs from what has been considered communist orthodoxy until very recently. Laos, therefore, has joined the cia! and economic ferment coursing through most communist s ie ties in the late twentieth century. Any researcher of contemporary Laos is indebted to the fin e work done by MacAlister Brown and Joseph Zasloff in Apprentice Revolutionaries (1986), and to Martin Sruart -Fox's work, e peci II his Laos: Politics, Economics and Society (1986) . The primary interest of these books, however, is politics rather than econ mics, and their discussion of agrarian policy is onJy a minor theme among others. This study, on the other hand, provides a more detailed outline and analysis of the evolution of agrarian poli y in

II Laos 1975-79: "A Profound and Complete Revolution in the Countryside''

The Na tional Congress in December 1975 which announced the forma tion of the new communist regime expressed its wish that But the peasa nts start to adopt collective forms of production. state ment was moderate and said that for the time being full-scale co-operatives wouJd only be establjshed on an experimental basis. Its broad views on the matter were clear nevertheless: Encourage and help the peasants to progress towards a collective way of life with a view to developing production and improving the standard of living. Persuade and help peasants to form and (a) con olidate solidarity units and labour exchange units. T hrough them the peasants will come to seriously plan their exchange of labuur and will familiarise them and workers from all ethnic gro u ps to a collective existence, in which the qualjty is superior to their former way of life . This aims to improve the way of life of all the people from aU the ethnjc groups.1 Thi straightforward statement of policy is not burdened with exhortations to revolutionize the countryside. Emphasis is on per uasion and force of example, not coercion. The general idea appears to have been that once peasants couJd be persuaded to operate low level forms f co-operation, such as solidarity labour unit and lab ur exchange teams, and once they bad experienced th supposed advantages of such organizations they couJd be easily persuaded to form hjgber collective forms of production such as co -operatives. The time cale for this was open-ended and government pronouncements carried no sense of urgenc . During 1976, the government's first year of p wer, little

4

AGRARIA N CHANG E IN LAOS

attention appea rs to have been paid to th e formation of collectivized production groups in agriculture. However, some over- e nthusiastic cadres obviously tried, in some regions and localities, to collectivize everything and prompted a statement of clarification from the government in May: The Governmen t's programme of action states clearly that the people's right to own property, money, houses and paddy fi elds will be respected strictly. This shows clearly that besides not seizing the peoples property, th e Governm ent takes steps to safeguard the people's interests .2 Having issued this reassurance, the governmen t reiterated that it was in the peasants' own interests to engage in collective forms of production, for only large-scale production, it argued, would enable them to overcome the hazards of natural calamities. At this time the new governmen t was still grappling with the problem of creating a new administra tion and controlling the economy at large. It was in no position to launch radical reforms in the countryside. On the contrary, it was trying to create an atmosphere of stability by assuring the peasants that it would protect their basic rights. Any government wishing to introduce substantial reforms in any society must possess the administrative capacity to do it or else it will create widespread social disruption and even chaos. The new communist government was bequeathed a particularly weak administra tive structure by the former Royal Lao Governmen t. This was a product of a poorly developed educational system as well as the fact that the RLG's American backers during the civil war had increasingly taken over the administrat ive burden of running the country, to the point where the U.S . ambassado r was commonly known as the "second Prime Minister" .3 Moreover, the 'semi-feudal' structure of the former state meant that the central government in Vientiane exercised tenuous power in th e outlying provinces. The withdrawal of United States Aid for Internation al Developme nt (USAID) in May 1975 removed the backbone of the old administration, and in the following six months a large number of the leading members of the RLG state apparatus fled across the Mekong to Thailand either before or after 'popular uprisings' in the bureaucracy removed them . This period possibly saw the departure of the majority of the educated elite in Laos. Those who remained were often viewed with suspicion by the Pathet Lao cadres, most of whom were less weiJ educated, and a significant

COMPLETE R EVOLUTION IN THE COUNTRYSIDE

5

number of old regime burea ucrats we re sent off to re-education camps. This in turn created a clim ate of unce rtainty among others who soon decided to leave lest they be sent off to re-education too. The communist government could ill-afford these losses, however the dynamics of its takeover made them almost inevitable. For thirty years the communists had controlled little more than a proto-state in the rugged Lao mountains and its form of Whatever its weaknesses administration ran along military lines. the RLG did have a civilian bureaucracy and it was this bureaucracy No doubt it was their lack of that the communists inherited. experience with routine bureaucratic work plus their natural suspicion of 'the other side' which inclined the communists to compensate for their weaknesses by exaggerating the importance Claims were made that there is a of revolutionary ideology. In such an 'revolutionary way' of doing virtually everything. atmosphere bureaucratic experts from the old regime who contradicted cadres were e asily denounced as ' counterrevolutionary' and often sent off to re-education to acquire 'correct' This situation soon produced either bureaucratic paralysis ideas. among the old personnel or bureaucratic chaos as a result of cadres implementing ill-conceived ' revolutionary' new ways. The difficulties encountered while establishing the new administration were documented by Australian journalist John His account of the Pathet Lao takeover of the Everingham. southern city of Savannakhet gives a rare glimpse of what was occurring inside Laos during the early months of the new regime. What is immediately apparent is a theme one encounters in most peasant revolutions. That is, the confrontation of the countryside with the city, the 'country-bumpkin' peasant armies with the 'city slickers' more inured to the ways of the urbanized West. Many of the Pathet Lao had literally come out of the hills, onto the plains, and into the cities for the first time in their lives. Thus in the takeover of Savannakhet rur a l cultural parochialism , indeed puritanism , tended to ove r-shadow practical administrative measures: " Western-influenced youths were taken to task for their Youths were dragged in for dress; girls, too, were criticised. haircuts and wome n admonished not to wear any form of make-up. To listen to Thai radio stations was to risk being labelled ' reactionary' , as with the playing of western music. Both the pursuit of pleasure or profit were denounced as being unpatriotic while th e task of re- building the country remained. For this people were Everingham notes that "without urged to go to bed early." compulsion, and with more visible action simultaneously in the important fields of economy, administration and education among

6

AGRARIA N CHANGE IN LAOS

others, the population might have reacted more positively". 4 As it was, the expectation s of the population , who had hoped th e revolution would sweep away its problems, fell as administrat ion became even more ineffective than under the former regim e. In this situation the evangelism of the peasant victors beca me particularly irksome: The citizens of this city were being subjected to the soldiers' eagerness to lecture at every opportunity . One woman was loudly and publicly held to ridicule in the market for wearing a pair of glasses. To her unschooled Pathet Lao antagonist th ey were 'reactionary ' - styles not fit for the new Laos. Attracting attention from all quarters, he demanded that she dispose of them immediately. The women was not to be beaten: she squared up to the soldier, declared that rather than 'fashion ', her glasses were prescription lenses medically necessary for improved sight. The soldier was not displaying a correct political line, she fired back, using the revolution 's own Jargon. The Pathet Lao soldier was laughed into humiliation and did not appear in th e market again for some time.5 But this incident is not only a revea ling instance of peasa nt parochialis m, it is also an instructive contras t with what was happening in neighbouring Kampuchea where the re were reports of bespectacled people who, unable to answer back to th e Khm er Rouge soldiers, had their glasses taken from th em a nd smashed. Laos only teetered on the edge of the anarchic violence which was an important part of the Khmer Rouge revolutio n in Kampuchea . One perceptive Savannakhet resident observed: "The Pat het Lao tried to apply in Savannakhe t the same rules and regulations that had applied in their liberated zones -- in th e jungles their rules worked well for the few people there -- never realising that the same would not also succeed when they got to the city. They never realised how complex and how numero us are the problems caused by so many people in such a small place." 6 For example, the soldiers spontaneou sly placed bans on the free movement of trade from the villages to the city. Previously the guerrillas bad only been familiar with the military control of trade in the old liberated zones. Moreover, because of their long years of hardship in the mountains they were largely bliviou to the serious impact that this was having on living condition in the

COMPLETE REVOLUTION IN THE COUNTRYSIDE

7

city food supplies dwindled, prices rose and smuggling began . In May 1976 Savannakhet was going hungry when a leading cadre realized what was happen ing and told the soldiers guarding the enu ... nee to the city to lift their ban ; whereupon the markets filled with food once again. E veringham also reported that the poorly educated soldiers were easily deceived by opp0rtunists whose command of revolutionary rhetoric enabled them to denounce people in high offices and then take their place. "Scores of officials, many of them honest citizens, fled the country" , he wrote.7 The discontent caused by the new regime's actions attracted the attention of the Party leader sh ip in Vientiane. Finance Minister, Nouhak Phoumsavan , a native of Savannakhet, was dispatched to the city to re-assert the central government's policies. At a public meeting in Savannakhet he accused the soldiers and the new administration of not adjusting to city life, of " oppressing the people" and of substituting what he called "one old feudalistic system for a new kind of feudalism ". They had, he said, " created a military dictatorship". 8 Strong corrective action by Vientiane checked the spontaneous tendency of regio ns in Laos to foUow their own political course. The situation in Savannakhet illustrates clearly the administrative problems faced b y the new government. Poor communications links -- and in this respect Savannakhet is much better located than many other areas of Laos -- and poorly educated cadres, meant that policies formulated in the capital were likely to be misa pplied in any particular local situation, and only discovered by Vientiane after the damage had been done . Although a significant factor in the communists' victory against the old RLG had been its ability to create a centralized nationwide military and political organization, this was still inadequate for the ad ministration of a country. The organization of the state they inherited was a product of weaknesses ansmg from economic backwardness and would continue to be a source of problems for the new regime. Relatively little is known about what was occurnng m the countryside at this time. However it is dear from the government statement quoted earlier that some Pathet Lao zealots had attempted to instantly communize agriculture, and, as in Savannakhet, their actions had to be repudiated by the new regime. One could speculate that there were fewer 'excesses' in the co untryside simply beca use there was less cultural gap between the peasa nt soldiers and the peasants themselves. On the other hand, rural remoteness would mean that instances of communizing zeal would take longer to come to the attention of higher authorities.

8

AGRARIAN CHANGE IN LAOS

Probably our best indicator that there were few instances o f such extremism in the early period of the new regime is the fact th at only a tiny proportion of refugees to Thailand at the tim e were peasants. These early problem s of transla ting central government policy into practice would re-emerge during th e collectivi zation programme .

Economic Problems The serious economic difficulties encountered by th e new regim e were an important reason for it turning to collectivization as a solution to a growing economic crisis m Laos. Wh e n th e communists came to power th ey inherited th e poorest country in Southeast Asia. In 1975 annual per capita incom e was estimated at $70-80. On top of this they inherited a bankrupt state. The former RLG had been supported by bilateral aid programmes and the Foreign Exchange Operations Fund. This was set up in 1964 by the United States, Japan, Britain, Australia and France so that Laos could make purchases on the world market and maintain price stability in the country. It fin anced the whole current account deficit (approximately a quarter of th e GNP in th e early 1970s), and nearly 80 per cent of its budgetary expenditures. In 1974 the FEOF provided US$32 million . In 1975 the amount halved th ereby de-stabilizing the kip and fu elling inflationary pressures. The withdrawal of USAID in mid-1975 had a similar effect. By the e nd of its twenty-year involvement in Laos in 1975 this orga nizati on was pouring approximately US$50 million into Laos while the RL budget stood at only US$14 million. The withdrawal of Western aid was only partially offset by aid from socialist co untries, and in the second half of 1975 inflation was running in exces f 100 per cent. 9 Inflation was carried along by social forces created by L o ' dependence on American dollar infusions. As in th r urban centres of Indochina, U .S. involvem ent in the regi n had pen d up great trading opportunities for merchan ts in th e citie f the RLG zone (who were mainly Thai, Chinese, Vietnam ese r Lndian) and this class had grown rapidly. From the earl y 1 s nw rd they were augmented by a steady stream of peasant refug s r m the battle areas who became petty traders in small shops and tails both in the cities and rural villages. These small trad r were largely dependent on the bigger city-based merchants f r their goods, and the whole trading edifice was largely de p nd nt n

COMPLETE REVOLUTION IN THE COUNTRYSIDE

9

imported consumer goods. The cut-off of U.S . dollars made these goods difficult to buy and the traders bargained frantically for dollars, drastically devaluing the kip and causing runaway inflation in the process. The departing RLG elite in 1975 also drove the blackmarket price for dollars up as they attempted to exchange thousands of kip. In the rural areas the war had damaged some of the most productive lands, resulted in the killing of tens of thousands of draught animals and made 400-700,000 of the rural population into refugees. At the beginning of the Provisional Government of National Union formed in February 1974, one year after the ceasefire in Laos, there were 350,000 of these people requiring resettlement. One result of these developments was that agricultural production neither kept pace with population growth nor with the demands of the bloated urban areas, and Laos became a food deficit country, importing 15 per cent of its annual nee requirements. The protracted nature of the communist takeover in Laos, the pace of which was largely dictated by he winding down of U.S. aid to the RLG and the subsequent disintegration of the Lao rightwing, meant that the central government could do relatively little about the deteriorating economic situation in the country. By mid-1975 almost the entire RLG wartime leadership had decamped to Thailand. But the final communist coup de grace came only after the Thai Government blockaded land-locked Laos following frontier clashes in November. The economic impact of the border closure was crippling and imposed unprecedented austerity on the population in the former RLG zone. Aid supplied by Vietnam and the Soviet Union enabled the emerging regime to withstand Thai pressure, but the crisis forced the Lao communists to call together a National Congress for early December. They had not expected to assert complete control until elections already announced for April 1976. "The hardening of Thailand's attitude," a Le Monde correspondent commented, " the prolonged closing of the frontier formed by the Mekong and the halt of deliveries of fuel and food stuffs have no doubt driven the Laotian communists to close their ranks and to provoke a political transformation which will allow them to deal rapidly with economic problems." 10 By the time the border was re-opened at two points on 1 January 1976, the new government had set out to bring the economy under its control. It struck first at food speculators and closed Vientiane's vast 'Morning Market', forcing many merchants to leave for Thailand. Yet, by the middle of 1976 Laos had one of the highest inflation rates in the world, and in mid-June the government

10

AGRA R IA ' CHA N(i

1:'-J LAO\

11 cmptcd ro cu rh rh c ~c ti v iti c!"> o f curr e ncy spec ul ato r by cnf 1 r 'n witch fr om the old Royal kip. beari ng the form er in portrait. to the Liheration kip previously onl y in circul ation in Pathct Lao h ld area!'>. By insisting th ai th e bulk of famil y and wealth b dcpo itcd in the governm ent -contro lled banks, new currency against it , th e governm ent hoped to 1 uan ca b . horl eco nomy a nd ea se inn a ti ona ry pressur e. u.sl the vernm ent all empt ed to fLX all mark et prices. mea ur e!> w re soon und ermin ed, howeve r, by de ma nd pr ur and sp culation agai nst th e kip ga in ed momentum once tn . inally, in Octobe r. soldiers were se nt to occupy th e stores of 1he major import merchan ts. Shops were searched and the mer hant w r forced to sell their goods to th e government or the public at prices convert ed from doJJ ar import values at the official low rat . Tbu anoth er wave of mercha nts quit socialist Laos. AJtboug h mo t rural eco nomic activity fell outside the m neti7..ed ector of the economy government restrictions on trade tn 1 7 did aff d th peasantry. In January the new regime had pr hibi1 ed m rchant fr om buying ri ce and livestock m the untry ide and banned inter-pr ovi ncial trade in goods . And even if th n w regim e's actions elsewhere did not degene rate to the poin t th ey did in Sava nn akh e t, ze alous applica tion of th e -- such as peasants being constantly checked and asked f r travel docum ents when they an empt ed to bring d tuff and animals to town to sell -- amount ed to bureau cratic h ras ment. Peasa nts soon found it was too much trouble to make the j urney, and in these conditions the flow of food to the urban r a eg n to dwindle . The state trading network , on the ot her h nd, was t o weak to fiU the gap, even though at the end of 1976 th rnm ent boast d it had 92 state- run departm ent stores and 1 mark ling - peratives. The governm ent respond ed to the d- h rt ges in the towns by resorting to rhetoric abo ut the need for self-sufficiency, and government ministri es were w their own vegetables and raise poultry and livestock. caused even more urban dwellers to leave the co untry or the peasant s, who had relativel y little to trade ubsistence needs were met, the new regi me's policies n enience but not a major disrupti on to their lives. lnd d the new policies induced a retreat to the tradi ti o nal ul rit of tbe Lao peasant community. While th go ernment's actions trimmed the economic power merchants, and therefore the power of a class the regi me h tile or lentiaUy hostile to it, they also ca used a furth er dr p in th le el f conomic activity in the country. No doubt

CO:\fPLETE R E \ '01 t iTIO:"' IN THE COl i

fR Sl

II

rhis was an in c,il:thlc l'Clmomic c~)S f lll rhc communi. I s cslnhl il hin -. !heir p0lirical writ in rh c wuntrv. Ycr. the ext ent pf the c), 1 ' IS greater than ncco sa rv ~ivcn !he state's pr o pc n. ir y t u. administrati,·c rather th an ("COnl1mic measures tn ac hieve it. im s. The maj0r pr nhkm f:t cc d hy the new gove rn me nt was fin ding intern al sour ces 0f ca pit.ll ac umubti o n fo r . n i t~ li . t CCl'n mi dcvc lnpm c nt. Th e ma nufac turin g cc !IH o f th e e o no my w s minuscule ; along with mining it ..tccn unt cd fur k ss th Ueng Khouang

15207

61

72

44

51

7500

17

93

15

30

Vientiane Prefecture

45000

98

20

19

20

Vientiane

36970

60

15

9

9

Khammouane

38310

92

17

16

20

Savannakhet

84100

89

57

51

51

Saravane

31130

81

37

30

32

Champassak

80493

93

85

79

80

Attapeu

9660

77

7

7

7

Bokeo

2903

31

57

18

18

12495

57

12

7

8

551

8

36

3

8

Houa Phan

Bolikhamsay Sekong

Note: Total area is area sown to rice.

Area

%Paddy Paddy in Co-ops: in Co-ops %Tota l Area

Land in Co-ops: %Tot a l Area

A LAO NEP

75

compared to the total area beca use paddy land is more amenable to co-operativ e formation that slas h and burn farming, and consequent ly statistics, such as those in the final column, whjch include upland cultivation must be treated with circum~ pection. In the light of these statistics the general progress of collectivization turns out to be considerabl y less than it would ftrst appear according to the governmen t's presentation ; the province which have been most successful are, in order, Chatnpassa k, Savannakhe t, Xieng Khouang, Saravane and Sayaboury. It is worth noting that the old liberated base area, Houa Phan, drops from the top five . Like the other northern provinces Houa Phan is an extremely mountainou s area with more than 50 per cent of its population ethnic minorities engaged largely in slash and burn cultivation. As an official in the Cooperativ e Department in the Ministry of Agriculture in Vientiane explained in early 1987, the farmers there are mainly involved in a self-sufficie nt natural economy where the mountains allow for few paddy fields . Most villagers farm hai and many villages have no paddy at all. The "movemen t towards a collective way of life" began there after 1954 when groups of 4 to 7 families formed production teams. After 1960 farmers' and womens' assoctatwn s were established to promote co-operativ es, however most co-operativ es were only 64 Even so, coestablished in the wake of the 1978-79 campaign. operatives still only cover a small number of farmers in Houa Phan. Out of the approximat ely 300 set up by 1984 only 10 were made up of ethnic minorities, and these among hill tribe peasants who had switched from their traditional slash and burn farming to wet nee cultivation . 65 Xieng Khouang is also a highland province, but it has registered successes for reasons already alluded to in the previous chapter. It is significantly different from other northern provinces also because of the Plain of Jars which aJlows a relatively higher percentage of paddy land to be farmed. But co-operativ es in this area, as observed by myself and others, are at a low technical level. Sayaboury is also a mountainou s province in which both lowland 66 Lao and highland peasants farm only hai or mixed paddy and haj. However, like Xieng Khouang, the existence of a substantial plain at Muang Phjang, some 50 kilometers south of the provincial city of Sayaboury, allows considerabl e paddy cultivation, in this case by Lao, T'ai Phuan, T'ai Daeng, and Hmong, among others who moved there as refugees from the war before 1975. On paper, Champassa k remains the most consistently successful of the provinces. A reason suggested for this in the previous chapter was that the province bordered both Kampuchea

76

AGRARIA N CHANGE fN LAOS

and Thailand and therefore the local government maintained strong control over the population. Yet relaxation of policy in recent years and of security has not seen the number of co-operatives diminish. Asked to explain the province's apparent success the Co-operativ e Departmen t in Vientiane attributes it to the high quality of the provincial leadership. Gauging the quality of the co-operatives which have been formed throughout the country is problematic, and information scarce. ln an interview in 1983 one official in the Co-operativ es D epartment offered the following assessment of the state of collectivization in some provinces. Out of the 252 co-operativ es then in Xieng Khouang, he said, 30 were considered "good" cooperatives, U1 "middle" co-operatives, and 101 "weak" . By weak the official said he meant they were " pseudo cooperative s. Just cooperatives in name, but really only labour exchange groups." In Houa Phan he said there were 66 "good" cooperatives, 84 "middle" ones, and U4 "weak" ones. ln Champassa k there were only 2 "good" ones (out of 587 it is worth noting), and the rest he felt unable to classify.67 A 1984 statement claimed that the " current number of outstanding cooperatives comprise only 15 per cent of the total throughout the country'',68 while officials in the Cooperative Departmen t in Vientiane in early 1987 were only prepared to say that 7-10 per cent of co-operativ es could be considered "excellent" . ln other words the standard of most cooperatives in Laos is not high. Kaysone offered an assessment in his report to the Fourth Congress: "in the agricultural field (most] cooperatives are still in the low form and the peasants have just embarked on the path to collectivization, but in general, they are still engaged in the natural economy''.8.1 In the most successful province of Champassak, a 1986 report claimed that out of 94 cooperatives in Champassa k district four could be " regarded as model ones". 70 That is, 4.2 per cent of co-operativ es. An overall assessment given in 1987 claimed Champassa k province had "29 'leading' cooperatives and 188 'middle level' cooperative s among its total of 645 cooperative units".71 ' The standard definitions of cQ-Qperatives are: Levell: Loose voluntary associations or mutual aid teams of a few farmers who pool assets and work but retain individual ownership rights and decision making. Level2: Assets under CQ-Qperative control but with some rental paid to original owners of land, draft animals and major equipment. Members are free to enter or leave, taking their assets with them . Level 3: Full CQ-Qperatives where all assets are owned by the CQ-Qperative and no rentals are paid. Co-operative members share returns in proportion to wo rk points allocated by the CQ-Qperative management commjttee.

ALAO NEP

n

The actual natur e of co-oper atives m Laos, however, cannot l be accurat ely determ ined through an exa minatio n of genera studies, field statistic s and the issue can only be settled by detailed few of which are availab le. Neverth eless it is fair to say that collecti vization in Laos is not as widesp read as the governm ent asserts and the organiz ation of those that exist is rudime ntary.

Notes

1. 2. 3.

BBC Summa ry of World Broadcasts: nze Far East (SWB ), 14 January 1980, 6318/C /2. SWB , 5 Februa ry 1980, 6337 / C/ 6. For discuss ions of the NEP in Russia see Alec Nove, An Econom ic History of the USSR (Londo n : Pengui n , 1976), Chapte rs 4, 5 & 6. Moshe Lewin, Political Underczments in Soviet Econom ic Debates (Londo n: Pluto Press, 1975), Chapte r 4.

SWB, 5 April 1982, 6996/ B/ 7. SWB , 14 January 1980, 6318/ C/ 6. Ibid ., 6318/C /9. See also K.Phom vihane, " Political Report to Mimeo graph the Fourth Party Congre ss of the LPRP" . (Vienti ane, Novem ber 1986), p. 66. Ibid ., 6318/C /6. 7. Ibid ., 6318/ C /8. See also Phomv ihane , " Politica l Report " 8. (1986), p. 31. Phomv ihane, " Politica l Report " (1986), p. 65. 9. 10. Ibid., p. 30. ed 11. This re-orien tation of the LPRP at the end of 1979 coincid worth is it er Howev . m with similar reform s in Vietna e mphasi zing the distinct iveness of the Lao Party's position. When in Hanoi in late January 1980 I suggest ed to the Directo r of Viet namese Studies , Nguyen Khac Vien, that the new policies in Vietnam bore a striking resemb lance to the NEP period in Russia . He denied that there was a parallel beca use th e NEP in the Soviet Union was a "step backwa rds", a strategi c retrea t, wherea s this was not the case in Vietnam . It is true that Lenin and other Bolsheviks saw the NEP as a step backwa rds in its initial stages, but by the time Lenin wrote his articles " On Cooper ation" he was saying " NEP is an advanc e, in that it is suited to the level of the ordinar y peasant , in that it does not demand anythin g higher of him" (V.I. Lenin, Selected Works, Vol. 2 (1947], p. 832). Vien's position reflects the much stronge r hold of latter day commu nist orthodo xy on

4. 5. 6.

78

12. 13 . 14 . 15 . 16. 17 . 18. 19.

20. 21. 22. 23 . 24. 25. 26 . 27 . 28. 29.

30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35 . 36 . 37 . 38. 39. 40.

AGRARIAN CHANGE IN LAOS the Vietnam ese leadership and intelligentsia. That the Lao have drawn a direct parallel with NEP and their new policies demonstrates a more open-minded approach to the problems of development than the VCP leadership. It was not until the rise of Nguyen Van Li.nh as Party General Secretary in 1986 that similar lhi.nking gained wide currency in VCP circles. SWB , 5 April 1982, 6996/B/6. World Bank Report , Lao People's Democratic Republic: Country Economic Memorandum, c. April 1983. SWB, 5 February 1980, 6337/C/5. Ibid., 6337 /C/7. SWB, 17 June 1987, 8596/C1/4. (London: George Alec Nove, Th e Soviet Economic System AUen and Unwin, 1978), p. 269. Country Economic Memorandum, op cit., p. 97. Bunyaraks Ninsananda et al., Thai-Laos Economic Relations: A New Perspective, Economic Cooperation Centre for the Asian and Pacific Region, Study no. 16 (Bangkok, May 1976), p. 15. Ibid., p. 17. SWB, 12 February 1980, 6343/C/1. SWB, 31 July 1987, 8634/B/1. SWB, 18 August 1987. 8649/ C1/1-2. Murray Hiebert, FEER, 31 December 1987, p. 45. Kaysone Phomvihane, Political Reporl. (1986), p. 78. SWB, 12 February 1980, 6343/C/1. SWB, 4 August 1987, 8637 /B/1. Ibid., 8637 /B/2. See also the Government decree, SWB, 30 JuJy 1987, 8633/C1/1-3. SWB, 12 February 1980, 6343/C/8. Ng Shui Meng, "Laos in 1986: Into the Second Decade of National Reconstruction" , Southeast Asian Affairs 1987 (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Affairs, 1987). Phomvihane, "Political Report" (1986), p. 68. SWB, 17 June 1987, 8596/C1/3. Ibid., 8596/C1/10 SWB, 17 June 1987, 8596/C1/7. Ibid., 8596/C1/10. Ibid., 8596/C1/13. Ibid ., 8596/C1/14. SWB, 20 June 1987, 8599/C2/4. SWB, 17 June 1987, 8596/C1/12 SWB, 20 November 1986, 8421/C1/12. Ibid., 8421/Cl/7.

LAO NEP 41. 42 . 43 . 44 . 45 . 46 . 47.

48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54 . 55.

56. 57 . 58 . 59. 60 . 61. 62 . 63.

79

20 Jun e 1987, 8599/C2/ 4. 6 August 1987, 8639/ Cl / 1-4. 30 January 1980, 6332/C/7. 1 May 1982, 7016/C2/7. 16 January 1982, 6929/C1/4. 17 April 1982, 7004/C1 /8. 1 May 1982, 7016/C2/7. But Kaysone's ambivalence is also demonstrated by the fact that he co uld say at the same Congress: " Lenin always placed emph::tsis on the superiority of the collective economic system. But, at th e same tim e he warned that it is not appropriate to hurry and arbitrarily set time limits for farmers to join the collective way of ea rning a living." SWB, 5 May 1982, 8386/C2/3. KPL, Bulletin Quotidien , 10 February 1983. Interview with the author, 24 February 1983. SWB, 11 November 1983, 7488/B/1. SWB, 24 November 1983, 7499/B/1. SWB, 19 March 1984, 7595/B/2. Ibid., 7595/B/3. SWB, 8 May 1984, 7637 /B/1-3. SWB, 13 October 1984, 7773/B/3. See also Grant Evans, "The Accursed Problem: Communists and Peasants", Peasant Studies 15, no. 2 (Winter 1988). SWB, 19 October 1984, 7778/B/1. SWB, 13 October 1984, 7773/B/4. Economic Review of Indochina, Economist Intelligence Unit, 19. no.1 (1985), p. SWB, 20 November 1986, 8421/C1/2. Phomvihane, "Political Report" (1986), p. 12. Ibid., p. 49. SWB, 5 February 1986, W1375/A/31. Calculations for total rice areas sown, total paddy area, areas of upland rice or hai, and population are taken from Ten

SWB, SWB, SWB, SWB, SWB, SWB, SWB,

Years of Socio-Economic Development in the Lao People's Democratic Republic, State Planning Committee, Vientiane 64. 65. 66.

(1985) . of Ministry Department, Co-operatives Interview Agriculture, Vientiane, February 1987. Murray Hiebert, " Soft Sell Socialism in Northeast Laos", Indochina Issues (September 1984), p. 6. See G . Evans, " Ethnographic Aspects of Farming Systems" in Australian Development Assistance Bureau, Lao People's

Democratic Republic Report of a Pre-feasibility Study of a Multi-Purpose Dam Project on the Nam Thien in the Context

A

RAR

I

LA

D ekJpmotJ in

Sayabowy

(Canberra,

3 July

with Lhe author, 24 February 1983. , 7773/B/4. Report" (1986) , p. 25. , Wl394/A/18. Unit, Indochina , no. 3 (1987), p. 18.

IV Socialism and Underd v I pm nt: . The Party tn Search of a

LPRP wishes to introduce socialism to Lao ·, a nd begin a pr c . th e high of accumulation which will e nable a tr a n iti n t y cd mi pr pr oductivity and high standards o f living industri alization . It must have been d is tr e ing, th e rcf re, t discove r that after ten years in power their co untry ppeared t be even further away from this goal th a n eve r. Fr o m 1977-84 agriculture's share in GOP had risen from 59 pe r ce nt in LC)TI to DP hare in abo ut 62.5 per cent in 1984. By contrast industry' had fallen to about 5.6 per cent, and the share of transp rt and commerce, after an apparent increase in 1977-82, declined lightly the reafter to about 10 per cent. This pattern of developm ent wa typical of other least developed countries in the world. Problems in agriculture and losses in ta te indu try had caused the change of policy in late 1979. For the next few years the share of industry in GOP grew, and its improved pe rform ance meant that transfers from state industries became th e most The s ubse qu e nt important source of government revenu e. • stagnation of this now vital state sector no doubt provided timulus f the for further reform and tempered the misgivings of criti new economic mechanism from within the state apparatu . Agricultural output rose at a rate of about 5.2 pe r cent per annum over the same period. Significant yield increases occurred for rice while other growth was accounted for by the expansion f the area cropped. Although Nouhak told th e Fourth Congress that "only 18% of total investments for capit al coo tru cti n" wa allocated to agriculture during the fu st Five-Year Plan, this w· nevertheless a respectable figure compared with the experience of other communist countries. 2 The real problem in Lao wa.s the distribution of agricultural investment, most of which had been used for the creation of expensive irrigation chemes. f or re ns relating to agricultural pricing policies the e were underutilized

82

AGRARIAN CHANGE IN LAOS

(only about one third of capacity in the 1985-86 dry season) , and they were poorly manage d . O r, in No uhak ' s words , " th e ir development was not linked to the movem ent of agricultural cooperativization". A higher pay-off would come from efforts to increase yields on existing rice areas and thro ugh diversifying crop production. The decentralization of investment decisions and the desire of planners to mobilize local savings has subsequently shifted att ention from large-scale irrigation projects, where the formation of co-operatives were a necessary pre-requisite to receiving the benefits of this government sponsored input, to promotion of smallscale, locally managed and financed ungation projects where cooperation would arise as a practical necessity rath er than through gove rnment diktat. Investment has also been directed disproportionately towards the 50 Stat e Farms (38 controlled by th e provincial governments, 6 by th e Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Co-operatives, and th e rest by the army and other Ministries) . These have been favour ed with scarce modern machinery a nd ot her inputs of improved agricultural technology, but much of this has been dissipated due to inexperience in managing large-scale agricultural enterprises. Co-operatives are also given favoured access to such inputs because government policy allocates scarce foreign credit to the co-operatives in preference to private farmer s. Much of this investment, in contrast to the State Farms, is put to efficient use. Although private farmers are discriminated against in practice in the provision of credit, the reality in Laos is th at th ere is not eve n enough credit available for the existing co-operatives. Hence political-economi c dec isions over the di s tributi o n o f scarce reso urces have to be made. Growth in rice output during the 1979-85 period was related to the improved official purchasing powe r o f paddy . Y e t fluctuations over this period show both the centrality of th e pricing mechanism to an NEP style programme, and th e difficulties of managing such a strategy. Over the 1980-83 period , despit e th e fa ct that manufactured commodities were much more expensive in th e open market compared with state shops, th e purchasing powe r of rice sold in the open market was still high er th a n if it was sold to the state. This situation was reversed in 1984 wh e n offi cia l te rm s of trade for rice were better than in the open mark et, but a reve rsal occurred again in 1985 when the prices of manufactured goods were raised in the context of the new economic mecha nisms .3 The criteria of profitability in the new enterprise system does not allow (theoretically) for subsidized manufactured commodities to he used in state shops as an incentive to sell to the state (although contracts

THE PARTY IN SEARCH OF A CLASS

83

may have more-or-less the same effect), and therefore the state is less able to directly manage the terms of trade between agriculture and industry. Thus the state has less direct means of mobilizing agricultural resources for accumulation, and state revenue, such as salaries for state employees. An example of the problems likely to be encountered can be gleaned from the experience over 1981-84 when the official price for rice increased substantially while the retail price remained unchanged, which meant that the Lao Food Corporation suffered substantial losses as it had to subsidize the wages of state It is hoped that employees who bought their rice through it. through the one-price system , which would effectively raise both the procurement and retail price of rice, paddy production will be stimulated and lead to increased tax revenue, and in the long term bring about a lower stable price for rice. In the short term, however, elimination of food subsidies and a move to cash wages for state employees is likely to produce budgetary imbalances and 4 Such changes could create higher food prices for state employees. dissatisfaction among state workers who could provide a basis for opposition to the new policies from within the party and the government. However their greater capacity to supplement their income through petty commerce will probably offset such a r eaction . Nevertheless , implementat ion of the new economic policies is sure to produce ongoing political, social and economic disagreements between different groups within Lao society and the LPRP and government. 5

Agents of Social Change Underdevelop ment ts more than an economic question able to be measured by, for example, per capita income. It is also a matter of social structure and the presence or absence of social forces 6 able to carry through or obstruct social change. Prior to 1975 there was no substantial bourgeois class in Laos bent on transforming social relations across the breadth of the society. The elite was made up of aristocrats from the various principalities which preceded the foundation of the modern Lao state in the 1950s. Their commercial activity was largely parasitic on the injection of outside funds and goods, was centred in the cities and was marginally articulated with the peasant economy. At best the old elite was a bourgeoisie in its earliest stages of formation. But before it could reach any dynamic coherence as a modernizing fore it was overtaken by historical changes in the Southeast Asian

84

AGRARIAN CHANGE IN LAOS

region which engulfed Laos in the Second Indochina War. When the majority of this nascent class fled Laos following the communist victory it took its already scarce, albeit rudimentary, commercial and bureaucratic skills with it. Therefore, far from building on the achievements of capitalism, the communists in Laos had to begin the process of economic development from scratch, with the state attempting to fill the place of the bourgeoisie as the agent of social change in the country. Inevitably this gave rise to etatisme, so common in developing countries, but it was buttressed in Laos by orthodox MarxismLeninism's hostility to the existence of social forces beyond the state sphere.· State-centred development is naturally attracted by the promise of the command economy, however the ability of the state to execute such a system depends on the social, political and economic forces it can muster. In Laos the new state was weak compared with other communist states and this ensured a rapid reappraisal of the LPRP's strategy for socialist development. It is not surprising that the Lao leaders should re-discover the preMarxist-Leninist policies of the Russian communists, those of the NEP, for they addressed almost identical problems to those faced by the Lao, and the latter adopted them wholeheartedly. 7 The LPRP is very conscious of the fact that it is overseeing a transition to socialism, and Kaysone never tires of a chance to remind his cadres of the fact. As be told them at the Fourth Congress: "It would be incorrect to say that our country is not at all a socialist society, and it would also be wrong to say that our society is a socialist one." 8 His multi-sector picture of the Lao economy underlines its transitional nature . There is, he says, the socialist economic sector "which exists in two form s: the state and collective sectors",9 and is weak or poorly developed ; the state capitalist sector, mainly made up of joint-state private endeavours, is only "newly founded and is a transitional form"; the small private capitalist sector is dominated by "petty proprietors"; and there is a sector of small craftsmen and peasants who have not joined cooperatives. In brief, in our country at present there are still nearly all the modes of production from pnmltJVe to contemporary modes of production mankind has gone through. All of these sectors exert an effect on one . ' It is arguab~e whether Marxism-Leninism is a direct product of etatisme in Russia ~olloWJng the revolut.. ~n rather than its cause; since then it has of course been a ready-made Ideology for modernJZmg communist elites.

THE PAR T Y IN SEA R CH OF A CLASS

85

another, depend on one another and remain united in an economy still in the period of transition to socialism. However, they contradict and struggle against one another in the class struggle and in the struggle between the two roads which are evolving in an arduous, fierce and complex manner.10

It is precisely because the new policies hand over part of the "struggle between two roads " to the ma rket that alongside economic 'liberalization ' there is simultaneous emphasis on the need for a stronger more disciplined communist party because the LPRP wishes to use its control of state power to ensure that a transition to socialism takes place. The economic choices for such governments, as Alec Nove has written, are "between difficult and perilous paths. There 1s no In many if not most Third World countries it is easy one. unrealistic to expect to be able to govern effectively while observing democratic procedures ... it really can be a case of kto kogo (Lenin's 'who beats whom '), with dangers of militar y pronunciamentos, assassination squads and other highly undemocratic procedures on the part of the opposition. " 11 Perhaps in the manner of Moshe Lewin 's characterizati on of the Russian NEP, the recent period m 12 Laos could be described as a " liberal dictatorship" . G iven the absence of any predominant, dynamic mode of produ ction or class in Laos we have a party and state in search of a cl ass on which to base itself during the transition period. It is in this light one can understand why the LPRP see the creation of coope ratives as " a most important strategic task" in the transition pe ri od . u Because " with th e transformation of the relations of produ cti o n through th e process of agricultural cooperatlVlsation th ere e me rges in the rur al areas of our country a new class, namely The formation of classes and social th e collective peasantry" . 1 ~ gro ups characte risti c of industrial socialism are decades away in Laos, and he nc e the strat egic importance of the " collective pe asa ntry". Ye t, like Le nin in his final articles, the LPRP's expectations fo r co-o pe ratives have bee n tempered by expe rience, and the party is pre pared to tolerat e "various types of cooperation at different 15 This has the le ve ls las ] tr a ns itional forms to socialism " . in the practice in y flexibilit of deal adva nt age of allowing a great vill ages thro ugh consecrating all forms of co-operation, including tr a diti o na l pe asant co -operation, as somehow transitional to socia lism. The pe asa ntry's normal everyday actions are, therefore, brought within the orbit of state sanctioned action rather than the

86

AGRARIA N CHANGE IN LAOS

peasants feeling what they are doing is in some way illegitimate in the state's eyes. Undoubted ly this pragmatic approach also explains why co-operativ e numbers have risen steadily since 1983. However, the communist governmen t's inability to openly give a permanent place to the private peasantry in the country's developmen t alongside co-operatives and state farms, could result in some continued feelings of insecurity among the peasants about their tenure and the worth of investing in agriculture to boost productivity . This may undermine the new policies' attempts to mobilize local savings for investment . Boguslaw Galeski has written of the debilitating affect that the "ever present threat " of collectivization had on private peasant farming in Pol and . For the peasant, "The land no longer offered security. There was therefore no sense in investing." 16 The Polish Communist Party could not eliminate the private peasantry, but at th e same time their orthodoxy meant that they could not acknowledge the importance of peasant agriculture and therefore could not set out to modernize private peasant agriculture in a systematic way. " Insistence on implementi ng doctrinal ideas about socialist agriculture, " writes Galeski, "created in Poland a state of permanent instability." 17 But the Lao Communist Party bas never been burden ed with the same Stalinist orthodoxy as the Polish Party, a fact Y~hich is obvious from the extent to which they have already moved in a market socialist direction. Hence a social compromis e specific to Laos appears to be in the making. Through their new economic mechanism th e LPRP bas understood that raised standards of living for the masses is the "key link" for establishing its legitimacy among the peasantry. James C. Scott has argued a key element of capitalist legitimacy is that one can be poor but free; pre-capitali st legitimacy entails unfreedom in return for elite responsibility for a right to a socially accepted subsistence minimum .18 In Socialist Laos, where most people still live in essentially pre-capitali st/pre-socialist conditions, peasants do not have political liberty yet they experienced a fall in their standard of living after the communists came to power. Therefore, as they have demonstrat ed in many ways, they have n 1 conceded legitimacy to the new regime. But, if the Lao NEP is successful and social and economic conditions improve for the peasants greater legitimacy is likely to follow for the govern me nt , and perhaps there will then be a successful voluntary tr ansi tion to a developed co-operativized agriculture in Laos. Given the enormous developmental problems fa ced by the Lao state, and the diversity of its economy, there are bo und to be conflicts over the precise balance to be struck between a centrally

THE PARTY IN SEARCH OF A CLASS

87

formulated plan and decentralized enterprises and the market at Regardless of inevitable swings in the policy any one time. pendulum a basic commitment to decentralized sccialism seems entrenched in Laos even though the LPRP clings to the orthodox long-term vision "of transforming a multi-sector economy into the socialist economy with onJy one economic sector existing in two forms : state and collective" .19

Note s

Economist Intelligence Unit, Quarterly Economic Review of Indochina , Annual Supplement (1985), p. 30. 2 . SWB, 8421/C1/3 . On agricultural invest ment in other communist countries see: Robert Bideleux, Communism and Development (London: Methuen, 1985), Table 10, p. 249. World Bank Report (1986), p. 46. 3. Ibid ., p. vii. 4. 5 . The Yugos lav newsage ocy, Tanjug, re ported disagreements ove r the implement ation of the new economic mechanisms on 15 June 19 7. "It bas been learned that there are certain disagree ments in the party and government about the new road, the position of the private sector and the limits to which it can extend. Certain ministers have allegedly threatened that they will leave their government posts if radical changes took place and the private sector took a greater hold in the economy." SWB, 1 June 1987, 8597 / B/ 3. 6 . Th ese comments de pe nd for their coherence on the perspective advanced by Barrington Moore Jr., Social Origins of Dictawrship and Democracy (London: Penguin University Books, 1973) . o rn e r eade rs may find th ese references to pre-Marxist7. Leninist Russian communism confusing. They may care to cons ult the argument of Velentino Gerratana, "Stalin, Lenin ew Left Review 103 (May-J une 1977). and ' Leninism"', Kaysone Phomvihane, ''Political R eport" (1986), p. 23. He als makes an interesting addition to this sector later m 9. his speech when he says the "household economy'' is "one ector of the so ialist economy''. Ibid., p. 31. 10. Ibid., p. 25. 11 . Alec Nove, TI1e Economics of Feasible Socialism (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1983), p. 195. 12 . Moshe Lewin, Political Undercu"ents in Soviet Economic Debates (London: Pluto Press., 1975), p. 96. 1.

88

AGRARIAN CHANGE IN LAOS

Phomvihane, op. cit., p. 33. Ibid., p. 33. (My emphasis). Ibid., p. 30. Boguslaw Galesk.i, "Solving the Agrarian Question m Poland", Sociologia Ruralis XXII, no. 2 (1982): 153. 17. Ibid., p. 165. 18 . James C. Scott, The Moral Economy of the Peasant (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976), p. 184. 19 . Phomvihane, op. cit., p. 30.

13 . 14. 15. 16.

THE

AUTHOR

Grant Evans is a Lecturer in anthropology and sociology at Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia. He has written widely Indoc hin a, including The Yellow Rainmakers (London, 1983) Red Brotherhood at War with Kelvin Rowley (London, 1984). has a book forthcoming on collectivization in Laos.

La on and He