Marxism In Pol Pot

The policies pursued by Pol Pot were done in order to maintain ideological purity, absolute control, and party security. So, did philosophers like Fanon and Marx have an undermining influence on the morals of elitists in the political realm? In response to the extreme process of purification from anything “other”, Fanon stated that, “violence is a cleansing force. It frees the native from his inferiority complex and from his despair and inaction; it makes him fearless and restores his self-respect” (p.35). If this is reflective of the anti-colonialism revenge that KSA advocated while they were in Paris, then it is plausible that Pol Pot was still seeking a personal vendetta from European powers. At its core, Marxism-Leninism is inherently oppressive. Isolated from the ideas of Lenin, Marxist philosophy determines that violence is often necessary for a communist revolution to succeed (Vandenbroek, 2008). On the contrary, Marxists tend to have a proclivity toward arguing that murder and mayhem found in any Marxist regime from Lenin to Pol Pot, is an exception and not a true Marxist society.
Pol Pot’s political agenda was largely comprised of Marxist-Leninist philosophies but owes the worst excess of its tyrannical reign to Stalinism. Stalinism is representative of a total authoritarian dictatorship that
20). Moreover, the contemporary challenges discussed in this chapter establish the linkage of education and democracy and the instabilities that arise as a result of a weak public sector service delivery system (USAID, 2015). Education increases people’s support for democracy, particularly in nations such as Cambodia, which have recently undergone democratic transitions (UNESCO, 2014, p.