Classicide

Classicide is a concept proposed by Michael Mann to describe the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of a social class through persecution and violence.[1][2] Although first used by Fred Schwarz in 1972,[3] classicide was popularized by Mann as a term that is similar but distinct from the term genocide to mean the "intended mass killing of entire social classes."[4] Classicide is considered "premeditated mass killing" and narrower than genocide in that it targets a part of a population defined by its social status but broader than politicide in that the group is targeted without regard to their political activity.[5]

Definition

Classicide is a term first used by Fred Schwarz in his 1972 book The Three Faces of Revolution.[3] It was used later by Michael Mann as a well defined term.[6] Classicide has since been used by some sociologists such as Mann[1] and Martin Shaw[2] to describe the unique forms of genocide that pertains to the annihilation of a class through murder or displacement and the destruction of the upper class to form an equal working class.[1][2][3]

According to Jacques Sémelin, "Mann thus establishes a sort of parallel between racial enemies and class enemies, thereby contributing to the debates on comparisons between Nazism and communism. This theory has also been developed by some French historians such as Stéphane Courtois and Jean-Louis Margolin in The Black Book of Communism: they view class genocide as the equivalent to racial genocide. Mann however refuses to use the term 'genocide' to describe the crimes committed under communism. He prefers the terms 'fratricide' and 'classicide', a word he coined to refer to intentional mass killings of entire social classes."[6]

Examples

Examples includes Joseph Stalin's mass killing of the affluent middle-class peasant Kulaks who were identified as "class enemies" by the Soviet Union. Classicide has been committed by the People's Republic of China during the Chinese Land Reform,[7] by North Vietnam as part of land reform, in unified Vietnam in suppression of South Vietnam upper class after 1975 and by the Khmer Rouge regime in Democratic Kampuchea.

History

Soviet Union
Main articles: Decossackization, Dekulakization, and Persecution of Christians in the Soviet Union

Classicide of kulaks

In 1929, at the beginning of his dictatorship, Joseph Stalin demanded the "liquidation of kulaks as a class."[8] The kulaks were peasants who were deemed "wealthy" by Stalin in 1929. The idea for dekulakization first arose in 1918 from Vladimir Lenin, who claimed that the kulaks were "freeloaders".[9] The oppression of kulaks did not end until 1932 and throughout this time they were being evicted from their homes, having their land confiscated, shot, imprisoned, deported, or being sent to local work camps.[3] Although the term classicide was never formally used to describe Stalin's destruction of the kulaks, Stalin stated that they had "gone over from a policy of limiting the exploiting tendencies of the kulak to a policy of eliminating the kulaks as a class."[10]

China
Main article: Mass killings of landlords under Mao Zedong

In 1947, during the Chinese Civil War, three years before the People's Republic of China, Mao Zedong won the hearts of the Chinese Communist Party and the peasant class by introducing a new land reform. This land reform encouraged the mass murder of landlords and well-off peasants in order to redistribute the land to the peasant class and other landless workers. The idea of killing landlords was first outlined by Kang Sheng, expert in terror tactics, in 1947. The reform was an open door for violence when Mao insisted that the peasants themselves should do the killing. Landlords were tortured, dismembered, buried alive, strangled and shot. There is no way to know exactly how many people were killed but the numbers range anywhere from one million to 28 million.

Cambodia
Main article: Cambodian genocide

In 1969 in the midst of the Vietnam war,[11] President Nixon[12] staged massive attacks on Cambodian soil due to his belief that the Viet Cong were hiding communist base camps, supplies and infantry in Cambodia.[13] Nixon also believed the Viet Cong enemy was bombing US soldiers from bases established in Cambodia as well. Cambodia's then-president Lon Nol[12] was initially unaware and did not address any of the Nixon bombings so they lasted from 1969–1975.

Victims of the US attacks saw the American enemy as rich and upper-class and they also believed that Lon Nol possessed the same characteristics as Nixon—he was rich and powerful. Pol Pot[14] recognized the Cambodian people's fear and hatred of the upper classes and exploited this hostile environment as a tactic in order to gain control of both the lower and upper classes so the Khmer Rouge could rise to power.

To enforce their rule of Cambodia and transform it into an agrarian socialist society, Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge believed they needed to cleanse Cambodia by killing everyone who they considered members of its 'upper classes’, including all members of its rich and educated ‘Khmer minority’[11] who shared cultures with the former leader, Nol. Supporters of Nol were primarily rich, upper-class elite. Therefore, Pol Pot targeted these individuals. Anyone who was educated including doctors, lawyers, and teachers were murdered.[14] Following the bombings, by Americans, Pol Pot persuaded victims of the bombings to join the Khmer Rouge by playing on their fearful state of mind. Anyone who would not cooperate was simply murdered.

Pol Pot's actions eventually led to displacement and created refugees. He soon abolished civil and political rights[14] which enabled his genocidal policies to go unchecked. Although the majority of the people who the Khmer Rouge massacred were Vietnamese immigrants and members of Cambodia's Cham minority,[11] over 2 million Khmer people were also murdered.[14] Children were ripped from their families and their parents were killed in cold blood, soldiers from the former regime and speakers of foreign languages were also killed. Pol Pot continued his raids by attacking Vietnamese border towns, which eventually led the Vietnamese to invade Cambodia and put an end to his reign. Many Cambodians believe that if the Vietnamese army had not fought back, the Khmer Rouge's raids and killings would have continued for a longer period of time.[13]

Vietnam
Main article: Land reform in North Vietnam

Ho Chi Minh, the former leader of North Vietnam, instituted land reform in the 1950s in order to redistribute land from the holdings of landlords to the peasantry.[15] The landlords in North Vietnam became targets of smear campaigns which were launched against them by the government, in the hope that the peasantry would revolt against the country's upper classes. Stories of rape, murder, and exploitation of the peasantry by landlords were told in order to gain the lower classes's support.[16] The government purged landlords as a class. Most of them were executed by firing squads, stoning, and starvation and the rest of them were imprisoned in reeducation camps.[17] The number of landlords killed during the years of the land reform ranges from 5,000 to 50,000.[18]

See also

References
  1. Mann, Michael (Spring 2002). "Explaining Murderous Ethnic Cleansing: Eight Theses" (PDF). UCLA. Brisbane, Australia. Retrieved February 7, 2018.
  2. Shaw, Martin (2015). What is Genocide?. John Wiley & Sons. p. 72. ISBN 978-0745631837.
  3. Schwarz, Fred (1972). The Three Faces of Revolution. Capital Hill Press. pp. 51–53. ISBN 978-0882210032.
  4. Mann, Michael (2005). The Dark Side of Democracy: Explaining Ethnic Cleansing. New York: Cambridge University Press. p. 17. ISBN 978-0-521-53854-1.
  5. Sangar, Eric (3 November 2007). "Classicide". Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence. p. 1, paragraph 3. Retrieved 14 November 2020.
  6. Jaffrelot, Christophe; Sémelin, Jacques, eds. (2009) Purify and Destroy: The Political Uses of Massacre and Genocide. Translated by Schoch, Cynthia. CERI Series in Comparative Politics and International Studies. New York: Columbia University Press. p. 37. ISBN 978-0-231-14283-0.
  7. Wu, Harry (1 December 2012). "Classicide in Communist China". Comparative Civilizations Review. 67 (Fall 2012): 101–106. Retrieved 15 November 2020 – via BYU ScholarsArchive.
  8. Conquest, Robert (1986). Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror-Famine. 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York, 10016-4314: Oxford Press Inc. ISBN 0-19-504054-6.CS1 maint: location (link)
  9. А.Арутюнов «Досье Ленина без ретуши. Документы. Факты. Свидетельства.», Москва: Вече, 1999
  10. Kotkin, Steven (6 February 2018). "Stalin's ism". New Criterion. Archived from the original on November 2017.
  11. Murray, Elisabeth Hope (2011). Under Attack: genocidal ideology and the homeland at war. the university of Edinburgh: the university of Edinburgh. p. 36. ISBN 978-1-900522-98-4.
  12. Murray, Elisabeth hope (2011). under attack: genocidal ideology and the homeland at war. the university of Edinburgh: the university of Edinburgh. p. 36. ISBN 978-1-900522-98-4.
  13. Murray, Elisabeth hope (2011). under attack: genocidal ideology and the homeland war. the university of Edinburgh: the university of Edinburgh. p. 36. ISBN 978-1-900522-98-4.
  14. "GENOCIDE - CAMBODIA". www.ppu.org.uk. Archived from the original on 2014-10-30. Retrieved 2018-02-05.
  15. Lind, Michael (2013). Vietnam: The Necessary War. Simon and Schuster. pp. 151–155. ISBN 9781439135266.
  16. Tucker, Spencer C. (2011). The Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War: A Political, Social, and Military History, 2nd Edition [4 volumes]: A Political, Social, and Military History. ABC-CLIO. p. 621. ISBN 9781851099610.
  17. Malarney, Shaun Kingsley (2002). Culture, Ritual and Revolution in Vietnam. University of Hawaii Press. p. 23. ISBN 9780824826604. vietnam land reform -site:.com.
  18. Olsen, Mari (2007-05-07). Soviet-Vietnam Relations and the Role of China 1949-64: Changing Alliances. Routledge, 2007: Routledge. ISBN 9781134174126.CS1 maint: location (link)
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