Research Catalog

From people's war to people's rule : insurgency, intervention, and the lessons of Vietnam

Title: From people's war to people's rule : insurgency, intervention, and the lessons of Vietnam / Timothy J. Lomperis.
Author: Lomperis, Timothy J., 1947-
Publication: Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 1996.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Use in library	DS558 .L64 1996	Off-site

Details

Description

xvi, 440 pages : illustrations; 25 cm

Summary

Timothy Lomperis argues that the lessons of American involvement in Vietnam are not to be found in any analysis of the war by itself. Rather, he proposes a comparison of the Vietnam experience with seven other cases of Western intervention in communist insurgencies during the Cold War era: China, Indochina, Greece, the Philippines, Malaya, Cambodia, and Laos. Lomperis maintains that popular insurgencies are manifestations of crises in political legitimacy, which occur as a result of the societal stresses caused by modernization. Therefore, he argues, any intervention in a 'people's war' will succeed or fail depending on how it affects this crisis. The unifying theme in the cases Lomperis discusses is the power of land reform and electoral democracy to cement political legitimacy and therefore deflect revolutionary movements. Applying this theory to the ongoing Sendero Luminoso insurgency in Peru, Lomperis makes a qualified prediction of that conflict's outcome. He concludes that a global trend toward democratization has produced a new era of 'people's rule.' --From publisher's description.

Subject

Genre/Form

History.

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Contents

Introduction. From Ghost to Lesson -- 1. On the Business of Lessons -- 2. Legitimacy, Insurgency, and the International Context of the Vietnam War -- 3. Analytical Framework of Legitimacy, Insurgency, and Intervention -- 4. Historical Setting: The Earthly Struggle for Heaven's Mandate -- 5. Framework Analysis: The War without a Lesson? -- 6. China, 1920-1949: The Long March to Liberation -- 7. Greece, 1941-1949: Three Rounds to Albania -- 8. The Philippines, 1946-1956: Liberation Deflected -- 9. Malaya, 1948-1960: The Unmaking of an Insurgency -- 10. Cambodia's "Autogenocide" and the Disappearance of Laos, 1949-1975 -- 11. Findings from the Prism and an Application: Sendero Luminoso of Peru -- Conclusion. The New Era: Wilson's Triumph over Lenin -- Appendix 1. Literatures of the Framework -- Appendix 2. A Tale of Two Strategies: An Alternative Explanation -- Appendix 3. Assumptions, Thematic Questions, and Propositions.

ISBN

0807822736
9780807822739
0807845779
9780807845776

LCCN

95036667

OCLC

ocm33008076
33008076
SCSB-14472340

Owning Institutions

Princeton University Library