Year Zero ( km, ឆ្នាំសូន្យ, ) is an idea put into practice by

Pol Pot Pol Pot; (born Saloth Sâr;; 19 May 1925 – 15 April 1998) was a Cambodian revolutionary, dictator, and politician who ruled Cambodia as Prime Minister of Democratic Kampuchea between 1976 and 1979. Ideologically a Marxist–Leninist ...

in Democratic Kampuchea that all

culture Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups ...

and

traditions A tradition is a belief or behavior (folk custom) passed down within a group or society with symbolic meaning or special significance with origins in the past. A component of cultural expressions and folklore, common examples include holidays o ...

within a society must be completely destroyed or discarded and that a new revolutionary culture must replace it starting from scratch. In this sense, all of the history of a nation or a people before Year Zero would be largely deemed irrelevant, because it would ideally be purged and replaced from the ground up. The first day of "year Zero" was declared by the

Khmer Rouge The Khmer Rouge (; ; km, ខ្មែរក្រហម, ; ) is the name that was popularly given to members of the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) and by extension to the regime through which the CPK ruled Cambodia between 1975 and 1979 ...

on 17 April 1975 upon their takeover of

Cambodia Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailand ...

in order to signify a rebirth of Cambodian history. Adopting the term as an analogy to the " Year One" of the French Revolutionary Calendar,Gfroerer, John. 2017 December 3.
John Gfroerer: Moving to Year Zero
" ''Concord Monitor''. Retrieved 2021 April 25. Year Zero was effectually an attempt by the Khmer Rouge to erase history and reset Cambodian society to a zeroth year, removing any vestiges of the past.

Concept and background

Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, most of whom were French-educated communists, took inspiration from the concept of " Year One" in the French Revolutionary Calendar. The French "Year One" came about during the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are conside ...

when, after the abolition of the French monarchy on 20 September 1792, the

National Convention The National Convention (french: link=no, Convention nationale) was the parliament of the Kingdom of France for one day and the French First Republic for the rest of its existence during the French Revolution, following the two-year Nation ...

instituted a new calendar and declared that date to be the beginning of Year I.

Year Zero of Cambodia

In 1975, the

forces took over Phnom Penh, the capital of

(subsequently renamed Democratic Kampuchea, 1975–79). Upon seizing power, Year Zero was decreed. Hoping to transform the nation into an agrarian utopia, communist leader

set out to reconstruct the country into a

pre-industrial Pre-industrial society refers to social attributes and forums of political and cultural organization that were prevalent before the advent of the Industrial Revolution, which occurred from 1750 to 1850. ''Pre-industrial'' refers to a time befor ...

classless society The term classless society refers to a society in which no one is born into a social class. Distinctions of wealth, income, education, culture, or social network might arise and would only be determined by individual experience and achievemen ...

by attempting to turn all citizens into rural agricultural workers rather than educated city dwellers, whom Pot and his regime believed to have been corrupted by western,

capitalist Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, private ...

ideas. He declared that the nation would start again at "Year Zero," and everything that existed before Year Zero was to be eradicated. In other words, this was to be a complete and thorough reset (or even cleansing) of Cambodian society. He isolated his people from the global community; established rural collectives; dismantled the

social fabric In sociology, a social system is the patterned network of relationships constituting a coherent whole that exist between individuals, groups, and institutions. It is the formal structure of role and status that can form in a small, stable group. A ...

and infrastructure of Cambodia; and set about the emptying of cities, as well as the abolition of money (thus also destroying banks),

private property Private property is a legal designation for the ownership of property by non-governmental legal entities. Private property is distinguishable from public property and personal property, which is owned by a state entity, and from collective or ...

, families, and

religion Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatur ...

. To build the new Cambodian society, the inhabitants of the depopulated cities were sent to labour camps. The people of

Phnom Penh Phnom Penh (; km, ភ្នំពេញ, ) is the capital and most populous city of Cambodia. It has been the national capital since the French protectorate of Cambodia and has grown to become the nation's primate city and its economic, indus ...

, in particular, were forced immediately to "return to the villages" to work. Similar evacuations occurred at Batdambang, Kampong Cham,

Siem Reap Siem Reap ( km, សៀមរាប, ) is the second-largest city of Cambodia, as well as the capital and largest city of Siem Reap Province in northwestern Cambodia. Siem Reap has French colonial and Chinese-style architecture in the Old ...

, Kampong Thom, among others. Knowledge of anything pre-Year Zero was prohibited. To ensure that there was no recorded memory of a pre-Year Zero society, books were burned. (Wearing glasses was also criminalized as it was taken to indicate that one might habitually read books.) In Democratic Kampuchea, the only acceptable lifestyle was that of peasant agricultural workers. Centuries of Cambodian culture and institutions were thereby eliminated—shutting down factories, hospitals, schools, and universities—along with anyone who expressed interest in their preservation. So-called New People—members of the old governments and intellectuals in general, including lawyers, doctors, teachers, engineers, clergy, and qualified professionals in all fields—were thought to be a threat to the new regime and were therefore especially singled out and executed during the purges accompanying Year Zero. The Khmer Rouge's takeover was rapidly followed by a series of drastic revolutionary de-industrialization policies which resulted in a

death toll ''Death toll'' is the number of dead as a result of a war, disaster, or other event. It may also refer to: * '' Death Toll'', 2008 action film * '' High-Ballin, 1978 action comedy film also released as ''Death Toll'' See also * List of li ...

that vastly exceeded the toll that resulted from the French

Reign of Terror The Reign of Terror (french: link=no, la Terreur) was a period of the French Revolution when, following the creation of the First French Republic, First Republic, a series of massacres and numerous public Capital punishment, executions took pl ...

Concept and background

Year Zero of Cambodia

See also

References

Further reading