Vietnam's Lost Revolution
Ngô ?ình Di?m's Failure to Build an Independent Nation, 1955–1963

This book analyzes the origins of the Vietnam War, examining President Ngô ?ình Di?m's efforts to build a modern, independent nation amongst internal struggles.

Geoffrey C. Stewart (Author)

9781107097889, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 24 March 2017

278 pages, 8 b/w illus. 3 maps
23.6 x 16 x 2.1 cm, 0.52 kg

'Vietnam's Lost Revolution is certainly one of the greatest scholarly works on the Diem period to date. Its academic merits are substantial.' Mark Schell, H-Net: Humanities and Social Science Reviews Online

Vietnam's Lost Revolution employs newly-released archival material from Vietnam to examine the rise and fall of the Special Commissariat for Civic Action in the First Republic of Vietnam, and in so doing reassesses the origins of the Vietnam War. A cornerstone of Ngô ?ình Di?m's presidency, Civic Action was intended to transform Vietnam into a thriving, modern, independent, noncommunist Southeast Asian nation. Geoffrey Stewart juxtaposes Diem's revolutionary plan with the conflicting and competing visions of Vietnam's postcolonial future held by other indigenous groups. He shows how the government failed to gain legitimacy within the peasantry, ceding the advantage to the communist-led opposition and paving the way for the American military intervention in the mid-1960s. This book provides a richer and more nuanced analysis of the origins of the Vietnam War in which internal struggles over national identity, self-determination, and even modernity itself are central.

1. A temporary expedient: the origins of civic action in Vietnam
2. Nationalism and welfare improvement in the Republic of Vietnam
3. Revolution, community development, and the construction of Di?m's Vietnam
4. 'Bettering the people's conditions of existence': civic action and community development, 1957–9
5. Civic action and insurgency
6. The strategic Hamlet program and civic action in retreat
Conclusion: Vietnam's lost revolution.

Subject Areas: Vietnam War [HBWS2], Military history [HBW], Postwar 20th century history, from c 1945 to c 2000 [HBLW3], 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW], Asian history [HBJF]