Malcolm Caldwell

James Alexander Malcolm Caldwell (27 September 1931 – 23 December 1978)^[1] was a British academic and a prolific Marxist writer. He was a consistent critic of American imperialism, a campaigner for Asian communist liberation and socialist movements, and a strong supporter of Pol Pot. Despite his vocal support for the Kampuchean revolution and Pol Pot's regime, support which only increased after visiting the country, Malcolm Caldwell was murdered, supposedly on the orders of Pol Pot, a few hours after meeting him, in 1978.^[2]

Malcolm Caldwell was born in Scotland, the son of a coal miner.^[3] He obtained degrees from University of Nottingham and University of Edinburgh. He did two years' national service in the British army, becoming a sergeant in the Army Education Corps. In 1959 he joined the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London as a Research Fellow. Although he met with conservative opposition within the School, he remained on its faculty throughout his life. As well as being an academic, he was an energetic and committed radical political activist. He was dedicated to criticising Western imperialism and American capitalist imperialism in particular.^[3] He was a founding editor of the Journal of Contemporary Asia, a journal concerned with revolutionary movements in Asia. In 1978 Caldwell was one of the Labour Party candidates in St Mary's ward in local elections in Sidcup, Bexley.^[4]

Caldwell was sympathetic to the Khmer Rouge. Along with Elizabeth Becker and Richard Dudman, he was part of the first group of Westerners invited to visit Cambodia since the Khmer Rouge closed the country. They were given 10-day structured tours of the country and a private audience with Pol Pot, experiences that apparently only intensified Caldwell's support for the regime. He was murdered on the orders of Pol Pot, in circumstances that remain unexplained,^[5] on the eve of the Vietnamese invasion in Phnom Penh, Cambodia in 1978.^[6] He was one of two British people who were killed in Cambodia alongside John Dawson Dewhirst.

Preceded by Sheila Oakes

Chair of CND 1968–1970

Succeeded by April Carter

Works

• - (ca. 1967). Hunger and the Bomb (pamphlet). CND. 
• - (1968). The Modern World: Indonesia. Oxford University Press. 
• (with James Lewis Henderson) (1968). The Chainless Mind: A Study of Resistance and Liberation (Twentieth Century Themes). Hamish Hamilton. 
• (as editor) (1972). Socialism and the environment: essays. Nottingham: Spokesman Books. 
• - (1972). The Energy of Imperialism and the Imperialism of Energy (booklet). 
• (with Lek Tan) (1973). Cambodia in the Southeast Asian War. Monthly Review Press. 
• - (1976). Ten years' military terror in Indonesia. Nottingham: Spokesman Books. 
• (with Umberto Melotti) (1977). Marx and the Third World. Macmillan. 
• - (1977). The Wealth of Some Nations: Introduction to the Study of Political Economy. London: Zed Books. 
• (with David Elliott) (1978). Thailand: Origins of Military Rule. London: Zed Books. 
• (with others) (1978). Thailand: Roots of Conflict. Nottingham: Spokesman Books. 
• (with N. Jeffrey) (1978). Planning and Urbanism in China (Progress in Planning). Elsevier. 
• (with Mohamed Amin) (1978). Malaya: The Making of a Neo-colony. Nottingham: Spokesman Books. 

References

1. ^ London Gazette: no. 47754. p. 1147. 25 January 1979.
2. ^ "Pol Pot murdered Scot in Cambodia", The Herald, 23 February 2008
3. ^ ^{a b} Peter F. Bell, Mark Selden Extract from a biography of Malcolm Caldwell, Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars vol. 11, 1979
4. ^ "London Borough Council Elections, 4 May 1978", GLC Intelligence Department, p. 20.
5. ^ Milton Osborne, Sihanouk, Prince of Light, Prince of Darkness. Silkworm 1994
6. ^ Philip Short Pol Pot The History of a Nightmare. London: John Murray, 2004; New York: Owl Books, p.393-4

External links

• An account of the night Caldwell was killed excerpted from Becker's When the War was Over
• Andrew Anthony "Lost in Cambodia", The Observer, 10 January 2010
• Michael Ezra "Malcolm Caldwell: Pol Pot's Apologist", Democratiya, #16, Spring/Summer 2009 (.pdf)

Persondata
Name	Caldwell, Malcolm
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	27 September 1931
Place of birth
Date of death	23 December 1978
Place of death