FULLTEXT01

A fascinating insight into how nations can be created
IVARSSON
The existence of Laos today is taken for granted. But the crystallization
of a Lao national idea and ultimate independence for the country was
a long and uncertain process. This book examines the process through
which Laos came into existence under French colonial rule through to
the end of World War II. Rather than assuming that the Laos we see
today was an historical given, the book looks at how Laos’s position
at the intersection of two conflicting spatial layouts of ‘Thailand’ and
‘Indochina’ made its national form a particularly contested process.
This, however, is not an analysis of nation-building from the perspec-
tive of administrative and political structures. Rather, the book charts the
emergence of a notion of a specifically Lao cultural identity that served to
buttress Laos as a separate ‘Lao space’, both in relation to Siam/Thailand
creating laos
and within French Indochina.
Based on an impressive variety of primary sources, many of them never
creating laos
before used in studies of Lao nationalism, this book makes a significant
contribution to Lao historical studies and to the study of nation-building
in Southeast Asia.
‘Ivarsson’s book is a path breaking study of Lao nationalism and the The Making of a Lao Space between
emergence of the modern idea of Laos. This subtle cultural and political
history is informed not only by the author’s understanding of Laos, but Indochina and Siam, 1860–1945
also by his deep knowledge of Thailand, the foil for Lao nationalism.
It will inspire others to launch similar detailed investigations into the
country’s past.’ – Grant Evans, University of Hong Kong
‘Ivarsson’s study is a fascinating read and one of the most important
and sophisticated books on modern Laos to have been published
in the last 30 or so years. [...] Ivarsson has clearly produced an
innovative,intelligently crafted and provocative book’ – Christopher E.
Goscha, Université du Québec à Montréal søren ivarsson
‘Creating Laos is an original study of the birth of the Lao nation and
the creation of its “geo-body.” This fascinating book is recommended
to readers interested in the origins and development of nations in
Southeast Asia and worldwide.’ – Volker Grabowsky, University of
Hamburg
www.niaspress.dk
Ivarsson_reprint-pbk-cover.indd 1 22/07/2010 15:47

CREATING LAOS
Ivarsson_prelims.indd 1 2/11/07 15:19:32

NIAS – Nordic Institute of Asian Studies
Monograph Series
69. Arne Kalland: Fishing Villages in Tokugawa Japan
70. Weng Eang Cheong: The Hong Merchants of Canton
71. Christine Dobbin: Asian Entrepreneurial Minorities
72. Eldrid Mageli: Organising Women’s Protest
73. Vibeke Børdahl: The Oral Tradition of Yangzhou Storytelling
74. Cecilia Nathansen Milwertz: Accepting Population Control
75. Sharifah Zaleha Syed Hassan & Sven Cederroth: Managing Marital Disputes in Malaysia
76. Antoon Geels: Subud and the Javanese Mystical Tradition
77. Kristina Lindell, Jan-Öjvind Swahn & Damrong Tayanin: Folk Tales from Kammu – VI
78. Alain Lefebvre: Kinship, Honour and Money in Rural Pakistan
79. Christopher E. Goscha: Thailand and the Southeast Asian Networks of the Vietnamese Revolution
80. Helle Bundgaard: Indian Art Worlds in Contention
81. Niels Brimnes: Constructing the Colonial Encounter
82. Ian Reader: Religious Violence in Contemporary Japan
83. Bat-Ochir Bold: Mongolian Nomadic Society
84. Shaheen Sardar Ali & Javaid Rehman: Indigenous Peoples and Ethnic Minorities of Pakistan
85. Michael D. Barr: Lee Kuan Yew: The Beliefs Behind the Man
86. Tessa Carroll: Language Planning and Language Change in Japan
87. Minna Säävälä: Fertility and Familial Power
88. Mario Rutten: Rural Capitalists in Asia
89. Jörgen Hellman: Performing the Nation
90. Olof G. Lidin: Tanegashima – The Arrival of Europe in Japan
91. Lian H. Sakhong: In Search of Chin Identity
92. Margaret Mehl: Private Academies of Chinese Learning in Meiji Japan
93. Andrew Hardy: Red Hills
94. Susan M. Martin: The UP Saga
95. Anna Lindberg: Modernization and Effeminization in India
96. Heidi Fjeld: Commoners and Nobles
97. Hatla Thelle: Better to Rely on Ourselves
98. Alexandra Kent: Divinity and Diversity
99. Somchai Phatharathananunth: Civil Society and Democratization
100. Nordin Hussin: Trade and Society in the Straits of Melaka
101. Anna-Greta Nilsson Hoadley: Indonesian Literature vs New Order Orthodoxy
102. Wil O. Dijk: 17th-Century Burma and the Dutch East India Company 1634–1680
103. Judith Richell: Disease and Demography in Colonial Burma
104. Dagfinn Gatu: Village China at War
105. Marie Højlund Roesgaard: Japanese Education and the Cram School Business
106. Donald M. Seekins: Burma and Japan Since 1940
107. Vineeta Sinha: A New God in the Diaspora?
108. Mona Lilja: Power, Resistance and Women Politicians in Cambodia
109. Anders Poulsen: Childbirth and Tradition in Northeast Thailand
110. R.A. Cramb: Land and Longhouse
111. Deborah Sutton: Other Landscapes
112. Søren Ivarsson: Creating Laos

CREATING LAOS
The Making of a Lao Space
between Indochina and Siam,
1860–1945
Søren Ivarsson

Monograph series, No. 112
First published in 2008

by NIAS Press
Leifsgade 33, DK-2300 Copenhagen S, Denmark
tel (+45) 3532 9501 • fax (+45) 3532 9549
email: books@nias.ku.dk • website: www.niaspress.dk
© Søren Ivarsson 2008

All rights reserved.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Ivarsson, Soren
Creating Laos : the making of a Lao space between Indochina
and Siam, 1860-1945. – (NIAS monographs ; 112)
1. Nationalism – Laos – History 2. Laos - History
I. Title
959.4’03
ISBN: 978-87-7694-022-5 (hardback)

ISBN: 978-87-7694-023-2 (paperback)
Publication of this monograph was made possible by a grant from the

Danish Research Council for the Humanities.
Typeset by NIAS Press

Produced by SRM Production Services Sdn Bhd
and printed in Malaysia

Contents
Preface ix
Abbreviations x
Thai and Lao Language Conventions xi
Introduction 1
Laos between Indochina and Siam • Colonialism and nationalism
in Laos
CHAPTER ONE
The Colonial Encounter 24
Siam and the Mekong region: Interstate relations in the premodern
period • The French and the Mekong • The colonial encounter:
Two conflicting spatial layouts • The French colonial discourse on
the Lao: Notions of race and history
CHAPTER TWO
Thai Discourses on History and Race 60
Making Laos ‘our’ space: Belonging in history • Making Laos ‘our’
space: Rethinking national maps • Suwannaphum or Laem Thong:
The racial link • Demanding the return of the lost territories
CHAPTER THREE
Roads, History, Religion and Language, 1893–1940 93
Laos between Siam and Indochina: Linking space • Laos in Indo-
china: The Vietnamese link • Towards a national history of Laos
• Towards a nationalisation of religion: The Buddhist Institute •
Towards a standardisation of the written Lao language

Creating Laos
CHAPTER FOUR
The Campaign for a National ‘Re-awakening’, 1941–1945 145
Outline of the campaign for a national renovation in Laos •
Towards a new national space: The problem of unification • A
national reawakening: The importance of history and Franco–Lao
cooperation • Les Annamites et nous: An ambivalent relationship •
Cultural revival: Literature and songs • ‘Siam-ification’ or ‘Lao-
ification’: The issue of language standardisation
CHAPTER FIVE
Setting Laos Free from the French 208
Turning the idea of Laos against the French • Concluding remarks:
Bringing Laos into existence
Bibliography 219
Index 235
vi

Contents
List of Figures
1. French map depicting ‘Laos Annamite’ (1892). 39
2. Erasing Laos from cartographic representations. 69
3. Infrastructure of Laos in the colonial period. 99
4. Lao Nhay – Laos’s first newspaper. 151
5. Bangkok monkey drills imitating soldier. 163
6. ‘In ancient times they burned our temples with wooden torches.
Today they use bombs. The Bangkok people have not changed
their ways at all’. 164
7. ‘The Bangkok Government tries to catch the moon [Greater
Thailand]. Will they succeed?’ 165
8. Wat Phra Kaeo and the resurrection of Laos. 175
9. Building a future through education. 183
10. Disciplining the body and modernising the nation/race. 184
11. The need for education. 185
Cover Illustrations
Front: Laotian landscape (design by NIAS Press).
Back: The That Luang festival, 1941 – celebrating history, religion
and unity in a New Laos. From Indochine, 69 (December 1941), p. 3.
vii

Preface
My thoughts on French colonialism and Lao nationalism found in

this book were initially expressed in my PhD dissertation. Since
finishing the dissertation, I have been caught up in research on
other topics, teaching and other distractive activities. Consequently,
this book has had a long period of gestation. However, I have used
this time to rewrite large parts of the dissertation and to expand
the text quite substantially. Over the years I have profited from the
friendship and support of Inga Floto, Christopher E. Goscha, Grant
Evans, Chalong Soontravanich, and Saichol and Attachak Sattaya-
nurak. When I was a PhD student Viggo Brun went far beyond the
ordinary call of a PhD supervisor. Without him the current book
would not have been possible!
My greatest thanks, however, go to Dorthe, Malthe and Jakob.
Your love and support has been an important source of strength for
me as I entered the often bumpy road of academia. At the same time
you have constantly reminded me that there is more to life than re-
search. Thanks for that.
A revised version of Chapter 2 has appeared in Christopher E.
Goscha and Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting Visions of the Lao Past.
ix

Abbreviations
AEFEO Archives of l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, Paris

AMAE Archives of the Ministère des Affaires Étrangères, Paris
c carton (archival box)
CAOM Centre des Archives d’Outre-Mer, Aix-en-Provence
CD Archives of the Conseiller Diplomatique
CG Archives of the Commission Guernut
CM Archives of the Cabinet Militaire
CP Archives of the Conseiller Politique
d dossier (file)
EA Archives of the États Associés
GGI Archives of the Government-General of French Indochina
HCI Archives of the Haut Commissariat d’Indochine
NF Indochine, Nouveau Fonds
RSL Archives of the Résident-Supérieur of Laos
SHAT Service Historique de l’Armée de Terre, Paris
TNA Thai National Archives, Bangkok

Thai and Lao Language Conventions
At the time of writing there exists no single and commonly used

system of how to transcribe Lao words. Instead of devising yet
another system for Lao I have chosen to make use of the system
already in existence for the romanisation of Thai and adopt it for
Lao. Therefore, for both Thai and Lao this book adheres to the 1999
guide for the romanisation of Thai words devised by the Royal In-
stitute in Thailand. It has to be stressed that adopting this practice
is purely a practical matter and should not be seen as an expression
of a nationalist vision of a greater Thai space engulfing contempo-
rary Thailand and Laos. Nor does it reflect an idea about Lao being
a dialect or a derivative language of Thai. For both Thai and Lao,
however, I have retained generally accepted spellings (e.g. Maha Sila
Viravong instead of Maha Sila Wirawong, Chao Anou instead of
Chao Anu, and Prince Phetsarath instead of Prince Phetsarat). For
place names in Thailand I have used the romanised forms suggested
by the Royal Institute in Thailand. As for place names in Laos I have
used the forms given in a recent atlas of Laos in which the spelling
is in conformity with the 1995 census in Laos. The atlas is Boun-
thavy Sisouphanthong and Christian Taillard, Atlas of Laos. Spatial
Dimensions of the Economic and Social Development of the Lao People’s
Democratic Republic (Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2000). The guide
for the romanisation of Thai words can be found at the homepage of
the Royal Institute of Thailand (www.royin.go.th).

Introduction
Today we have grown accustomed to the existence of Laos as a nation-

state in the heartland of the mainland of modern Southeast Asia
sharing borders with Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, China and
Myanmar. Laos is, however, a new state in modern nationalist and
geographical terms. Its creation can be traced back to the colonial
encounter at the end of the nineteenth century, when France carved
out Laos as an unprecedented territorial entity in conformity with
Franco-Siamese treaties. As the new colonial possession of Laos
came into being it formed part of two larger and competing spatial
layouts which could have potentially superseded Laos as nation-
states. One was that of an Indochinese-wide colonial space that many
French colonial architects dreamed of making. Another was that of
a Greater Siam – baptised Thailand in 1939 – including part of or
all the territories making up present-day Laos and Cambodia that
seduced many Thai nationalists, especially in the 1930s. Caught in
a regional crossfire Laos was a contested space whose modern form
was anything but sure during the colonial period.
This book examines the process through which Laos came into
existence under French colonial rule, until the end of World War II.
Rather than assuming that the Laos we see today was an historical
given, this reflection looks at how its position at the intersection of
these two conflicting spatial layouts of ‘Thailand’ and ‘Indochina’
made its national form a particularly contested process. It is, how-
ever, not an analysis of nation-building from the perspective of ad-
ministrative and political structures. Instead, the aim of the book is
to discuss how a specific idea about Laos and its culture was formed
1
Ivarsson_book.indd 1 2/11/07 15:20:34

Creating Laos
with reference to divergent discourses on Laos and the Lao. It is an

analysis of the emergence of a notion of a specifically Lao cultural
identity that served to buttress Laos as a separate ‘Lao space’, both in
relation to Siam/Thailand and within French Indochina. In so do-
ing, this book provides a new approach to the study of Laos’s history
in general and to the study of nationalism in Laos in particular. On
this note, it is worth considering some recent studies dealing with the
wider colonial space of Indochina and its competing national forms.
LAOS BETWEEN INDOCHINA AND SIAM

Nation-states are landmarks of a quite recent date in the geopolitical
landscape. In Southeast Asia, the formation of nation-states can be
traced back to the establishment of borders throughout the region
that followed in the wake of the colonial confrontation in the nine-
teenth century. In this process the unbounded states that had dom-
inated the geopolitical layout of the premodern period were replaced
by geographically bounded states. The geo-bodies, to use the term
coined by Thongchai Winichakul, of the future nation-states were
born.1 Acknowledging the contingency of the modern nation-state
scholars have discussed the background for the divergent experi-
ences of two hybrid constructs, both of which were brought into
being in the colonial period with only a slight – if any – resemblance
to premodern domains: Indochina and Indonesia. While the French
colonial domain of Indochina eventually gave way to the territorial
nation-states of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, the Dutch colonial
domain of Indonesia was moulded into one unified space, even if
that national unity is coming under increasing fire today.
This question was first addressed by Benedict Anderson in
his seminal study Imagined Communities in which he discusses the
origins, development and spread of nationalism and the process of
national imagining from Latin and North America to Europe and
further into the colonial domains in Asia and Africa. From a na-
tionalist perspective, if one acknowledges the ideological position
that nations are rooted in antiquity, the question of why Indonesia
became one nation and why Indochina was fragmented is odd, if
2

Introduction
not heretical. For Anderson, who perceives the nation as a modern

cultural construct or artefact, this is, however, a quite illuminating
question to ask as it illustrates two different outcomes of colonial
policies with regard to the transformation of colonial states into na-
tion-states. In general, Anderson associates the emergence of the na-
tionalist imagining with the decline of classical communities linked
by sacred languages and dynastic realms, with changing apprehen-
sions of time and with the role of print-capitalism. More specifically,
in relation to the emergence of nationalism in the colonial domains,
Anderson accentuates the importance of the colonial state.
Anderson, however, is not concerned with the often-studied link
between colonialism and anticolonial nationalism. Rather, Anderson
is interested in how the colonial state in a much more subtle manner
fundamentally engendered the grammar of the nationalisms that
eventually rose to combat the colonial state. A central element of
this grammar is the very idea that humans are divided into nations,
which, according to Anderson, was spread through the classrooms
in the colonies as the students studied the national histories of their
colonial masters. Anderson also draws attention to what he calls the
‘educational and administrative pilgrimages’ which brought people
from all over the colonial state together in educational centres and
also circulated people for administrative posts within the colonial
state. These pilgrimages contributed to turning the colonial space
into an imagined reality. Finally, Anderson accentuates the import-
ance of the census, the map and the museum. They contributed
to forming a total classifying grid reflecting how the colonial state
imagined its dominion. Later, these imaginations and classifications
formed important elements in anticolonial and later postcolonial
national imaginings. With this approach Anderson highlights the
complexity of the colonial project: it was not only a political and eco-
nomic project, but it was also a cultural and intellectual one that can
be linked with far-reaching changes in local societies and cultures
throughout the colonised world.
In relation to Indochina and Indonesia, Anderson locates the rea-
sons for the divergent outcomes of these two colonial constructions in
3

Creating Laos
the domain of educational and language policies and the trajectories of

local civil servants in the bureaucratic system. In the case of Indonesia,
Anderson draws attention to the centralised educational system where
Batavia formed the nucleus for all tertiary education. The classrooms,
where students coming from all over Indonesia met, represented the
wider colonial space of Indonesia and turned it into an imagined real-
ity. This process of imagination was further stimulated as the admin-
istrative careers of the educated locals were not restricted to their place
of origin because they could seek state employment throughout the
archipelago. In Indonesia this created a situation where ‘virtually all
the major ethnolinguistic groups, by the end of the colonial period,
were accustomed to the idea that there was an archipelagic stage on
which they had parts to play’.2 Finally, a common Indonesian language
had been created and spread through the press and schools, which
gave Indonesia a real and experienced meaning.
As for Indochina, Anderson argues that in the first decades of
the twentieth century Indochina also had an imagined meaning for
the educated elite. Again, Anderson brings in the educational poli-
cies as important elements to explain the growth of an Indochinese
consciousness. First, the educational system was designed so that it
served to break the politico-cultural connections to the surround-
ing territories of the colonial construct of Indochina and thereby
nourish the notion of Indochina as a separate entity. With regard
to ‘Western Indochina’ – that is, Laos and Cambodia – attempts
were made to break the religious and cultural connections to Siam
through the formation of renovated pagoda schools and the École
Supérieur de Pali in Phnom Penh in 1930. With regard to ‘Eastern
Indochina’ – Tonkin, Annam and Cochinchina – the connections
with China were severed as the Confucian educational system was
replaced by a colonial educational system and as a romanised phon-
etic script – quoc ngu – was adopted. Second, up until the 1930s
a centralised structure of the higher system of learning comparable
to that of Indonesia was in place where the classrooms in Hanoi
and Saigon attracted students from the wider colonial space giving
the notion of Indochina a real experienced meaning. In contrast to
4

Introduction
Indonesia, however, this process of imagination was countered by

other developments. With the formation of a lycée in Phnom Penh
in 1935 the system of higher education was decentralised and the
classrooms in ‘Eastern Indochina’ no longer served as a micro-cos-
mos of Indochina to the same degree as before. Further, contrary to
the situation in Indonesia, there existed no isomorphism between
education and administrative pilgrimage within Indochina as the
local layer of the administrative apparatus primarily was peopled
by Vietnamese,3 while the Lao and Khmer civil servants were sel-
dom employed outside their home-country. While Indochina was
the stage for the Vietnamese this was not the case for the Lao and
Khmers – Indochina was not as easily imagined by them as by the
Vietnamese. Furthermore, no common local language was designed
for Indochina, as several vernacular languages remained in use
whereby print-capitalism served to delineate the space of three sepa-
rate domains rather than to unite them into a single one.
Exploring the study of nations and nationalism within a modern-
ist framework Anderson is looking for the fundamental factors con-
tributing to the divergent fates of Indochina and Indonesia in colonial
policies and practices. He is not concerned about the impact of prena-
tional conditions on the formation of nations. Stressing how the rise of
nationalism is associated with a change in human consciousness – e.g.
new concepts of time and space – Anderson is more concerned with
discontinuity between the prenational and the national period than
with continuity. In this respect Anderson’s approach differs widely
from other significant approaches to nations and nationalism which,
on the one hand, just like Anderson acknowledge the modernity of
nations and nationalism while, on the other hand, also identify im-
portant markers of continuity between the prenational and national
period in terms of ethnic bonds, symbols, sentiments or between what
Anthony Smith has labelled ‘ethnies’ – ethnic communities of the pre-
national period – and modern nations.4
Working from this framework, David Henley has taken the dis-
cussion of the reasons for the disintegration of the colonial domain of
Indochina versus the integration of the colonial domain of Indonesia
5

Creating Laos
in a new direction. Henley recognises the importance of colonial

practices advanced by Anderson as working against the formation
of an Indochina nation-state – the continued existence of several
vernacular languages, several educational centres, and the non-shar-
ing of mutual experiences within the Indochina-wide bureaucratic
system. In addition Henley suggests various other factors located
in the colonial period conducive to the fragmentation of Indochina:
the continued existence of monarchical traditions in different parts
of colonial Indochina, the lack of integrative political institutions
due to the federal structure of Indochina, local resistance against
the Vietnamese living in Laos and Cambodia, and the existence
of a Vietnamese nationalism based on the eventual integration of
the colonial division of the three colonial subunits Annam-Tonkin-
Cochinchina. The point on which Henley differs most widely from
Anderson, however, is in the articulation of factors located in the
legacy of precolonial history that worked against the formation of an
Indochina nation-state. That is, Henley does not hold that colonial
practices alone were enough to explain why Indochina was not uni-
fied. While Anderson adopted a modernist approach locating the
factors solely in the modern phenomenon of colonialism, Henley
advocates a combined approach emphasising both modernist and
perennial explanations. With regard to the last point, Henley sees
the existence of a strong sense of a separate Vietnamese identity
– and also to a lesser extent a Cambodian – located in the precolo-
nial heritage as an immanent feature running against a unification of
Indochina.5
In their studies both Anderson and Henley see the failure of the
Indochina nation-state primarily in the light of the success of trans-
forming two of the constituent parts of this colonial space into na-
tion-states – Vietnam and Cambodia. The position of Laos within
this wider Indochinese space and the reasons why the colonial state
of Laos subsequently emerged into the nation-state of Laos receive
only cursory treatment.6 In comparison, the aspect of Laos within
Indochina receives more treatment in Christopher Goscha’s illumi-
nating study Vietnam or Indochina? Contesting Concepts of Space in
6

Introduction
Vietnamese Nationalism, 1887–1954.7 In this study Goscha adds more

depth and new dimensions to the perspectives outlined by Anderson
and Henley by arguing convincingly for how French colonial poli-
cies aimed at making an Indochinese space a reality and how this
notion of a wider Indochinese space was embedded in, for example,
the layout of the infrastructure, maps, schoolbooks, and the domi-
nant Vietnamese element in the local administration throughout
Indochina. In addition to the factors brought forward by Anderson
to explain why Indochina did not emerge as a nation-state, Goscha
emphasises also how this colonial space was contested. Based on a
reading of the Vietnamese press in the 1920s–1930s Goscha shows
how Vietnamese nationalists were divided with regard to whether
the geographical delimitation for a Vietnamese nationalism should
be Indochina or Annam. But Goscha also argues that the notion
of Indochina was contested by emerging national identities in
Laos and Cambodia from the early 1930s. National identities that
were nourished by opposition to the dominant role assigned to
the Vietnamese by the French and by a premodern cultural divide
between the Lao and Khmer Indianised Buddhist cultures in the
west and the Vietnamese Sinicised Confucian culture in the east.
According to Goscha, the hyphen in the word ‘Indo-China’ that up
till the early 1930s was the official way of writing the name of this
French colonial domain ‘was thus important, symbolic of a deeper,
precolonial cultural divide that the French did not succeed in bridg-
ing – even though they dropped the hyphen’.8 While Indochina for
the Vietnamese moving through it ‘was a functional concept and
space’ and thus easily imagined, it was not a space imagined by the
Lao and Khmer.9
The present book joins the above-mentioned studies showing
how the French colonial project in Laos can be linked with the for-
mation of an idea of Laos associated with a Lao cultural identity
that emerged within the context of a wider Indochina-wide colonial
project and subsequently ran counter to this. It will be argued that
the formation of this idea of Laos or Lao-ness was linked with an
attempt to dissociate the French colonial space of Laos from that of
7

Creating Laos
a Greater Siam, a process that involved the formation of a ‘cultural

frontier’ between Laos and Siam by attributing a distinctiveness to
Laos in relation to Siam with reference to some of the basic factors
normally used to define national identities – history, language and
religion. What is analysed here is how the unprecedented colonial
space of Laos was given a past and a culture and thereby also a fu-
ture as a distinct state: the identity of a nation-to-be was formed.
In this analysis a distinct and separate Lao nation did not emerge
‘naturally’, but was the product of competing discourses about Laos
and the Lao. What this book is dealing with is not political but cul-
tural nationalism as a distinctive form of nationalism preceding the
formation of a nation-state. When we refer to political nationalism,
the focus is on the state and the formation of an independent state.
State-formation and the achievement of an independent state are
not uppermost when we talk about cultural nationalism. Cultural
nationalism is concerned with identity and the regeneration of the
national community through the development and strengthening
of a national essence – a distinct civilisation which is the product
of a distinct history and culture. The primary leaders of cultural
nationalism are found among historians, lexicographers, artists and
the like. In praxis, these two forms of nationalism are closely inter-
related. However, as John Hutchinson has pointed out in his study
of cultural nationalism in an Irish context: ‘[i]ndeed, the struggle for
nationhood in the modern world has everywhere been preceded by
emerging cultural nationalist movements’.10 In his classic study of
the nationalist movements among eight small European nationali-
ties Miroslav Hroch has also emphasised the cultural orientation of
the nationalist movements when they first emerge. According to the
three-stage periodisation of the nationalist movements proposed by
Hroch, the activities in the first and initial phase are devoted to:
scholarly enquiry into and dissemination of an awareness of the
linguistic, cultural, social and sometimes historical attributes of
the non-dominant group [here Hroch is referring to cases with
an ‘exogenous’ ruling class] – but without, on the whole, pressing
specifically national demands.11
8

Introduction
Likewise, in his highly influential book The Nation and its

Fragments Partha Chatterjee emphasises the importance of dis-
tinguishing – from both a thematic and a temporal perspective
– between political and cultural nationalism in a colonial context.
In Imagined Communities Benedict Anderson argues that the co-
lonial and anticolonial nationalisms in Asia and Africa were based
on a process of copying the modular forms of nationalism already
in existence in the Americas and Europe. Chatterjee criticises this
idea about nationalism’s modular nature as he finds that it deprives
anticolonialism of agency:
If nationalisms in the rest of the world have to choose their imagined
community from certain ‘modular’ forms already made available to
them by Europe and the Americas, what do they have left to imag-
ine? History, it would seem, has decreed that we in the postcolonial
world shall only be perpetual consumers of modernity. Europe and
the Americas, the only true subjects of history, have thought out on
our behalf not only the script of colonial enlightenment and exploi-
tation, but also that of our anticolonial resistance and postcolonial
misery. Even our imaginations must remain forever colonized.12
In order to rectify this aspect of Anderson’s approach Chatterjee
argues that anticolonial nationalism operates in two different do-
mains. One is an outer and material domain encompassing economy,
state-craft, technology and science. This is a domain dominated by
the colonial power and it is a domain in which ‘Western superiority
had to be acknowledged and its accomplishments carefully studied
and replicated’. The other is an inner and spiritual domain ‘bearing the
“essential” marks of cultural identity’. It is a domain outside the reach
of Western hegemony. With recourse to this bifurcation Chatterjee
demarcates the dual nature of anticolonial nationalism. On the
one hand, we have the outer domain which is characterised by the
modular nature proposed by Anderson. It is a domain in which anti-
colonialism strives to create similarities between European and local
institutions and practices and thereby to negate the rule of difference
that is fundamental for the workings of the colonial state. On the
other hand, we have the inner domain in which anticolonial nation-
9

Creating Laos
alism strives to establish a distinct national culture that is not only

modern but also different from that of the colonialists. Therefore, if
the history of anticolonial movements takes into account only the
workings of anticolonialism in the outer domain then ‘nationalism’s
autobiography is fundamentally flawed’. In order to present a more
accurate portrait of anticolonial nationalism we need to take into ac-
count the process of localising the national idea in a specific context
which takes place in the inner domain. According to Chatterjee it is
here that:
[…] nationalism launches its most powerful, creative, and histori-
cally significant project: to fashion a ‘modern’ national culture that is
nevertheless not Western. If the nation is an imagined community,
then this is where it is brought into being. In this, its true and es-
sential domain, the nation is already sovereign, even when the state
is in the hands of the colonial power. The dynamics of this historical
project is completely missed in conventional histories in which the
story of nationalism begins with the contest for political power.13
It has to be noted, however, that in Chatterjee’s analysis the inner
domain is by no means unrelated to the colonial system or colonial
forms of knowledge. Take, for example, Chatterjee’s discussion of
how a national perception of history was formed in India. From his
analysis there is no doubt about how colonial educational institu-
tions and colonial knowledge had an impact on the new perception
of history that came into being. Chatterjee writes:
For Indian nationalists in the nineteenth century, the pattern of
classical glory, medieval decline and modern renaissance appeared
as one that was not only proclaimed by the modern historiography
of Europe but was also approved for India by at least some section
of European scholarship. What was needed was to claim for the
Indian nation the historical agency for completing the project of
modernity. To make that claim, ancient India had to become the
classical source of Indian modernity, while the ‘Muslim period’
would become the night of medieval darkness.14
In this manner, the local intellectual elite borrows from colonial
forms of knowledge and this knowledge is adapted to fit with the
10

Introduction
national project. Chatterjee characterises this process as a ‘selective

appropriation of Western modernity’.15
Picking up on these ideas about cultural nationalism in general
and the link between cultural nationalism and colonialism more spe-
cifically, this book seeks to investigate how a similar kind of cultural
nationalism or notions of a Lao cultural identity developed in Laos
preceding the formation of an overt anticolonial and political national-
ist movement. It will be evident from my analysis that this idea about
Laos and its culture did not come into being in a sphere independent
of the workings of the colonial state. Indeed, French colonialism was
instrumental in bringing about a Lao cultural nationalism. To use
Anderson’s terminology, we can say that the colonial state engendered
the fundamental grammar that made the imagination of a national
culture possible. As colonial subjects the Lao manifested their agency
in participating in this project by unearthing the cultural elements that
a Lao nationalism subsequently identified as its national culture.
The cultural aspects of French colonialism is a topic that has
been neglected in studies of Laos’s history in general and of nation-
alism in Laos in particular. In order to place this book in relation
to the field of studies in the history of Laos, I will in the following
briefly discuss the main tenets of the existing studies dealing with
the link between French colonialism and Lao nationalism.
COLONIALISM AND NATIONALISM IN LAOS

In all societies, discourses about the past shape the understanding
of the present and ruling groups have always used perceptions of
the past as an ideological tool to legitimate and reinforce existing
power relations. Nowhere can this be better seen than in the way the
history of Laos is written in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic
(LPDR). Since the LPDR was established in 1975, the history of
twentieth-century Laos has been framed to show how the revolu-
tionary movement in Laos has deep historical roots and how the
Lao People’s Revolutionary Party is the carrier of the fight against
colonial and neo-colonial foreign aggressors. It can come as no great
surprise that a very critical representation of French colonialism and
11

Creating Laos
its impact on Lao culture and society is embedded in this percep-

tion of the Lao past. The main tenets of this version of Laos’s past
can be located in Phoumi Vongvichit’s assessment of Laos’s his-
tory published in the late 1960s. Phoumi’s treatment of the colonial
period includes the following themes. First, French colonialism is
made synonymous with a system of exploitation and oppression of
the Lao people that brought no benefits to the population at large. A
situation existed where the Lao people were ‘plunged in misery and
ignorance’ during the ‘sixty years of most ruthless French oppression
and exploitation’.16 Second, French colonialism is associated with a
system that brought decadence and stagnation to Lao culture. Not
only because the French language and culture were promoted to the
detriment of Lao language and culture, but also because the French
colonialists pursued a policy of obscurantism, which ‘kept Laos in
stagnation, plunged its culture into decadence, and held its language
and script in contempt’.17 Third, the heavy exploitation and repres-
sion of the Lao people by the French colonialists led to ‘continuous
popular uprisings’ which are expressions of a so-called ‘fighting
tradition’ of the Lao people against French colonialism.18 The Lao
people’s struggle against the colonialists was not, however, successful
before 1945, when the Lao people seized power and established a
provisional government. According to Phoumi, the reasons for the
lack of success in the pre-1945 period are that the risings were ‘short
of a correct revolutionary line, a nation-wide co-ordination and
especially the guidance of an authentic political party’. Still, these
movements are important as they formed the basis for the later, suc-
cessful fight against the foreign colonialists:
[…] the blood shed by thousands of patriots at the hands of the
colonialists had exasperated the hatred of the Laos, tempered their
combativeness and made the entire people aware of their historic
mission to liberate the country and build a genuinely independent
and free Laos. It was those traditions that brought about success to
the Lao people’s revolutionary struggle.19
Basically, it is the same representation of French colonialism that
we find in state-sanctioned surveys of Laos’s history published in
12

Introduction
Laos after 1975. The recently published History of Laos by Souneth

Phothisane and Nousai Phoummachan offers a good example of
how French colonialism in Laos is represented in such an ideologi-
cally motivated and party-sanctioned perception of the Lao past.20
The book is of a monstrous size (more than 1,000 pages) and it
spans a period from prehistory to the turn of the twenty-first century.
Therefore, in the part dealing with the colonial period we find more
details and narrative than in Phoumi’s account of the same subject.
Still, Souneth and Nousai reproduce basically the same structure as
found in Phoumi’s text. Thus, they depict the colonial state as a state
that not only demanded high taxes from the population at large, but
was also equipped with an administrative and coercive apparatus to
extract them. With reference to the economic sphere, Souneth and
Nousai underscore that the colonial state only aimed to make an
easy profit and was not interested in developing the economy for
the betterment of the population at large. From this perspective the
colonial period represents a situation without benefits for the Lao
people:
The French colonialists forced the Lao population to pay different
heavy and constantly increasing taxes. They used the money from
the Lao to govern and to suppress the Lao people. Besides that,
they [the French] were dependent on this money for their personal
incomes and for income to be sent back to France. Nonetheless, the
French propagated [the idea] that they brought capital from France
in order to develop Laos to achieve progress and civilisation.21
Following Phoumi’s narrative structure a central theme in
Souneth and Nousai’s representation of French colonialism is the
Lao people’s repeated uprisings against the French colonialists.
Illustratively, the section of the book dealing with the colonial period
is entitled ‘the Lao people’s struggle resisting French colonialism’.
The struggle against the French is told with reference to a series of
uprisings against the French which have attained an iconographic
quality in the LPDR historical narrative: Pho Kaduak (1901–03),
Ong Kaeo and Khommadam (1901–37), Chao Fa Pacaj (1914–22),
Chao Fa Mueang Sing and Nai Khu Kham. On the one hand, these
13

Creating Laos
revolts are described in order to illustrate how the Lao people coura-
geously rose to fight the militarily stronger colonialists. On the other
hand, the fate of these revolts is described in order to articulate the
importance of the party in guiding the Lao people. Thus, despite the
heroic struggle of the people none of the revolts succeeded in bring-
ing down the colonial regime. For Souneth and Nousai, the lack of
success is an expression of how the people who participated in the
revolts lacked leadership and class consciousness (sati son san), and
it illustrates how the revolts were merely localised forms of upris-
ings without a clearly specified goal.22 A new situation emerged in
1930 when the Indochinese Communist Party was created. Hereby
the scene was set for a successful struggle against the French as
Marxism-Leninism began to be spread to the Lao people and the
banner of national democracy became the banner of the ‘nationalist
struggle resisting French colonialism’.23
Another theme in the text is how the Lao people ‘sank into a con-
dition of ignorance, venerated the French, forgot their own lineage
and consented to being the slaves of the foreigners’.24 In the same vein,
Souneth and Nousai refer to an association for Lao civil servants
founded by the French as an organisation established to manipulate
the Lao and make them ‘forget the nation and venerate the French’.25
Whereas French is being implemented as an official language, reli-
gious institutions – temples in general and the Buddhist Institute in
Vientiane in particular – become the guardians of Lao language and
culture.26
Built into this representation of Laos’s history is the idea of the
Lao nation as a primordial entity which is tinted temporarily by
French colonialism only to emerge in full blossom again after a long
period of anticolonial struggle under the guidance of the party. Such
a primordialism is, for example, expressed when French colonial ex-
pansion into the Mekong region is linked to the splitting up of ‘Laos’
(pathet lao) or a Lao nation (sat ban mueang) spanning both banks
of the Mekong River, when this river became the boundary between
French Laos and Siam.27 The authors also invoke the primordial
character of ‘Laos’ when they place the leaders of the various revolts
14

Introduction
in the colonial period in a pantheon of ‘Lao heroes’ and note how the
struggle against the colonial state strengthened the ‘patriotism’ (lathi
hak sat) which had existed since Fa Ngum, Setthathirat and Chao
Anou.28 In this manner the precolonial and colonial period is linked
together with reference to the existence of a timeless Lao patriotism.
In relation to the uprisings, the authors describe the timeless quality
of the Lao nation in the following manner:
The Lao people have [in the lineage] an ancestral love for their
homeland, [a love for their] territory and village, and a love for
their birth place. That is, they love their nation (pathet sat), [and]
they cherish and venerate their nation in an unsurpassed manner.
Therefore, when the French colonialists came in and placed the
yoke of control on the neck of the Lao people, the Lao people felt
the need for extreme revenge towards the enemies of the nation and
together they rose up to fight the French. […] The armed uprisings
of the Lao people to resist the yoke of the French colonialism were
done in order to seize independence and national freedom.29
In this party-sanctioned version of the Lao past, an independ-
ent Lao nation and Lao culture emerged not because of but rather
despite of French colonialism. There is no room for the cultural
aspects of the French colonial project and the cultural aspects of an
early Lao nationalism.
We encounter basically the same thematic orientation as outlined
above in Western studies of French colonialism and nationalism in
Laos published since the 1970s. One dominant theme is the back-
ground for and nature of the revolts during the colonial period.30
Another dominant theme in the literature is the political and anti-
colonial dimension of Lao nationalism. In this connection the main
focus is on identifying the impact of Marxism on the nationalist
movement or the Vietnamese communists’ role in the anticolonial
struggle in Laos.31 Despite the overall focus on the political and an-
ticolonial aspects of Lao nationalism, an important feature of these
studies is that they unanimously link the birth of a modern Lao
nationalism with a movement that developed with French support
during World War II. The movement in question is the so-called
15

Creating Laos
Lao Renovation Movement which emerged as part of a French

propaganda campaign designed to stimulate awareness in Laos of a
Lao cultural and national identity. The aim of this campaign was to
counter potent pan-Thai propaganda radiating from Thailand and
show the Lao elite that their future was to be found in an alliance
with the French colonial project. Alfred McCoy, for example, in his
very comprehensive outline of the history of French colonialism in
Laos, deals with this movement under the heading ‘the great awak-
ening’, emphasising its importance in relation to an understanding
of the emergence of Lao nationalism.32 In order to distinguish the
later ‘revolutionary’ nationalism from the nationalism that developed
under the French aegis, the latter has variously been termed ‘imma-
ture defensive culturalism’ or ‘bourgeois’.33 Likewise, in his account
of Laos’s history, Phoumi Vongvichit refers to this movement in the
following manner:
During the Second World War and the Franco–Thai conflict,
France stepped up her policy of buying over the higher strata of the
feudal class and the bourgeoisie, launched a ‘nationalist’ movement
dubbed ‘Lao Nhay’ (Greater Laos) to counter the ‘Greater Thailand’
policy of which the Japanese fascists pulled the strings, and issued
the first Lao paper Lao Nhay as its propaganda medium.34
By placing the term ‘nationalist’ in quotation marks Phoumi con-
veys the idea that here we are not faced with a ‘true’ or ‘real’ form of
nationalism – it is not a ‘mass’, ‘revolutionary’ or ‘authentic’ national-
ist movement. In the same vein, Souneth and Nousai mention this
movement but do not give it a pivotal place in the development of
Lao nationalism, due to the political connotations and the primor-
dial conception of the Lao nation.35 What we are dealing with here,
however, is in fact a classic example of a cultural nationalist move-
ment that developed with support from the colonial state – a move-
ment which was not linked with the formation of an independent
state, but is associated rather with the sowing of ‘the seeds of cultural
pride and national identification’.36 Although the cultural aspect of
this early form of Lao nationalism is highlighted in this manner in
16

Introduction
these studies it is not an aspect that is discussed at length. What

count in these studies are the political and anticolonial forms of Lao
nationalism that dominated the perspective in Western studies in
the 1970s–80s.
In more recent studies, we can discern a gradual move towards
not only a more systematic incorporation of the cultural aspects
of this early Lao nationalism, but also a move towards locating the
roots of a Lao cultural nationalism earlier than the World War II
period. This is the case, for example, in Martin Stuart-Fox’s History
of Laos. The backbone in Stuart-Fox’s approach is the political and
the economic spheres. In the chapter on the French colonial period
Stuart-Fox provides a general overview of some of the central aspects
of the French colonial project in Laos: the administrative and eco-
nomic organisation and the anticolonial revolts. Overall Stuart-Fox’s
discussion of the Lao nationalist movement includes the classic ele-
ments consisting of the Lao Renovation Movement, the anticolonial
Lao Issara and the anticolonial revolutionary Pathet Lao. However,
he adds a new element to our understanding of the formation of the
nationalist movement and a nationalist sentiment in Laos. He refers
to the impact of the restoration and preservation of ancient monu-
ments and scholarly research into Lao history and literature which
took place during the 1920s–30s.37 According to Stuart-Fox, these
are central for an understanding of the formation of Lao nationalism
as ‘these historical, literary and cultural studies and the discussions
to which they gave rise provided an early stimulus to elite Lao na-
tionalism, thus laying the groundwork for the more overtly national-
ist movements of the 1940s’.38 He connects this development with
the first stirrings of ‘Lao cultural nationalism’. Here the use of the
term ‘cultural nationalism’ is employed to convey clearly the differ-
ence from the political nationalism that later emerged. Thus, it was
not a popular movement with mass appeal. Rather, it was confined
to a tiny, culturally active group who made little attempt to pursue
political goals.39 However, he does not provide us with a thorough
discussion of this issue and – as mentioned earlier – the backbone
in his approach is the political and economic spheres.
17

Creating Laos
Grant Evans is another scholar who has been dealing with the
cultural dimensions of French colonialism and the implications of
French colonialism on the formation of Lao nationalism and Lao
cultural identity. Evans’ point of departure is in the modernity of
nation-states and to him the ‘culture of Laos’ is not simply the em-
bodiment of a primordial Lao culture or a timeless socio-cultural
substratum. Rather, as Evans points out in his thought-provoking
introduction to the edited volume Laos: Culture and Society, the study
of culture in Laos involves a ‘study of the state’s attempt to stand-
ardise features of Lao culture and society under several regimes’.40
It is through this process that a distinct sense of Lao-ness or Lao
cultural identity takes its form. Evans traces this process back to the
formation of the colonial state of Laos at the end of the nineteenth
century.41 This, of course, raises the fundamental question of what
constitutes this element of Lao culture that the modern state finds
in the premodern period and sets out to standardise in its endeavour
to make culture congruent with the borders of the modern state.
Evans does not provide a clear answer to that question, but his text
constitutes an attempt to outline a programme for further research
into the cultural complexities of the premodern period on which the
later national cultures have been formed. It is a call for new research
on Laos and Lao culture, which go beyond national units and beyond
the notions of bounded cultures and societies when dealing with the
premodern period. For the modern period it is a call for research
into the contribution of French colonialism to the formation of a
notion of a Lao cultural identity. Subsequently, in his Short History of
Laos, Evans has followed up on this approach to the nexus between
colonialism and nationalism. In this book Evans stresses the import-
ance of French colonialism for the formation of Lao nationalism,
not only in relation specifically to the role of the Lao Renovation
Movement but also in relation to French colonialism more generally.
As he puts it:
When the French took over Laos there was no sense of a Lao na-
tion among the population that fell within the boundaries that
18

Introduction
they mapped. Even for the French, Laos was, at that time, more a
cartographic reality than a social or historical one. But it was the
French who brought the idea of the modern nation to Laos, and this
idea would grow slowly among the population over the following 50
years.42
Based on this understanding of the relationship between French
colonialism and Lao nationalism, Evans briefly outlines how the
French colonial state contributed to forming a basis for a Lao cul-
tural identity with reference to the endeavours undertaken to create
a national Buddhist religion, a new national history for Laos and to
standardise the Lao written language.
While newer studies of Laos’s history in this manner clearly dis-
play a tendency to incorporate cultural elements in their analysis of
Lao nationalism, this topic is still lacking a thorough analysis. This
book is intended to take the first step to fill this gap in the scholarly
literature on Laos’s history. It is based partly on an analysis of the
campaign for a national renovation in Laos during World War II re-
ferred to above. From an Indochina-wide perspective Eric Jennings
and Anne Raffin have discussed the centrality of the French-orches-
trated campaign for a national renovation in relation to understand-
ing subsequent anticolonial nationalism defined along the lines of
the three nation-states that later came into being – Laos, Cambodia
and Vietnam.43 There can be no doubt about the importance of
the machinations of the French colonial state in Indochina during
World War II for understanding why Indochina broke up into three
individual nation-states. However, adopting a cultural approach this
book will also show how the nationalist discourse on Laos and the
Lao related to this campaign in the first half of the 1940s did not
come out of nothing but can be linked with the notion of a Lao-
ness already in the making in the 1920s–1930s. Finally, the book
will show that the basic grammar for this notion of a Lao-ness that
formed during the colonial period is located in the French discourse
on the Lao in the period preceding the formation of Laos as a French
colonial state. In doing so the book is intended as a sequel to the
existing literature dealing with cultural nationalism and cultural
19

Creating Laos
identities under French colonial rule in other parts of Indochina,

and studies dealing with French metropolitan representations of
Indochina.44
NOTES
1. Thongchai Winichakul, Siam Mapped: A History of the Geo-Body of a Nation
(Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1994).
2. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origin and
Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 1991 [revised version]), p. 132.
3. During the colonial period that this book deals with, the term ‘Annamite’ was
the conventional term used by the French for the ethnic majority in present-
day Vietnam. Today it is conventional to use ‘Viet/Vietnamese’ in preference
to ‘Annamite’ or ‘Annamese’ as the latter may invoke notions of racial inferiority
vis-à-vis the white coloniser.
4. The classic statement is Anthony D. Smith, The Ethnic Origins of Nations
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1986).
5. David E. F. Henley, ‘Ethnographic Integration and Exclusion in Anticolonial
Nationalism: Indonesia and Indochina’, Comparative Studies in Society and
History, 37:2, 1995, pp. 286–324.
6. The same Vietnam–Cambodia dominating perspective is reproduced by
Stein Tønnesson and Hans Antlöv in their introduction to the anthology
Asian Forms of the Nation (NIAS Studies in Asian Topics, No. 23, Richmond:
Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 1996), pp. 36–37.
7. Christopher E. Goscha, Vietnam and Indochina? Contesting Concepts of Space
in Vietnamese Nationalism, 1887–1954 (NIAS Report, No. 28, Copenhagen:
Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 1995). See also Christopher E. Goscha,
‘Annam and Vietnam in the New Indochinese Space, 1887–1945’, in Tønnesson
and Antlöv (eds), Asian Forms of the Nation, pp. 93–130; and Christopher E.
Goscha, ‘L’Indochine repensée par les “Indochinois”: Pham Quynh et les deux
débats de 1931 sur l’immigration, le fédéralisme et la réalité de l’Indochine’,
Revue française d’histoire d’outre-mer, 82:309, 1995, pp. 421–453.
8. Goscha, Vietnam and Indochina?, p. 78.
9. Ibid., pp. 29, 58.
10. John Hutchinson, The Dynamics of Cultural Nationalism. The Gaelic Revival
and the Creation of the Irish Nation State (London: Allen & Unwin, 1987), p. 2.
For a recent general discussion of cultural nationalism, see John Hutchinson,
‘Re-Interpreting Cultural Nationalism’, Australian Journal of Politics and
History, 45:3, 1999, pp. 392–407.
20

Introduction
11. Miroslav Hroch, ‘From National Movement to the Fully-formed Nation.

The Nation-building Process in Europe’, New Left Review, 198 (March–April
1993), pp. 6–7.
12. Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments. Colonial and Postcolonial
Histories (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 5. See also Partha
Chatterjee, Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World. A Derivative Discourse
(London: Zed Books, 1993).
13. Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments, p. 6.
14. Ibid., p. 102.
15. Ibid., p. 120.
16. Phoumi Vongvichit, Laos and the Victorious Struggle of the Lao People against
U.S. Neo-Colonialism (No place: Neo Lao Haksat Publications, 1969), p. 35.
17. Ibid., p. 39.
18. Ibid., p. 41.
19. Ibid., pp. 42–43.
20. See also Bruce Lockhart, ‘Pavatsat Lao: Constructing a National History’,
Southeast Asia Research, 14:3, 2006, pp. 361-386. For a discussion of the
LPDR’s historiographical relationship with communist Vietnam, see
Christopher E. Goscha, ‘Revolutionizing the Indochinese Past: Communist
Vietnam’s “Special” Historiography on Laos’, in Christopher E. Goscha and
Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting Visions of the Lao Past: Lao Historiography at
the Crossroads (NIAS Studies in Asian Topics, No. 32, Copenhagen: NIAS
Press, 2003), pp. 265–299.
21. Souneth Phothisane and Nousai Phoummachan, Pawatsat lao (duekdamban
– pachuban) [History of Laos (from ancient times to the contemporary pe-
riod)] (Vientiane: Ministry of Information and Culture, 2000), p. 551.
22. Ibid., p. 632.
23. Ibid., p. 655.
24. Ibid., p. 562.
25. Ibid., p. 571.
26. Ibid., pp. 569–570.
27. E.g. ibid., pp. h, 512.
28. Ibid., p. 634.
29. Ibid., pp. 630–631.
30. See, for example, Bernard Gay, ‘Millenarian Movements in Laos, 1895–1936:
Depictions by Modern Lao Historians’, in Mayoury Ngaosrivathana and
Kennon Breazeale (eds), Breaking New Ground in Lao History. Essays on
21

Creating Laos
the Seventh to Twentieth Centuries (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2002),

pp. 281–295; Geoffrey C. Gunn, Rebellion in Laos. Peasant and Politics in a
Colonial Backwater (Boulder: Westview Press, 1990); François Moppert, ‘La
Révolte des Bolovens (1901–1936)’, in Pierre Brocheux (ed.), Histoire de
l’Asie du Sud-Est: Révoltes, Réformes, Révolutions (Lille: Presses Universitaires
de Lille, 1981), pp. 47–62; John B. Murdoch, ‘The 1901–1902 “Holy Man’s”
Rebellion’, Journal of the Siam Society, 62:1, 1974, pp. 47–66.
31. E.g. Clive J. Christie, ‘Marxism and the History of the Nationalist Movements
in Laos’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 10:1, 1979, pp. 146–158;
MacAlister Brown and Joseph J. Zasloff, Apprentice Revolutionaries: The
Communist Movement in Laos, 1930–1985 (Stanford: Hoover Institution
Press, 1986); Geoffrey C. Gunn, Political Struggles in Laos (1930–1954).
Vietnamese Communist Power and the Lao Struggle for National Independence
(Bangkok: Editions Duang Kamol, 1988); Arthur J. Dommen, The Indochinese
Experience of the French and the Americans: Nationalism and Communism in
Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001);
Jean Deuve, Le Laos, 1945–1949. Contribution à l’histoire du mouvement Lao
Issara (Montpellier: Université Paul Valery, 2000 [1992]).
32. Alfred W. McCoy, ‘French Colonialism in Laos, 1893–1945’, in Nina S.
Adams and Alfred W. McCoy (eds), Laos: War and Revolution (New York,
Evanston, and London: Harper Colophon Book, 1970), p. 92.
33. Nina S. Adams, ‘Patrons, Clients, and Revolutionaries: The Lao Search for
Independence, 1945–1954’, in Adams and McCoy (eds), Laos, p. 101 (‘im-
mature defensive culturalism’); Gunn, Political Struggles, p. 3 (‘bourgeois’).
34. Phoumi, Laos and the Victorious Struggle, p. 36.
35. Souneth and Nousai, Pawatsat lao, pp. 673–675.
36. Brown and Zasloff, Apprentice Revolutionaries, p. 22.
37. Martin Stuart-Fox, A History of Laos (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1997), p. 45. Clive Christie has pointed out that in the late 1930s the
Sociéte des Amis du Laos formed by ‘old colonial hands’ in Paris in 1937 also
stressed the importance of restoring the crumbling monuments of Lao civilisa-
tion in order to help form the foundation for a secure sense of Lao identity.
Clive J. Christie, Ideology and Revolution in Southeast Asia, 1900–1980. Political
Ideas of the Anti-Colonial Era (Richmond: Curzon, 2001), p. 113. Likewise, in
an article from 1989 Geoffrey Gunn briefly addresses the cultural aspects of
French colonialism in Laos when he refers to the archaeological work and res-
toration of monuments associated with the Buddhist religion and royal power
undertaken by the French in the colonial period. In this connection Gunn
associates these undertakings with attempts to strengthen Buddhist social
institutions and royal power to coopt traditional hierarchies in the interest of
22

Introduction
indirect rule and the administrative expediency that flowed from that measure.
Thus, he is not emphasising the relevance of these undertakings in relation to
the formation of a Lao cultural identity. Geoffrey C. Gunn, ‘Approaches to
Tai-Lao Studies: From Orientalism to Marxism’, Review, 12:4, 1989, p. 508.
38. Stuart-Fox, A History of Laos, p. 45.
39. Ibid., p. 52.
40. Grant Evans, ‘Introduction: What is Lao Culture and Society?’, in Grant
Evans (ed.), Laos: Culture and Society (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 1999),
p. 23.
41. Ibid., pp. 21–22.
42. Grant Evans, A Short History of Laos: The Land In-Between (Crows Nest
NSW: Allen & Unwin, 2002), pp. 70–71.
43. Eric Jennings, Vichy in the Tropics: Pétain’s National Revolution in Madagascar,
Guadeloupe, and Indochina, 1940–1944 (Stanford, California: Stanford Uni-
versity Press, 2001); Eric Jennings, ‘Conservative Confluences, “Nativist”
Synergy: Reinscribing Vichy’s National Revolution in Indochina, 1940–1945’,
French Historical Studies, 27:3, 2004, pp. 601–635; Anne Raffin,‘Easternization
Meets Westernization. Patriotic Youth Organizations in French Indochina
during World War II’, French Politics, Culture & Society, 20:2, 2002, pp. 121–
1140; Anne Raffin, ‘Domestic Militarization in a Transnational Perspective.
Patriotic and Militaristic Youth Mobilization in France and Indochina,
1940–1945’, in Diane E. Davis and Anthony W. Pereira (eds), Irregular Armed
Forces and their Role in Politics and State Formation (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2003), pp. 303–321; Anne Raffin, Youth Mobilization in
Vichy Indochina and Its Legacies, 1940 to 1970 (Lanham: Lexington Books,
2005).
44. The first group of studies includes, for example, David G. Marr, Vietnamese
Tradition on Trial, 1920–1945 (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1981); Patricia M. Pelley, Postcolonial Vietnam. New Histories of the National
Past (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2002); Penny Edwards,
Cambodge: The Cultivation of a Nation, 1860–1945 (Honolulu: University
of Hawai‘i Press, 2007). The second group includes studies like Panivong
Norindr, Phantasmatic Indochina. French Colonial Ideology in Architecture, Film
and Literature (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1996); Nicola
Cooper, France in Indochina: Colonial Encounters (New York and Oxford: Berg,
2001); Kathryn Robson and Jenifer Yee (eds), France and ‘Indochina’: Cultural
Representations (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2005).
23

CHAPTER ONE
The Colonial Encounter
If the formation of Laos as a modern nation-state is closely associ-

ated with developments in the twentieth century, the terms ‘Laos’
and ‘Lao’ have a much longer pedigree. Writing in the middle of the
sixteenth century Portuguese historiographer João de Barros, for
example, employed Lao as a collective term for the people living in a
region north of Siam (then the Ayutthaya Kingdom) encompassing
the kingdoms of Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai and Lan Xang.1 In general,
the use of Lao/Laos with reference to a region encompassing what
is today northern Thailand, northeastern Thailand and Laos can
be found in both Western and Siamese texts produced in a period
spanning approximately from the middle of the sixteenth to the late
nineteenth century.2 In line with this tradition Carl Bock’s account of
his expedition from Bangkok to Chiang Mai in 1881 was published
with the subtitle ‘Narrative of a journey of exploration through up-
per Siam and Lao’, even though Bock never entered areas considered
Lao today.3
The origins of these terms remain obscure. However, it seems
likely, as Grant Evans has suggested, that Lao/Laos came to be
used as a general category for referring to a region located beyond
the Siamese kingdom of Ayutthaya as a result of encounters with
Western merchants and missionaries who ‘trafficked in general cat-
egories, such as Siamese or Chinese’ and demanded ‘general descrip-
tions of the people who lived beyond Ayutthaya’.4 In other words, the
terms Lao/Laos were initially employed as a vaguely defined meta-
24

category or general names to describe a group of people constituting

‘the other’ as part of an Ayutthaya-centred ‘us-them’ dichotomy. Later,
the same basic dichotomy was employed in the Bangkok period.
Predating the period of modern nation-states, the statecraft of
nineteenth-century Siamese kings was not linked to the ideal that
the political unit corresponded to an ethnic and culturally homoge-
neous population. Rather, the Siamese political unit was envisaged
as a culturally diverse empire including the Lao as one of its subject
populations. By the end of the nineteenth century, however, the
category Lao became increasingly problematic as the geo-bodies of
Laos and Siam were coming into being and burgeoning nationalist
thinking stipulated that political and national units must be congru-
ent. Thus, from the turn of the twentieth century the Siamese elite
set about to incorporate the Lao into the ‘us’ category in order to link
the emerging geo-body with the idea of a cultural and ethnic homo-
geneous population. At the same time, a French colonial discourse
aimed at consolidating and more clearly defining Lao/Laos as a
classificatory category. The Lao were made manifest. They could be
identified, classified, counted, measured and compared with other
groups of people.
This chapter details how the French colonial discourse on Laos
and the Lao in the pre-1893 period contributed vitally to defining
and placing the Lao on a par with the Siamese in a racial order and
how the French gave the terms Lao/Laos a more clearly defined
and fixed meaning. It has to be noted that I am not concerned with
the validity of race as a category for dividing humanity. Rather, I
approach race as a social and cultural construct and my concern is
how categories of race were applied on both sides in the colonial
encounter. The chapter also considers how the territories east of the
Mekong to become Laos constituted a contested space forming part
of two conflicting spatial layouts – that of a larger French colonial
space defined with reference to Vietnamese tributary rights, and that
of a larger Siamese space defined with reference to Siamese tributary
rights. Before dealing with these issues I will offer a brief historical
backdrop providing a short account of first Siam’s and later France’s
25

Creating Laos
interference in the Mekong region. For if the French were newcomers

to the Mekong region in the second half of the nineteenth century,
Siam had gradually expanded its suzerainty over the small kingdoms
and principalities located in the territory that later became Laos
since the end of the eighteenth century.
SIAM AND THE MEKONG REGION: INTERSTATE

RELATIONS IN THE PREMODERN PERIOD
The kingdoms of premodern Southeast Asia differed in some fun-
damental ways from the modern states that developed in the wake
of the colonial confrontation. While the new states developed into
centralised structures linked with a specific geographical region
demarcated by fixed boundaries, the premodern kingdoms were
unbound and overlapping structures based on hierarchical net-
works of personal loyalties among rulers. With reference to Indian
political philosophy O.W. Wolters has shown how the system of
power and interstate relations of the premodern period conforms
to the so-called mandala conception of the state.5 A mandala does
not refer to a geographical area with fixed boundaries or to state
structures. It signifies rather a map of power relations between
political centres. It was a tributary network comprising a political
core surrounded by numerous political centres connected to the core
by personal loyalties and kinship alliances. Within such a tributary
network the political centres outside the core area were regarded
as separate entities which enjoyed a high degree of independence
as long as they remained loyal to the centre. This loyalty implied,
for example, mobilising manpower on demand and not supporting
forces from competing mandalas. Political centres outside the core
area were often part of more than one mandala structure at the same
time. Consequently, mandalas were overlapping structures due to
overlapping tributary networks and they represented a highly fluid
structure that expanded or contracted in accordance with the ability
of the centre to keep the tributary states from breaking away to form
an individual tributary network or to attract new tributary states.
Wolters has applied this perception of power and interstate relations
26

to describe early Southeast Asian polities in general and specifi-

cally to the diplomatic dealings of King Naresuan of the Ayutthaya
Kingdom.6 The mandala perception of interstate relations has also
been applied to describe the Lao kingdoms in the Mekong region
and Siam’s interaction with these in the initial period of Siam’s en-
deavours to expand its suzerainty over this region – a period span-
ning from the late 1770s until the early 1880s.7
Direct Siamese involvement in the territories east of the Mekong,
which later became Laos, can be traced to the late eighteenth cen-
tury. At that time, the Lan Xang Kingdom, which long had formed
the centre of gravity for political power in the Mekong region, had
been split into three rival kingdoms centred on Luang Phrabang,
Vientiane and Champassack. Besides these three kingdoms located
in the Mekong Valley, the geopolitical map of what was to become
Laos was made up by smaller kingdoms like the Phuan Kingdom
in Xiengkhuang and a group of smaller chiefdoms like Huaphan
and Sipsong Chuthai situated between the Mekong Valley and the
Annamese Cordillera. In the late 1770s, the three major kingdoms
situated along the Mekong River became vassals of King Taksin’s
newly resurrected Siam. The paradigm of power and interstate rela-
tions of the premodern period guided Siamese suzerainty over these
territories. This meant that the Lao vassals retained a significant
measure of autonomy and Siamese intervention was expressed pri-
marily through the naming of new rulers. The Lao vassals could con-
solidate and expand their own tributary networks, as well as be part
of other tributary networks. During the rule (1804–28) of Chao
Anou over Vientiane, for example, Vientiane paid tribute to Hue
and in this period relations between Vientiane and Hue may have
been just as close as relations between Vientiane and Bangkok.8
At that time Siam was also consolidating its position on the
Khorat Plateau stretching out between the valleys of the Mekong
River and the Chao Phraya River. Volker Grabowsky has studied the
demographic development of this region and has pointed out that
the amount of settlements on the Khorat Plateau increased mark-
edly following the political conflicts that led to the disintegration of
27

Creating Laos
Lan Xang.9 While these new settlements were initially dependencies

of Vientiane and Champassack, many ceased to accept the overlord-
ship of Vientiane and Champassack and established tributary rela-
tions with Siam via Khorat instead of one of the Lao political centres
situated along the Mekong River. To further strengthen its control
with manpower in this region, Siam initiated a Khorat-wide tattoo-
ing campaign in 1824. This reorganisation of tributary relationships
on the Khorat Plateau, however, did not go unchallenged. Under the
leadership of Chao Anou, troops from the kingdoms of Vientiane
and Champassack attacked Khorat in 1827 in order to resettle peo-
ple in the vicinity of Vientiane. The Siamese response was firm. The
Lao troops were not only defeated but subsequently Vientiane was
sacked. In the words of the official chronicler of the third Bangkok
reign, the Siamese troops allowed only ‘grass, water and the savage
beasts to remain’ in the area where Vientiane had been located previ-
ously.10
Subsequent Siamese policies towards the territories east of
the Mekong can be associated with an attempt to maintain these
territories as a buffer zone – or ‘overlapping margin’ as Thongchai
Winichakul has termed it – between Siam and Vietnam (or Dai
Nam under the Nguyen).11 This was done mainly through depopu-
lation and allowing overlapping tributary networks. As a result, in
the north Luang Phrabang continued to exist as part of an over-
lapping tributary network as a vassal of both Bangkok and Hue.12
Furthermore, the position of Luang Phrabang as the centre for local
tributary relations was strengthened. The tiny towns of the Huaphan
states had formerly been vassals of both Vientiane and Hue. In the
early 1830s a Siamese military expedition was sent to this region in
order to secure the loyalty of local rulers there, who subsequently
were made vassals of Luang Phrabang. The region of Sipsong
Chuthai formed part of both Luang Phrabang and Hue tributary
networks. The role played by Luang Phrabang – and therefore also
Siam – in Sipsong Chuthai was, however, very limited, and by the
1850s Luang Phrabang no longer regarded it as a vassal. Contrary
to this, Siam interfered directly in the Phuan state centred in the
28

strategically located Xiengkhuang-area. A radical depopulation of

that area was undertaken by Siam in the 1820s–30s with the aim
of evacuating the entire population. This policy was, however, not
successful and from the 1850s Bangkok settled for a policy of dual
Phuan suzerainty via Luang Phrabang to Bangkok on the one hand
and to Hue on the other.13
Further to the south, the Kingdom of Vientiane ceased to exist
after the destruction of the city of Vientiane in 1827–28, when the
people who had formerly belonged to this kingdom were removed
to territories west of the Mekong. In areas along the Mekong be-
tween Vientiane and Champassack a policy of depopulation was
also pursued. In this region a Vietnamese influence emerged in the
early 1830s, both in the Mekong valley itself, where, for example, a
Vietnamese military camp was established opposite Nakhon Phanom
in 1833, but especially in the three river basins of Banghian, Bangfai
and Kadin. Siamese military campaigns were undertaken, burning
towns and removing the population so that the Vietnamese troops
in an attack on territories west of the Mekong should not be able to
gain assistance and supplies from the local population. The aim of
these campaigns was, as it was stated in an edict of King Nangklao
(Rama III): ‘to cut completely the routes of the Vietnamese armies’.14
By the 1840s–50s this policy was abandoned and instead a situa-
tion emerged by which the towns east of the Mekong were officially
regarded as non-existing and no attempts were made to build up any
administration or buttress Siamese suzerainty. On the other hand,
in practice the region was considered as an extension of the towns
west of the Mekong and the elite from these towns collected taxes
from the people inhabiting areas across the Mekong. This situation
continued until the 1880s, when the territories to become the colo-
nial state of Laos were defined as a Siamese space proper.
THE FRENCH AND THE MEKONG

French focus on the Mekong region initially followed in the wake of
the French move into Cochinchina in the early 1860s.15 When the
French Navy took possession of Saigon in 1862 they gained a long-
29

Creating Laos
desired foothold on Vietnamese territory, a stepping stone to pene-

trating the Chinese markets from the south. Taking control over this
small harbour city, however, was still a long way from establishing of
a protectorate over the whole of Vietnam which had been the initial
objective of the naval expedition. In order to legitimate a continued
French presence in this new colonial possession, it was of utmost im-
portance for the navy and members of the pro-expansionist segment
in the political circles in Paris to prove the economic profitability
of Saigon. In these endeavours it was inevitable that Saigon would
invite comparison with the major entrepôts in the region, such as
Singapore and Shanghai. At first glance, however, Saigon had really
nothing to offer. Chasseloup-Laubat, a long-time Navy Minister and
major supporter of French expansion in Indochina, put it this way:
It is clear that this town [Saigon] does not stand out as one of those
essential ports of call on one of the world’s great sea routes [. . .]
However splendid the position of Saigon and Mytho, it must be
acknowledged that these towns do not have the advantages that
are offered by Singapore as a trading settlement, situated as it is at
the far end of the Malacca Strait, the very entrance of the highway
to China and Japan, or by Shanghai at the mouth of the Yangtse
Kiang.16
It is in this context that French focus shifted towards Cambodia
and the territories found north of Cambodia along the Mekong
River. Together these territories formed part of a new geographical
layout in which Saigon was designated a central position, promising
unlimited economic opportunities for the French. This vision was
based on the assumption that Saigon should become the nucleus of
trade carried by the Mekong to and from Cambodia, the Lao ter-
ritories flanking the river, and southwestern China. Paraphrasing
Chasseloup-Laubat, the Mekong was to become the Yangtse Kiang
and Saigon the Shanghai of Southeast Asia.
At that time, only limited knowledge existed about these areas
and their economic potential, as the Mekong region up until the
middle of the nineteenth century had been more or less terra in-
cognita for European travellers. Notable exceptions are the Dutch
30

trader Van Wuysthoff, who had visited Vientiane in 1641–42 and

the Jesuit missionary Giovanni Maria Leria, who stayed in Vientiane
in 1642–48.17 Over two centuries passed before this region was
again visited by Europeans – this time by the French explorer Henri
Mouhot who travelled to Luang Phrabang in 1861, where he died
the same year.18 Many of the Western accounts of Siam produced
in the first half of the nineteenth century included information
about the territories in the Mekong region. However, in the middle
of the nineteenth century this information was of a ‘very imperfect
and of fragmentary character’, as the British envoy John Bowring
noted with reference to the state of Western knowledge about the
‘countries’ dependent on Siam – including territories in the Mekong
region.19 This lack of knowledge is, as Thongchai Winichakul has
pointed out, also reflected in Western maps of Siam dating from the
same period. In these maps the great eastward bend of the Mekong
River south of Luang Phrabang was not indicated, whereby the
northeastern region of modern Thailand only appeared as a narrow
strip of land.20 The vision of a prosperous Saigon at the mouth of
a lively trading river was therefore sustained by vivid expectations
rather than by real knowledge of the navigability of the Mekong and
of existing trade on this river.
A first move to secure the economic viability of Saigon and the
French colonial enterprise in Indochina was taken in 1863 when a
treaty was signed placing Cambodia under a French protectorate.
Subsequently, in order to verify the expectations of the economic
gains to be gained from the territories in the Mekong region, the
so-called Mekong expedition was initiated in 1866 under the leader-
ship of Doudart de Lagrée and Francis Garnier. It was expected that
this expedition would add credibility to the Saigon-Mekong-China
vision by sailing up the Mekong investigating the navigability of the
river and collect information about the unknown hinterland that
spread out north of Cambodia. Although the expedition actually
made it all the way to China, it meant the burial of the dream of
the Mekong as an artery of trade. It was realised that the rapids at
Khemmarat and the cataracts at Khon presented obstacles too great
31

Creating Laos
to make the Mekong the desired commercial highway. As one of the

members of the expedition explained soon after leaving Cambodia:
The truth began, at last, to force itself on the most sanguine among
us. Steamers can never plough the Mekong, as they do the Amazon
or the Mississippi; and Saigon can never be united to the western
provinces of China by this immense river-way.21
The hope of attaining a river-way to China, however, was not
completely abandoned. The expedition’s report observed that the
Red River ‘promises to realise all the hopes and expectations which
the Mekong destroyed’.22 In this way one vision was rejected while
another was born. As mentioned above French interest in the Lao
territories in the Mekong region in this early period of French co-
lonial expansion in Indochina was primarily a function of the rel-
evance of these areas to the economic viability of Saigon. Therefore,
as the dream of the Mekong as the link between southern China
and Saigon crumbled, the focus of the French Navy moved towards
the northern parts of Vietnam where the Red River became the new
hope for French access to the supposed riches of southern China.
With this re-orientation of French focus, the Mekong region north
of Cambodia slipped away from the agenda of French colonial ex-
pansion for the next decade.
THE COLONIAL ENCOUNTER:

TWO CONFLICTING SPATIAL LAYOUTS
In the early 1880s French interest in the Mekong region was rekin-
dled under the Third Republic. There are several reasons for this
renewal of interest. First of all, it can be linked with a changing
political environment in France. Following the French defeat in the
Franco-Prussian war (1870–71) the new government in the Third
Republic was faced with a strained economy caused by the loss of
Alsace–Lorraine with its industries and mines, and by the huge war
indemnity it had to pay. In this situation the government initially
turned to internal restructuring and did not favour further French
colonial expansion and increased colonial expenditures. By the end
32

of the 1870s, however, the government started supporting a renewed

French colonial expansion for political and economic reasons. France
was to regain its national prestige and strengthen its economy through
overseas expansion. Colonial expansion in general was placed firmly
on the political agenda, and thus French politicians now favoured the
further expansion and consolidation of French colonial interest in
the Mekong region. A second reason for the re-emergence of French
interest in the region was that many French colonial administrators
feared either that Siam would soon fall under British colonial rule
or that the British would move first into the Chiang Mai region and
subsequently into the upper Mekong region. Therefore, plans were
made to put Luang Phrabang under French control in order to bar
possible British expansion eastwards. In conformity with this view
the French consul in Bangkok, Jules Harmand, characterised Luang
Phrabang as ‘the most significant strategic point in Eastern Indochina’
in the early 1880s.23 Third, since a French protectorate over Annam
and Tonkin was established in 1884 the need to settle the frontier
with Siam became an issue of utmost importance. But this renewal
of French interest in the Mekong region raised the problem of Siam’s
relationship with the territories east of the Mekong.
I have earlier mentioned how Western accounts of Siam from the
first half of the nineteenth century stressed the lack of information
concerning the territories in the Mekong region. In general, however,
Siam’s suzerainty over the Lao-territories in the Mekong region had
been acknowledged, as this region was perceived as one of the outer
tributary layers or dependencies in a Siam-centred empire.24 Not
surprisingly, the issue of Siam’s suzerainty in the Mekong region
became a thorny issue when the French became interested in the
region in the 1860s. It was addressed in connection with the signing
of a Franco-Siamese treaty in 1867 whereby Siam acknowledged a
French protectorate over Cambodia. While the Siamese were given
a verbal assurance that they did not intend to extend their control
over Laos, the French had all phrases implying formal French ac-
knowledgement of Siamese suzerainty over the Lao territories along
the Mekong removed from the text.25 The same kind of ambivalence
33

Creating Laos
to the issue of Siamese suzerainty over the Mekong region was also
raised by Louis de Carné, who participated in the Mekong expedi-
tion as representative of the French Minister of Foreign Affairs. On
the one hand, Carné noted that:
We had always refused to recognise the rights of the king of Siam
over Laos, and, he himself, had besides, found it convenient, about
that time, to say that he exercised a purely nominal sovereignty over
that country, so that he could not with a good grace, formally shut
us out of it.26
On the other hand, Carné refers to the letter that the expedition
had received from the Siamese king as the ‘magic talisman which
opened every door to us’, and territories east of the Mekong – like
Saravane and Atopeu – are called ‘Siamese provinces’.27 It is also
significant that according to the map produced by the expedition
the limit for Siamese possessions in the east follows the Annamese
Cordillera.28
When the Mekong was put on the French colonial agenda again
in the 1880s, the French challenged this perception of Siamese suzer-
ainty. This change is illustrated in French-produced maps of the re-
gion from the 1880s. When a shortened version of the official report
of the Mekong expedition was published in 1885, it included a map
where Siamese suzerainty no longer extended east of the Mekong.29
Likewise, a French-produced Atlas Colonial published the same year
included a map in which the border of Siam runs along the Annamese
Cordillera, while in another map the frontier is placed between the
Mekong and the Annamese Cordillera with a legend explaining that
this is a ‘unsettled frontier’ that should be moved to the Mekong.30
A parliamentary report of 1855 had also underscored the need for
a regulation of the frontiers between Siam and the French colonial
possessions.31 A year later one of its authors – the future governor-
general of Indochina, Jean Marie de Lanessan – observed in his book
L’expansion coloniale de la France that the border between Siam and
the French colonial empire should be pushed not only to the Mekong
but beyond. In fact, he claimed that what is northeastern Thailand
34

today should be included in the French colonial empire as he identi-

fied the mountain range between the Mekong Basin and the Menam
Basin as the ‘natural limit of her [France] Indo-Chinese Empire on
the side of Siam’.32 Although neither these maps, the parliamentary
report or Lanessan’s book were official documents, they reveal how
a new notion of a French colonial space was in the making. By 1885
the Quai d’Orsay regarded the Mekong River as the future line of
demarcation between Siam and the French colonial possessions.33
From a Siamese point of view, however, European colonialism
had unleashed the powerful weapon of modern geographical know-
ledge and introduced new ideas to the region about fixed borders and
undivided suzerainties. As Thongchai Winichakul has shown amply,
the Siamese elite was not a passive victim of an intruding Western
colonialism and new forms of knowledge. Rather, they set out to
transform the premodern system of dual suzerainty into modern
territorial rights under the influence of the new forms of knowledge
associated with the colonial powers. Therefore, from the early 1880s
Siamese claims to the territories east of the Mekong were framed
with reference to a new perception of geography and geopolitical
space in which overlapping margins were no longer permissible. In
this bid to define exclusive rights to territory and create a bounded
Siamese space, mapping became an indispensable technology. As
Thongchai Winichakul has put it:
Apparently they [the Siamese elite] realized that in order to coun-
ter the French claim, modern geography was the only geographical
language the West would hear and only a modern map could make
an argument.34
In his birthday speech in 1884 the King of Siam announced
that a geographical expedition would be sent to the territories east
of the Mekong with the aim of drawing a map of the territories in
the Mekong Basin up to the water-shed, which was regarded as ‘the
limit for our possessions where our authority is respected’ and as
a ‘convenient and natural frontier’.35 James McCarthy headed the
Siamese mapping enterprise. Between 1884 and 1887 McCarthy led
35

Creating Laos
several mapping expeditions to the territories east of the Mekong

and in 1888 the first modern map was published. It projected a ter-
ritorially bounded Siam incorporating all the territories that would
subsequently become Laos.36
However, the newly bounded Siam in the making did not only
exist as a cartographic representation. In the Mekong region French
travellers found border posts on the ground marking it out. In con-
temporary French publications reference is repeatedly made to how
these border posts were kicked over by the French to erase this trace
of a Siamese space running counter to French colonial designs.37 At
the same time a Siamese military and civil presence was built up in
the contested region. In 1886, resident commissioners were sent to
Luang Phrabang and to Xiengkhuang. Likewise, a postal map from
1886 proclaimed that the Royal Thai Post Offices would soon ap-
pear in the Luang Phrabang region signalling how this region was to
be considered an integral part of a new modern Siam.38
We can gain another insight into how a new Siamese space was
emerging from a report written by a J. Taupin, who lived for several
months in Ubon in 1887–88 to study the Lao language and collect
information about the Khorat Plateau. Taupin notes that all local
governors on the Khorat Plateau worked directly under resident
Siamese commissioners and twice a year they made an oath of alle-
giance to the King of Siam in a local temple. Similar ceremonies had
been conducted in the past. But what was new about this ceremony
was that it was related to the King of Siam and not to a local ruler. At
such occasions a photograph of the King was present in the temples
and the governors heard lectures on what Taupin calls the politi-
cal geography of Siam, and the greatness of the Siamese King was
elucidated.39 This praxis had also been institutionalised in localities
east of the Mekong as local chiefs twice a year travelled to Ubon to
take the oath of allegiance likewise before a portrait of the King of
Siam.40 On these occasions the east-bank chiefs received a betel-box
decorated with portraits of the King and Queen of Siam. In general,
royal photographs were distributed to frontier towns claimed by
Siam and were displayed prominently in administrative centres in
36

the contested territories.41 In 1889 an oil painting of the Siamese

King dressed in military uniform appeared in the hall of audience
of the King of Luang, Phrabang signalling that the kingdom formed
part of the Siamese space.42 In his recent book on the fashioning of
the Siamese monarchy’s modern image, Maurizio Peleggi has shown
how the royal elite adopted photography as a medium reflecting mo-
dernity in its form and at the same time displaying a modern image
of the royal elite in its modern sartorial ways.43 Photographs and
paintings of the King of Siam served also to demarcate the emerging
geo-body of Siam on the ground. Yet another marker working to
define the Siamese space on the ground was the red flag with a white
elephant which was placed in front of the offices of the Siamese com-
missioners’ offices in the contested territories. This flag later became
the first national flag of Siam. To link a flag with Siamese territory,
however, was in fact a new practice instigated during the reign of
King Chulalongkorn.44
In this manner, French expectations about including the east-
bank territories in their colonial domain were countered in a most
tangible way by the Siamese using an assorted compilation of military
force, administrative arrangements, the map as an avatar of modern
geographical knowledge, and the modern symbolism of the flag. The
premodern system of multiple suzerainty and overlapping margins
was giving way to notions of exclusive territorial sovereignty and
modern territorial rights. For the French, a military confrontation
as had taken place in Tonkin was one way of fulfilling their territo-
rial ambitions. But for domestic political reasons the Quai d’Orsay
did not support an occupation of the east-bank territories through
the use of overt force throughout the second half of the 1880s.45
Instead, as noted by Martin Stuart-Fox, the French response was
twofold. One was gradually to increase the French presence in the
east-bank territories through a number of expeditions, commercial
agents, and military garrisons. Second, they sought evidence to sup-
port French claims to the east-bank territories which could then
be used in negotiations with the Siamese government.46 What the
French were looking for was proof that could establish Vietnamese
37

Creating Laos
historical tributary rights to the territory to the east of the Mekong

– rights that the French claimed that they had taken over when a
protectorate had been established over Annam.
To this end a Captain Luce was first commissioned in 1887 by
the Quai d’Orsay to search for material to substantiate these claims
in the royal archives in Hue. Later the task of the first Pavie expedi-
tion, 1886–89, was to ‘gather information on the true conditions of
these little known regions to provide us with the means to formulate
arguments claiming ownership of them’ – that is, with reference to
Vietnamese claims.47 The Siamese presence on the east-bank ter-
ritories was to be countered with reference to Vietnamese historical
rights to the same territory. McCarthy’s map of 1888 of what was
perceived as Siam’s contemporary geopolitical layout was to be coun-
tered with historical maps showing the extent of a Vietnamese space
encompassing not only the east bank of the Mekong, but also most
of the Khorat Plateau, as a certain Professor Folliot argued in an
article published in the journal Bulletin de la Société des Études Indo-
Chinoise in 1889. The title of Folliot’s article was the ‘investigation
of the ancient frontiers between Siam and Annam […] and Siam’s
encroachment on Annamite territory’. This title illustrates nicely
an important aspect of French colonial thinking on the territories
east of the Mekong. First, the frontier in question was presented as
a frontier between Siam and Annam, not between Siam and Laos.
In other words, the French did not perceive the territories that
would become Laos to constitute a separate political entity. Second,
whereas the Siamese presence in these territories in the 1880s was
a reality, it was linked to an illegitimate occupation of or to the
encroachment (empiétement) on a Vietnamese space defined with
reference to a notion of historical rights. In defining the extent of a
historical Vietnamese Empire, Folliot refers to a map published by
Bishop Taberd in 1838. This map depicts supposedly the extent of
a Vietnamese Empire in the early nineteenth century encompassing
Cambodia, the territories that became Laos, and great parts of the
Khorat Plateau.48 In 1892 a report from the Résident-Supérieur in
Hue reached the desk of the Governor-General of Indochina de-
38

fining the east-bank territories as part of a Vietnamese space with

reference to the same logic as expressed by Folliot – ‘historical rights’
as opposed to ‘illegitimate occupation’ in the present.49 This report
was accompanied by a map in which the east-bank territories were
depicted clearly as a Vietnamese space. The map includes the terri-
Figure 1: French map depicting ‘Laos Annamite’ (1892).

Source: ‘Rapport à Monsieur le Gouverneur Général sur les territories du Laos
Annamite occupès par les Siamois, le 7 septembre 1892, No. 741’. d. 14476, GGI,
CAOM.
39

Creating Laos
tory between the coastal areas of Annam and the Mekong River, and
localities are primarily identified with Vietnamese names – excep-
tions being Luang Phrabang, Nong Khai, Phon Phisai, and Lakhon
– while the Khorat Plateau is not included. (See Figure 1.) In fact,
what we can observe here is how two contesting spatial layouts were
in the making as both parts – Siam and France – adopted the same
strategy: transforming premodern systems of dual suzerainty into
modern territorial rights and states.
However, a diplomatic confrontation based on cartographic
claims and historical documents on tributary relationships never
developed, because the French decided to resort to force. In 1893
France sent gunboats up the Chao Phraya River to Bangkok and
forced the King of Siam to sign a treaty whereby Siam relinquished
all claims to the territories east of the Mekong. In this manner, the
‘Lao fate’ of the territories on the Mekong was decided outside the
region itself. Siamese colonial expansion into the territories across
the Mekong halted and the river became the border between Siam
and the new colonial construct of Laos. In 1904 the French incorpor-
ated two territories west of the Mekong into Laos – one opposite
Luang Phrabang and the other being Champassack.50 In the treaty
of 1893 between France and Siam we find no reference to tributary
rights and no reference to ‘Laos’ as an entity. According to the treaty,
the ceded territory was considered a geographical not a political
entity. This was a logic that ran clearly against the idea of Laos as a
separate Lao space. Yet in French colonial thinking on the Lao in the
pre-1893 period we can also locate a discourse on race and history
that laid the foundation for notions about a Lao cultural identity,
something which occurred later when Laos came into existence as a
French colonial state.
THE FRENCH COLONIAL DISCOURSE ON THE LAO:

NOTIONS OF RACE AND HISTORY
During the high tide of European colonial expansion in the second
half of the nineteenth century, the logic of racial classifications
provided what was seen as a scientific means to classify the people
40

encountered by the Europeans. Whereas race implies classification

in accordance with biological characteristics, language and culture
were in fact determining. In relation to the Siamese-Lao nexus, an
overall classificatory grid emerged in which the Siamese/Thai and
Lao were incorporated as different branches of an inclusive Thai
race. This classification of the Siamese/Thai and Lao as members
of the Thai race was linked primarily with linguistic communality
as the Thai and Lao languages are closely related and are part of the
overall Tai language family.
Focusing primarily on the period after Laos was established as a
French colonial space in 1893, David Streckfuss has discussed how
notions of race became an important ideological tool for French
colonialists in the attempts to seize the ‘Laotian’ and ‘Cambodian’
portions of Siam and how the Siamese ruling elite creatively adapted
racial thinking in delegitimising French claims. As I have discussed
earlier, before 1893 notions of tributary rights – and not notions
of race – loomed large in official French colonial thinking on the
east-bank territories. Streckfuss mentions, however, that the French
colonial discourse on the Lao in the pre-1893 period contributed to
placing the Lao on the same footing as the Siamese within a racial
hierarchy and thereby set the stage for the racial policies of the later
period.51 Since Streckfuss focuses primarily on the period after 1893
he does not deal at length with this issue. In the following section, I
will develop this aspect of Streckfuss’ ideas looking at how the Lao
and the Lao-Siamese nexus manifested themselves in the French co-
lonial discourse in the period before 1893. In order to set the stage
for this discussion it is worthwhile to start with examining John
Crawfurd’s early nineteenth century account of the Siamese Empire.
This account offers a window into this process of demarcating racial
differences and to how the Siamese-Lao distinction is articulated
and consolidated.
In 1821 the government of India dispatched John Crawfurd to
the courts in Siam and Cochinchina. His mission was a diplomatic
and trade one, but in many ways it was a fact-finding mission about
the people inhabiting mainland Southeast Asia. From an overall
41

Creating Laos
perspective Crawfurd’s analysis of the population inhabiting the

region between China and India is a tale of unity in diversity. On the
one hand, leaving out the Vietnamese, Crawfurd classifies the people
of this region as ‘a distinct and peculiar family of the human race’ as
they are believed to display a high degree of affinity with regard to
physical form, language, manners, institutions and religion.52 On the
other hand, within this unity Crawfurd distinguishes between sev-
eral groups of people which are distinct from each other: Siamese,
Lao, Cambodians and Peguans. Crawfurd is not explicit about on
what basis this demarcation is made within the overall racial unity
he has proposed. Only with regard to language does he note:
The dialects of these nations bear each other a common resem-
blance in structure and in idiom. They have borrowed much from
each other, yet appear radically distinct.53
Along these lines, Crawfurd breaks up the Siamese Empire
into various components. At the core is ‘the proper country of the
Siamese race’ surrounded by the vassals of ‘a large portion of Lao, a
portion of Kamboja, and certain tributary Malay States’.54 In the case
of the Siamese and Khmers the racial constituted entities coinciding
with political entities (‘Kingdom of Siam’ and ‘Kamboja’). This is
not the case with the Lao. Lao is purely an overall cultural-racial
or geographical category split into various political centres, which
are vassals of either Siam or Burma. The terminology employed by
Crawfurd is not unequivocal. In some instances Crawfurd applies
the term ‘nations’ to these subgroups while in other instances they
are called ‘race’ or even tribes. In spite of this vagueness, Crawfurd’s
account of the Siamese Empire is one of a racial or cultural hetero-
geneous political structure in which the Lao and Siamese are distin-
guished from each other. The heterogeneity of the Siamese Empire
becomes more apparent in a table quantifying each group of people
making up the empire.55
Another important feature of Crawfurd’s account is the civilisa-
tional hierarchy he proposes. His hierarchy has two dimensions. First,
there is an ‘indigenous’ versus Western distinction. The ‘indigenous’
42

cultures and societies are ranked far lower than the Western equiva-
lents. With reference to the Siamese language, Crawfurd notes that it
‘possesses that species of redundancy which belongs to the dialects of
many semi-barbarous nations, and which shows a long but not an use-
ful cultivation’.56 Likewise, Crawfurd classifies repeatedly the Siamese
as a ‘rude people’ – that is, a ‘rudimentary’ people. With reference to the
existence of historical texts, for example, he notes:
The Siamese are said to have some historical compositions; and it
is probable that the dry chronology of their kings, and the leading
events of their history for a few centuries, may be told by them with
sufficient fidelity; but it cannot for a moment be imagined that they
are capable, any more than other rude people, of writing a rational
and connected narrative of their national history.57
Second, Crawfurd proposes a hierarchy among the ‘indigenous’
people or races and here we are confronted with a civilisational hier-
archy in which the Lao are ranked on a scale lower than that of the
Siamese. This is evident in several ways. Although Crawfurd ranked
the Siamese low in comparison with Western societies and culture,
he regards the Siamese, together with the Burmans and Peguans, as
the most civilised and the leading group in the area. In comparison,
the Lao are identified as a ‘secondary nation’. In addition, the Lao lan-
guage is classified as a ‘dialect of the Siamese language’.58 Embedded
in this notion is the idea of the Lao as being derivative of a Siamese
standard and of a hierarchical ordering with the Siamese towering
over them. Such an ordering of the Lao vis-à-vis the Siamese was ap-
parently widely accepted at the time. In a book on Siam serialised in
1881 in the Illustrated Library of Travel, it is noted that it was common
for some writers to characterise the Lao as ‘a primitive stock of the
Siamese’.59 Likewise, James McCarthy noted how Lao was used as a
term of contempt indicating the same kind of hierarchical ordering.60
With regard to the multi-racial aspects, Crawfurd’s description of
the Siamese Empire was in conformity with contemporary Siamese
perceptions of the geopolitical space. This perception, however,
was bound to become problematic when confronted with Western
notions of ‘natural’ political entities defined along racial or cultural
43

Creating Laos
lines. If such notions were applied to the Siamese Empire, this could
imply the deconstruction of the Empire into ‘natural nations’ that
had potentially the right to self-rule outside the Siamese orbit.
This comes through in a geographical memoir contemporary with
Crawfurd’s account of the Siamese Empire. The text was written by
James Low and presented together with a map of Siam, Cambodia
and Laos to the Government of Prince of Wales Island (Penang) in
1824.61 Larry Sternstein has analysed Low’s map and the memoir
and he has classified the memoir as a ‘sloppy document comprising
bits of information both factual and fanciful presented in an indif-
ferent, if not negligent, fashion’.62 From a geographical point of view
the memoir may therefore be rated as a mere historical curiosity.
Nevertheless, the document provides a window into contemporary
understandings of how to demarcate groups of people:
In venturing to mark out the limits we ought to assign to Siam as a
Country essentially distinct from its neighbours, I have been greatly
influenced, and indeed regulated, by two considerations of material
importance. The first is the extent of Country throughout which the
Thai or Siamese language is indigenous, the second, that in which tat-
tooing the body is not practiced. By these [cultural characteristics] it
may with some degree of confidence be shewn, how wide the original
confines of Siam were, and how far it may be conjectured to have
advanced beyond its natural boundaries [my emphasis] 63
Although Low does not develop this point further, the ideological
framework for race politics in a crude form is obvious – that is, the ar-
gument that rule can only be legitimate when the rulers and the ruled
share the same race or ethnicity.64 However, if the Lao or Laos were to
be ‘liberated’ from Siamese rule, the Lao had not only to be defined as
a culturally distinct group but also had to be placed on a par with the
Siamese in a civilisational hierarchy. Crawfurd’s civilisational ordering
had to be reshuffled. Nowhere can we see better this repositioning of
the Lao in relation to the Siamese than in the knowledge on things
Lao produced by the Mekong expedition of 1866–68.
In the words of one of the participants, this undertaking was
aimed to get to ‘know our neighbours of Laos better’.65 This implied
44

collecting knowledge not only on trade and political relations, but

also on physical and cultural characteristics of the Lao. The report
contains a chapter dealing specifically with anthropological notes on
the Lao, Siamese, Vietnamese and other groups of people encoun-
tered by the expedition. The chapter is written by Clovis Thorel – the
expedition’s medical doctor – and in it we witness how the Lao are
consolidated as a separate group with reference to the classificatory
principles employed in physical anthropology at that time.66 Thorel’s
point of departure is the general classificatory scheme developed by
Cuvier and later modified by Omalius d’Halloy in the end of the
1860s. According to this scheme humanity was divided into five rac-
es: white (corresponding to the Caucasian type), yellow (Mongolian
type), brown (Ethiopian or Negro type), black and red. Following
the scientific nomenclature of the day the overall racial categories
are divided into branches (rameaux) and finally tribus and sauvage
are employed with reference to hill-dwelling people with only a low
degree of civilisation. In line with this conceptual layout, the people
encountered by the expedition were classified as belonging to the
yellow race – ‘not only because of their natural characteristics but
also because of their civilisation and language’.67 This overall category
is further divided into six branches where the Lao and the Siamese
appeared as two separate branches along with the Vietnamese,
Cambodian, Burman and Chinese branches. Whereas the Lao and
Siamese in this way were distinguished from each other in theory,
the report repeatedly stresses how it was in practice very difficult
to distinguish between them. However, within the logic of physical
anthropology, the distinction between the Lao and Siamese is first
and foremost carried out with reference to physical characteristics:
[. . .] what distinguishes this Mongol branch [the Lao] above all is
the vertical elongation of the cranium, that appears oblong and not
ovoid like the neighbours. It offers a perfect example of brachyc-
ephalic cranium, that makes their front less narrow and less reced-
ing at the top than is found with other members of the Mongolian
[race]. We have to note that this brachycephalis is a characteristic of
race and is not justified by any particular practice with regard to the
heads of the children, as is the case with certain savages.68
45

Creating Laos
However, the distinction between race and branch breaks down

throughout the report. For example, the term race is also employed
with reference to branches of race in the rigid classificatory scheme.
The Lao and Siamese, for example, are also termed the ‘Lao race’
and ‘Siamese race’. In the same manner, the classificatory scheme is
made further complicated as ‘Thai race’ – encompassing the Lao and
Siamese – is employed as a subdivision of the yellow race.69
Whatever the nomenclature employed, the important point is
that the Lao were singled out from the Siamese with reference to the
scientific discourse of the day. It therefore became possible to talk
about Lao/Laos with much more confidence than ever before and
part of the report can be read as an inventory of ‘things Lao’. From
the report also follows a civilisational hierarchy in which the Lao and
the Siamese are placed at the same level. Here the main distinction
delineated in the report is that between the equally rated civilisations
in the river valleys and the lower standing of the ‘wild’ people in-
habiting the mountains. However, in the areas visited, it was only in
Luang Phrabang that the Mekong expedition encountered what was
seen as a viable Lao civilisation. Therefore, Louis de Carné charac-
terised the Lao as a ‘decayed race’, being of a ‘lazy and slothful nature’
and as ‘indolent and hating work’.70 Whereas such a characterisation
of the Lao could have potentially ranked the Lao lower than the
Siamese in a racial hierarchy this was not the view propagated in
the official account of the expedition. Here the lack of dynamism
in the Lao territories is not regarded as flaw in the Lao race. Rather,
it is linked to an illegitimate Siamese oppression of the Lao. Thus,
when comparing the relative dynamism of Luang Phrabang with the
situation encountered in the Lao territories further south along the
Mekong River, the background for the differences lies in the differ-
ent political systems. While Luang Phrabang maintained a relatively
independent standing vis-à-vis Siam, the other parts had been sub-
jected to Siamese rule which has had a stifling influence due to sup-
pression, economic monopolies and forced transactions.71 Although
the contemporary relationship between the Lao and Siamese races
was not a relationship between equals, an equal ranking in a racial
46

hierarchy is produced with reference to the past. In this rendering

of the Lao past, the fate of the Lao is intimately linked to that of
Vientiane – ‘la celebre métropole du Laos’.72 Thus, the Kingdom of
Vientiane is presented as a kingdom that flourished already in the
late fourteenth century and a fragmentary history of this kingdom
is presented.73 Vientiane is elevated to a symbol of the greatness and
glory of the Lao in a distant past which later was destroyed by the
Siamese who left ‘nothing existing of the Laotian nationality but a
name, and to make of Vien-Chan [Vientiane], its principal centre,
a mass of ruins’.74 Chao Anou’s uprising is thus interpreted as a val-
iant attempt to liberate the Lao from Siamese expansion designed to
include all the members of the Thai race in Siam. The destruction of
Vientiane epitomises the essence of an unacceptable historical process
of Siamese expansion into the Lao territories in the Mekong region:
[T]hus a flourishing capital has been annihilated in our own days,
and an entire people has, in some sort, disappeared, without Europe
ever having suspected such scenes of desolation – without even a
solitary echo of this long cry having reached her.75
Or, as it later was summarised succinctly by Taupin in his report
to the Governor-General in Cochinchina:
One can conclude […] that Laos, powerful in the first centuries of
our era, thriving and flourishing in the sixteenth century, has seen
its greatness decline rapidly and has ended up in a rank of slaves
of its first cousin: Siam. The Lao people have no [notions about
their] history, they do not possess any of the great historic tradi-
tions which can form the basis for patriotic feeling and the idea
of nationality. Nevertheless, the instinct of race is not completely
absent. It owns in this field a feeling intense enough, and its regrets
expressed in the elegies about the ancient Vien-Chan resemble the
lament of Jeremiah.76
It is with reference to this historical projection that the French
colonial expansion was viewed as a legitimate interference to undo
the injustice done to an Asian ‘nation’ – the Lao. The early begin-
nings of a French colonial discourse on Laos and the Lao were com-
47

Creating Laos
ing into being, where the survival of this ‘intelligent and gentle race’
is intimately linked with the French colonial project under the guise
of the mission civilisatrice.77 In that connection it is interesting to see
how external influences are linked with a positive impact on Laos
and the Lao. In the past, such an external influence is linked with a
Chinese domination which later was eclipsed by the despotism of
the Siamese or Burmese. In this way, an ideological framework for
French intervention is established:
This domination [the Chinese], benevolent and wise, which stimu-
lated production instead of weakening it, and increased the well-be-
ing and the vital strength of the subject population by raising it on
the ladder of civilisation, bequeaths today to European powers a role
which she [China] no longer is capable of fulfilling. […] France cannot
renounce the moral and civilising role which it is her responsibility [to
play] in this gradual emancipation of these so interesting populations
in the interior of Indo-China; she [France] must not forget that this
emancipation is the express condition for the commercial freedom
and franchises necessary for establishing profitable relations for our
industry. The suzerainty of an Asiatic government always means
monopoly, compulsory transactions, [and, as a consequence] motion-
lessness; [in comparison] European intervention in the nineteenth
century means commercial freedom, progress and wealth.78
The Pavie expeditions are also of central importance to the framing
of French colonial expansion into the Mekong region and perceptions
of the Lao past. In connection with the first expedition (1886–89)
to Upper Laos, Pavie spent considerable time in Luang Phrabang
in an attempt to establish a close relationship with the court and
counter the Siamese presence. In that connection he was in Luang
Phrabang in June 1887 when the town was sacked by marauding
Ho – Chinese troops from southern China. During the attacks he
helped save the King of Luang Phrabang from the troops. This event
became crucial for the framing of French representations of the colo-
nial enterprise in Laos. According to Pavie, it made the king declare
that he would offer the kingdom as a gift to France and thereby be-
came iconographic for representing French colonial expansion into
Laos as a ‘conquest of hearts’.79
48

Further, it is through Pavie that the Lao were given a written his-
tory based on indigenous chronicles handed over to him by the King
of Luang Phrabang in 1887 after Pavie supposedly saved his life.
These Lao chronicles were copied, translated and later published.
With these in hand it was now possible to document a continuous
Lao history stretching back to the middle of the fourteenth century.
In the manuscript Abrégé de l’histoire pays de Lan-Cchang, Hom-
Khao a myth of origins of the Lao is first presented. It is followed
by a brief outline of the Kings of Lan Xang from when the kingdom
was founded by King Fa Ngum in 1353 until the kingdom was di-
vided into two parts in 1707. Only a few lines are subsequently de-
voted to the following fate of Vientiane, while the history of Luang
Phrabang is followed up to 1836.80 The same sense of a continuous
history spanning almost five centuries is depicted in the manuscript
Chronologie de l’histoire de pays de Lan-Cchang, Hom-Khao, where
the chronological table itself spans the period from 1559 till 1845,
while the introductory text links this period with that of the mythi-
cal past of King Borom.81 These chronicles brought the Lan Xang
Kingdom out of the mists of time and made the history of Lan Xang
synonymous with the history of the Lao in the Mekong valley. The
brief outline of the history of the Lan Xang Kingdom that had been
delineated around thirty years earlier in the official report of the
Mekong expedition was substantiated. With reference to the Lan
Xang Kingdom the Lao were placed as actors on the historical scene
alongside with the Siamese kingdoms of Sukhothai and Ayutthaya.
We have earlier seen how reference to historical Vietnamese tribu-
tary rights formed one strategy for the French to counter Siamese
endeavours to incorporate territories east of the Mekong into Siam.
Here we encounter the outline of another path whereby the Siamese
presence is refuted by referring to past Lao splendour. In the words
of Pavie:
What is revealed in them [the chronicles] about the relations with
the neighbours: China, Annam, Burma and Siam is very suggestive
as to what concerns this latter empire. […]. Incontestably written
fully in freedom, they [the chronicles] give a clearly negative note of
49

Creating Laos
her [Siam’s] pretensions. They say that of the four countries Siam
is the only one to which Luang Phrabang never had to bow. They
say that in ancient times Siam brought tribute to the kings of Lan-
Chang [Xang]. […] These findings have shown why the Siamese
agents had desired to see me unaware of everything except the
present about these territories.82
The Lao were not only given a past; but they also possessed a
written tradition symbolising a flourishing civilisation of the past.
The written history was an important mark of civilisation vis-à-vis
the Siamese. Lefévre-Pontalis, a member of the Pavie expedition,
summarised nicely the importance of these chronicles for the per-
ception of the Lao in the following way:
Of course the Siamese have destroyed, smashed and carried away
many things. But, by the fact that they acted as conquerors and sowed
fear along their way [southwards], many things would escape them
and would never belong to them. Not least of which was a desire for
independence, for the [Siamese] never succeeded in smothering the
memory of their past of the Laotian populations, nor did they [the
Siamese] destroy the chronicles that celebrate it [the Lao past]. Not
only did the members of the Pavie mission obtain very important
[chronicles], but even in places where their disappearance seemed
clear, they [the members of the Pavie mission] were able to certify
their existence – ‘All was burned’, said the Siamese. Or even better:
‘Those people are savages. How can you think that they actually
have books?’83
Massie, another member of the Pavie expedition and later (vice)
consul in Luang Phrabang, put it this way:
What an error to treat the Laotians as savages! On the contrary,
they are a civilised – very civilised – people, possessing their own
language and writing, more than 3,000 years old, and an original
literature. Education is found in all villages. Hundreds of years ago
we were savages ourselves; and today, I do not know who deserves
the most this epithet – our peasants or the Laotians. To have an
idea about Luang Phrabang, move Athens of the antique time to
Haiti and let it evolve in this environment.84
50

In this way, the Lao were liberated from a subordinate position

in relation to the Siamese. The key was the reference to the glory
of a distant past. At the same time, however, they were placed in a
new hierarchy subordinate to the Vietnamese. The east-bank terri-
tories were not only – as we saw in the last section – associated with
Vietnamese tributary rights, but in the French colonial discourse the
Vietnamese were closely associated with the French colonial project
in the Lao territories. Thus, the Vietnamese are pictured as a sedu-
lous race that can be turned into a catalyst bringing development
and progress to the Lao territories. This is evoked by Carné when
confronted with the village of Lakhon – Nakhon Phanom – on the
banks of the Mekong, peopled by Vietnamese:
At the sight of this simple village, which was busy as an ant-hill,
one could not but hope that Annamite emigration would be still
more developed in Laos; for the Annamites would be like leaven in
heavy dough, among the Laotians. Essentially similar in both their
good and bad points, they would be most useful, and the leading
instrument of our policy in these countries.85
Or, as it is phrased in the concluding chapter of the account of
the expedition compiled by Francis Garnier:
The Annamese [Vietnamese] have, following the example of the
Chinese, been endowed with expansionist and colonising quali-
ties of an excessively remarkable type. They took possession of the
Delta of Cambodia only just at the beginning of this century and
today this region is one of the best cultivated and most rich on the
Chinese seas. Thus the pioneers are capable of taking the place of
the settlers that we lack and extend our influence and commerce to
the interior of the Indochinese peninsula.86
While both the Siamese and Vietnamese were associated with
expansionist capacities, in this colonial logic they were not linked
with the same qualities. A set of polarities was set up whereby
the Siamese were linked with an oppressive influence whereas the
Vietnamese – by means of Chinese influences – were imbued with
a ‘democratic spirit’ and individual initiative. The stifling influence of
51

Creating Laos
the Siamese was to be countered with the industrious Vietnamese

who would serve both ‘the interests of France and of civilisation’.87
The Vietnamese were thus presented as an integrated part of the
French civilising mission that – in this specific case – aimed at lib-
erating the Lao from their subordinate position in relation to the
Siamese and help the Lao attain a more refined and developed posi-
tion in the human hierarchy.
The same vision of the superiority of the Vietnamese was
embedded in the writings of Jules Harmand, who travelled in the
Mekong region in 1870s and later became French Minister in
Bangkok.88 In a short article published in an anthropological journal
in 1875, Harmand delineated a hierarchy of races in Indochina. At
the top of this hierarchy Harmand placed the Vietnamese. Although
he knows that he may be labelled an uncritical ‘annamitophile’, for
Harmand there is no doubt: despite the ‘vices’ and ‘immorality’ of the
Vietnamese he recognises them as ‘notably superior, as a nation, to
their neighbours of Siam, Cambodia and Laos’.89 Therefore, accord-
ing to Harmand, the Vietnamese were to become the tool for French
colonial expansion and it was this race that should be allowed to
colonise the major part of Indochina.90 He repeated the same view in
an address to the Quai d’Orsay in 1892 when he pushed for French
expansion into the Mekong region and he linked French colonial ex-
pansion into this region with the fulfilment of the historical destiny
of this superior race with expansionist qualities.91 This position had
already been set out by Le Myre de Vilers in 1881 in connection
with the dream of reaching the ‘rich provinces of the Upper Mekong’
to form a vast Indochinese Empire as a substitute for the ‘loss’ of
India. This project is associated with Vietnamese advisers whose:
[. . .] fathers conquered Ciampa [Champa]. Their race has spread to
Cambodia and has already passed the rapids at Sambor. They are
not surprised by our dreams. We only follow the traditions of this
nationalité conquérante.92
This chapter has focused on the racial and spatial aspects of the
process that brought Laos into being as a territorial entity in the
52

late nineteenth century. Whereas the outcome of this process was

to de-link Laos from the Siamese geo-body, the fate of Laos within
the colonial space of Indochina was by no means given. The French
colonial discourse on the Lao had outlined two possible trajectories.
First, Laos could be turned into a de facto Vietnamese space per-
ceived as a territory defined with reference to tributary rights and
peopled by Vietnamese, who would pull the Lao out of their torpor
or even replace them. Second, Laos could be turned into a Lao space
perceived as a resurrection of the Lao kingdom – or kingdoms – of
the past that the Siamese had destroyed so utterly. Within Indochina
Laos was a contested space. In the following chapter we shall see how
Laos also remained a contested space from a Thai perspective in the
period after 1893.
NOTES
1. See Joaquim De Campos, ‘Early Portuguese Accounts of Thailand’, Journal of
the Siam Society, 32:1, 1940, p. 9.
2. A general overview of early Western accounts dealing with Lao/Laos can
be found in Mayoury and Pheuiphanh Ngaosrivathana, ‘Early European
Impressions of the Lao’, in Mayoury Ngaosrivathana and Kennon Breazeale
(eds), Breaking New Ground in Lao History. Essays on the Seventh to Twentieth
Centuries (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2002), pp. 95–149. For Thai usage
of Lao/Laos in the early Bangkok period, see Thaveesilp Subwattana, ‘“Lao”
nai thatsana khong thai samai ratanakosin’ [‘Lao’ in the view of Thai rulers
in the early Ratanakosin period], Codmai Khao Sangkhomsat, 11:1, 1988, pp.
104–121.
3. Carl Bock, Temples and Elephants. The Narrative of a Journey of Exploration
through Upper Siam and Lao (Bangkok: White Orchid Press, 1985 [1884]).
4. Grant Evans, A Short History of Laos: The Land In-Between (Crows Nest
NSW: Allen & Unwin, 2002), p. 22. For a possible genealogy, see Jit Pumisak,
Khwam pen ma khong kham sayam, thai, lao lae khom lae laksana thang sangkhom
khong chue chon chat [Origins of the words Siam, Thai, Lao and Khom and
social characteristics of nationality names] (Bangkok: Editions Duang Kamol,
1981), pp. 579–611, or Michel Lorrillard, ‘Les Chroniques Royales du Laos.
Contribution à la connaissance historique des royaumes lao (1316–1887)’
(PhD thesis, Paris: École des Hautes Études, 1995), pp. 329–338.
5. O.W. Wolters, History, Culture, and Region in Southeast Asian Perspectives
(Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1982).
53

Creating Laos
6. O.W. Wolters, ‘Ayudhaya and the Rearward Part of the World’, Journal of the
Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, 3 & 4, 1968, pp. 166–178.
The applicability of these notions to the kingdom of Ayutthaya has further
been discussed by Sunait Chutintaranond, ‘“Mandala”, “Segmentary State” and
Politics of Centralization in Medieval Ayudhaya’, Journal of the Siam Society,
78:1, 1990, pp. 89–100. It is the same notion of power relations that is em-
bodied in the perception of the ‘galactic polity’ proposed by Stanley J. Tambiah,
World Conqueror and World Renouncer: A Study of Buddhism and Polity in
Thailand against a Historical Backdrop (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1976).
7. See Martin Stuart-Fox, A History of Laos (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1997); Thongchai Winichakul, Siam Mapped. A History of the Geo-
Body of a Nation (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1994); Evans, A
Short History of Laos.
8. Kennon Breazeale, ‘The Integration of the Lao States into the Thai Kingdom’
(PhD thesis, Oxford: University of Oxford, 1975), p. 6. For a general overview
of the history of the Lan Xang Kingdom and the dynamics that led to its
disintegration, see Martin Stuart-Fox, The Lao Kingdom of Lān Xāng: Rise
and Decline (Bangkok: White Lotus Press, 1998).
9. Volker Grabowsky, ‘The Isan up to its Integration into the Siamese State’,
in Volker Grabowsky (ed.), Regions and National Integration in Thailand
1892–1992 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 1995), pp. 107–129.
10. Quoted in Mayoury Ngaosyvathn and Pheuiphanh Ngaosyvathn, Paths to
Conflagration. Fifty Years of Diplomacy and Warfare in Laos, Thailand, and
Vietnam, 1778–1828 (Ithaca: Southeast Asia Program Publications, 1998),
p. 60. This book offers a modern Lao nationalist account of these events. For
another interpretation see Evans, A Short History, p. 25. Evans offers an in-
sightful and critical discussion of different interpretations of Chao Anou in
Grant Evans, ‘Different Paths: Lao Historiography in Historical Perspective’,
in Christopher E. Goscha and Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting Visions of the
Lao Past: Lao Historiography at the Crossroads (NIAS Studies in Asian Topics,
No. 32, Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2003), pp. 97–110
11. Thongchai, Siam Mapped, pp. 97–101.
12. Breazeale, ‘The Integration of the Lao States’, pp. 11–12.
13. Ibid., p. 18. The campaigns undertaken to depopulate Phuan are dealt with
in Snit Smuckarn and Kennon Breazeale, A Culture in Search of Survival: The
Phuan of Thailand and Laos (Monograph Series, No. 31, New Haven: Yale
University of Southeast Asian Studies, 1988), pp. 9–22.
14. Breazeale, ‘The Integration of the Lao States’, p. 20.
54

15. A general account of French colonial policies in Indochina can be found in

Martin Stuart-Fox, ‘The French in Laos, 1887–1945’, in Martin Stuart-Fox,
Buddhist Kingdom. The Making of Modern Laos (Bangkok: White Lotus Press,
1996), pp. 17–36. For a detailed study taking the political climate in France
and its implications for the colonial policies in Indochina into account, see
Patrick Tuck, The French Wolf and the Siamese Lamb. The French Threat to
Siamese Independence, 1858–1907 (Bangkok: White Lotus Press, 1995).
16. Quoted in Tuck, The French Wolf and the Siamese Lamb, pp. 16–17.
17. Jean-Claude Lejosne (translation and comments), Le journal de voyage de
G. van Wuysthoff et de ses assistants au Laos, 1641–1642 (Metz: Centre de
Documentation et d’Information sur le Laos, 1993). Giovanni Filippo de
Marini, A New and Interesting Description of the Lao Kingdom, 1642–1648
(Bangkok: White Lotus Press, 1998 [1666]).
18. Henri Mouhot, Voyages dans les Royaumes de Siam de Cambodge et de Laos
(Genève: Éditions Olizane, 1989 [1868]).
19. John Bowring, The Kingdom and the People of Siam (Oxford in Asia Historical
Reprints, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1969 [1857]), Vol. II, p.
1.
20. Thongchai, Siam Mapped, p. 115. See for example ‘Map of the Kingdom
of Siam and Cochinchina’ in John Crawfurd, Journal of an Embassy from the
Governor-General of India to the Courts of Siam and Cochin China (Oxford
in Asia Historical Reprints, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1967
[1828]), without page; or ‘Map of Siam and the Adjacent Countries’, in
Frederick Arthur Neale, Narrative of a Residence at the Capital of the Kingdom
of Siam with a Description of the Manners, Customs, and Laws of the Modern
Siamese (Bangkok: White Lotus Co, without year [1852]), without page. For
a series of historical maps of Siam, see Lucien Fournereau, ‘Le Siam Ancien’,
Annales du Musée Guimet, 27, 1895, pp. 1–43.
21. Louis de Carné, Travels on the Mekong, Cambodia, Laos and Yunnan. The
Political and Trade Report of the Mekong Exploration Commission (Bangkok:
White Lotus Press, 1995 [1872]), pp. 99–100.
22. Carné, Travels on the Mekong, p. 362.
23. Tuck, The French Wolf and the Siamese Lamb, p. 63.
24. See, for example, Neale, Narrative of a Residence, p. 67; or Bowring, The
Kingdom and the People of Siam, Vol. I, p. 3.
25. Tuck, The French Wolf and the Siamese Lamb, pp. 28–29.
27. Ibid., pp. 76, 88.
55

Creating Laos
28. Ibid., without page. See also Malte-Brun’s ‘Carte du Royaume de Siam de
la Cochinchine Française et du Royaume de Cambodge d’après les docu-
ments les plus récent, 1878’ in Amédee Gréhan, Le Royaume de Siam (Paris:
Challamelaîné, 1878), without page.
29. Snit and Breazeale, A Culture in Search of Survival, p. 78.
30. The first map is ‘Carte spéciale du Tong-King’ and the second is ‘Voies de pene-
tration en Chine’, in H. Mager, Atlas colonial (Paris: Charles Bayle, 1885).
32. Quoted in Henry Norman, The Peoples and Politics of the Far East (London:
T. Fischer Unwin, 1895), pp. 469–470.
33. Tuck, The French Wolf and the Siamese Lamb, p. 81. This colonial space had
actually been anticipated by the Catholic missions in Tonkin, Annam and
Cochinchina whose domains were limited by the Mekong in the west, see Snit
and Breazeale, A Culture in Search of Survival, p. 88
34. Thongchai, Siam Mapped, p. 121.
35. Quoted in ‘Consulat de France à Bangkok à Monsieur le Gouverneur de la
Cochinchine, Bangkok, le 4 octobre 1884’, d. 13536, GGI, CAOM.
36. See James McCarthy, ‘Siam’, Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and
Monthly Record of Geography, 10:3, 1888, pp. 117–134.
37. See, for example, Charles Lemire, Le Laos Annamite. Affaires Franco–Siamoises
(Paris: Augustin Challamel, 1894), pp. 19, 36, 70.
39. J. Taupin, ‘Rapport à Monsieur le Gouverneur Général’, Bulletin de la Société
des Études Indochinoises, 2:3, 1889, pp. 83–84.
40. Lemire, Le Laos Annamite, pp. 41–43.
41. Breazeale, ‘The Integration of the Lao States’, p. 275.
42. ‘Copie du journal du poste de Luang Prabang et de la mission d’étude pour la
periode le 27 mars à le 20 avril 1889, redigé par Monsieur Massie’, d. 14403,
GGI, CAOM.
43. Maurizio Peleggi, Lords of Things. The Fashioning of the Siamese Monarchy’s
Modern Image (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Pres, 2002).
44. Snit and Breazeale, A Culture in Search of Survival, p. 98. For a discussion of
the birth and politics of the Thai national flag, see Chanida Phromphayak
Phueaksom, Kan mueang nai prawatisat thong chat thai [Politics in the history
of the Thai national colours] (Bangkok: Matichon, 2003).
45. Tuck, The French Wolf and the Siamese Lamb, pp. 83–84.
46. Stuart-Fox, ‘The French in Laos’, p. 20.
56

47. In Tuck, The French Wolf and the Siamese Lamb, p. 87.
48. Folliot, ‘Examen des anciennes frontières entre le Siam et l’Annam, d’après
la carte de Monseigneur Taberd, et des empiétements des Siamois sur le ter-
ritorie Annamite’, Bulletin de la Société des Études Indochinoises, 2, 1889, pp.
21–24. For information about Bishop Taberd’s map, see Tam Quach-Langlet,
‘La perception des frontières dans l’Ancien Viêtnam à travers quelques cartes
vietnamiennes et occidentales’, in P.B. Lafont (ed.), Les Frontières du Vietnam,
Histoire des frontières de la Péninsule Indochinoise (Paris: Éditions l’Harmattan,
1989), p. 47, for the map itself see pp. 60–61.
49. ‘Rapport à Monsieur le Gouverneur Général sur les territories du Laos
Annamite occupès par les Siamois, le 7 septembre 1892, No. 741’, d. 14476,
GGI, CAOM. See also ‘Exposé des droits historiques de l’Annam sur le Laos
central, le 1 juin 1893’, d. 14488, GGI, CAOM.
50. A detailed account of the treaties demarcating the geographical outline of
Laos can be found in Kennon Breazeale, ‘Laos Mapped by Treaty and Decree,
1895–1907’, in Mayoury and Breazeale (eds), Breaking New Ground in Lao
History, pp. 297–336.
51. David Streckfuss, ‘The Mixed Colonial Legacy in Siam: Origins of Thai Racialist
Thought, 1890–1910’, in Laurie J. Sears (ed.), Autonomous Histories, Particular
Truths: Essays in Honour of John R. W. Smail (Center for Southeast Asian Studies,
Monograph No. 11, Madison: University of Wisconsin), 1993, p. 128.
52. Crawfurd, Journal of an Embassy, p. 310.
53. Ibid., p. 341.
54. Ibid., p. 436.
55. Ibid., p. 452.
56. Ibid., p. 335.
57. Ibid., p. 337.
58. Ibid., pp. 342 (‘secondary nation’), 399 (‘dialect’).
59. George B. Bacon, Siam. The Land of the White Elephant – As It Was and
Is (Illustrated Library of Travel, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1892
[1881]), p. 13.
60. James McCarthy, Surveying and Exploring in Siam with Descriptions of Lao
Dependencies and of Battles against the Chinese Haws (Bangkok: White Lotus,
1994 [1900]), p. 155
61. The map of ‘Siam, Cambodja and Laos’ and the accompanying geographical
memoir is reproduced in Larry Sternstein, ‘Low’s Description of the Siamese
Empire in 1824’, Journal of the Siam Society, 78:1, 1990, pp. 8–34. For a
discussion of the background for the production of map and text, see Larry
57

Creating Laos
Sternstein, ‘“Low” Maps of Siam’, Journal of the Siam Society, 73:1–2, 1985, pp.
132–157.
62. Sternstein, ‘Low’s Description’, p. 9.
63. Ibid., p.12.
64. Streckfuss, ‘The Mixed Colonial Legacy in Siam’, p. 129.
66. Clovis Thorel, ‘Notes anthropologiques sur l’Indo-Chine’, in Francis Garnier,
Voyage d’exploration en Indo-Chine (Paris: Librairie Hachette et Cie, 1873),
Vol. II, pp. 285–334. For a short account of the development of French
anthropology in relation to Indochina, see Streckfuss, ‘The Mixed Colonial
Legacy in Siam’, pp. 126–129.
67. Garnier, Voyage d’exploration en Indo-Chine, Vol. II, p. 289.
68. Ibid., 296.
69. E.g. Garnier, Voyage d’exploration en Indo-Chine, Vol. I, p. 328.
70. Carné, Travels on the Mekong, pp. 66, 128, 144.
71. E.g. Garnier, Voyage d’exploration en Indo-Chine, Vol. I, pp. 320, 548–549.
72. Ibid., p. 285.
73. Ibid., pp. 482–486.
75. Ibid., p. 134.
76. Taupin, ‘Rapport à Monsieur le Gouverneur Général’, pp. 63–64.
77. Garnier, Voyage d’exploration en Indo-Chine, Vol. I, p. 488. For a general dis-
cussion of the French civilising mission, see Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to
Civilize: The Republican Idea of Empire in France and West Africa 1895–1930
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998).
78. Garnier, Voyage d’exploration en Indo-Chine, Vol. I, p. 322.
79. For an analysis of the French colonial myth of Pavie, see Agathe Larcher-
Goscha,‘On the Trail of an Itinerant Explorer: French Colonial Historiography
on Auguste Pavie’s Work in Laos’, in Goscha and Ivarsson (eds), Contesting
Visions of the Lao Past, pp. 209–238.
80. Auguste Pavie, Mission Pavie Indo-Chine 1879-1895. Études diverses II.
Recherches sur l’histoire du Cambodge, du Laos et du Siam (Paris: Ernest Leroux,
1898), pp. 79–94.
81. Ibid., pp. 95–102.
82. Auguste Pavie, Travel Reports of the Pavie Mission. The Pavie Mission Indochina
Papers 1879–1895, Volume 3 (Bangkok: White Lotus Press, 1999 [1911/1919]),
pp. 116–117.
58

83. P. Lefèvre-Pontalis, ‘Introduction’, in Auguste Pavie and Pierre Lèfevre-

Pontalis (eds), Mission Pavie. Exploration de l’Indo-Chine. Mémoires et docu-
ments. Archéologie et histoire (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1894), Vol. I, p. xviii.
84. Massie, ‘Le “laotien”’, Bulletin de la Societe de Geographie de Marseille, 4:3, 1890,
p. 276.
85. Carné, Travels on the Mekong, pp. 115–116.
86. Garnier, Voyage d’Exploration en Indo-Chine, Vol. I, p. 547.
87. Ibid., pp. 548–549.
88. Jules Harmand, L’Homme du Mékong. Un voyageur solitaire à travers l’Indo-
chine inconnue (Paris: Phébus, 1994 [Published originally in Tour du Monde
1879–80]).
89. Jules Harmand, ‘Les races Indo-Chinoises’, Mémoires de la Société d’Anthropo-
logie de Paris, 2:2, 1875, p. 316, 323.
90. Ibid., p. 315.
91. Quoted in Hugh Toye, Laos. Buffer State or Battleground (London: Oxford
University Press, 1968), p. 39.
92. Quoted in Georges Taboulet, ‘Les origines du chemin du fer de Saigon à
Mytho. Projet Blancsubé d’un chemin de fer de pénétration au Laos et au
Yunnan (1880)’, Bulletin général de l’Instruction publique, 20:10, 1941, p. 349.
59

CHAPTER TWO
Thai Discourses on History and Race
This chapter will approach Laos from the outside to highlight how
Laos remained a contested space from a Thai1 perspective even after
the French conquest in 1893. It is a study of how the idea of a ‘Greater
Siam’ or ‘Thailand’, running counter to the national boundaries estab-
lished at the turn of the twentieth century, was articulated in Siam
between 1900 and 1941. This is a period during which a coup in
1932 overthrew the absolute monarchy and paved the way for the
emergence of authoritarian military rule in Siam associated with a
militant pan-Thai nationalism, intended to implant a growing sense
of national unity and secure political legitimacy. Especially under the
premiership of Phibun Songkhram (1938–44), the pan-Thai ideology
was linked with an irredentist drive designed to incorporate Laos and
Cambodia, among other regions, into a ‘Greater Siam’, or ‘Thailand’ as
his government termed it officially in 1939. This nationalist campaign
culminated in 1941, when Thai troops attacked the French colonial
possessions in Indochina and subsequently annexed parts of Laos and
Cambodia with the backing of the Japanese. This military campaign
was known as ‘the campaign for a return of the lost territories’. This
chapter is a study of this Thai nationalist discourse on Laos and the
Lao and how it stressed the sameness of the Lao and Thai in geo-
historical and racial terms. The first part of this reflection looks at how
Thai nationalists incorporated the ‘lost territories’ east of the Mekong
– that is, most of modern Laos – into a wider Thai historical and
nationalist geography. The second part examines how these same Thai
60

defined the Lao, the inhabitants of modern Laos, into a greater Thai
space with reference to notions of race.
MAKING LAOS ‘OUR’ SPACE: BELONGING IN HISTORY

The last chapter dealt with different discourses on Laos and the Lao
that crystallised in the Franco-Siamese colonial encounter in the
pre-1893 period and we saw how the Thai elite using both admin-
istrative undertakings and symbolic markers claimed the territories
which were to become Laos as part of Siam. Therefore, as Siam was
forced to accept the Mekong River as the boundary in the northeast
it can come as no surprise that the Thai elite regarded Laos as a ‘lost
territory’.2 Still, according to Thamrongsak Phertlert-anan, the loss
of territories was an issue treated with caution among the Thai elite
in the early twentieth century. This was because references to this
part of Siam’s recent past, when the absolute king was forced at gun-
point to submit to the demands of a foreign power, discredited royal
dignity and could potentially be associated with an attempt to com-
promise the absolute monarchy. Another reason was fear that public
treatment of this issue would damage the relationship between Siam
and France. This was at least the reason given by the former minister
of the interior and long-time chief librarian of what became known
as the National Library in Bangkok, Damrong Rajanuphab, when,
in 1925, he halted the publication of a book entitled Memoirs From
the Time When France Occupied Chanthaburi, 1893–1904, written
by a Thai official.3 Later, Wichit Wathakan, the chief ideologue of
Thai nationalism in the 1930s and 1940s, probably had these ideas
in mind, when, in a 1940 speech dealing explicitly with the loss of
territories, he noted that people who had previously written about
this subject had to conceal many ‘truths’ because of ‘fear for upsetting
[people] causing danger for oneself and nation’.4 However, the 1932
military coup in Bangkok – which toppled the absolute monarchy
– paved the way for a more open treatment of this touchy issue in
the rapidly emerging nationalist discourse. Indeed, the lost territo-
ries became a nationalist question. The coup implied, as Thongchai
Winichakul has noted, that the wound of 1893 was no longer in-
61

Creating Laos
terpreted as wounded royal dignity, but as wounded nationhood, as

a stain on the Siamese past.5 Illustrative of this change, the book
stopped by Damrong in 1925 was published in 1936, and three years
later an account by the same author of the French occupation of Trat
was published.6 The changing events in Europe and Asia, especially
as World War II began in China in 1937, held out the possibility
that a new conjuncture would allow Siam to reverse this ‘shame’ in
concrete, territorial ways.
In conformity with Thamrongsak’s observation, a study of
history and geography schoolbooks used in Siam in the first two
decades of the twentieth century shows that many of them are silent
about the loss of territories, even though these matters formed an
important part of Siam’s very recent past.7 However, a reading of
Thai school textbooks from the pre-1932 period reveals also that
the issue of the territorial losses inflicted on Siam in the wake of the
colonial encounter was not entirely banned from officially sanctioned
knowledge about the formation of Siam. In a geography textbook
from 1908, for example, students are presented with the following
knowledge under the heading ‘something to be remembered’:
The left-bank territories of the Mekong used to be a major monthon
in our country and people in that locality are ‘Northern Siamese’,
whom we once called ‘Thai-Lao’. In year 112 of the Ratanakosin
Era [1893] [these territories] fell to France and were integrated into
Vietnam (prathetsarat yuan).8
To characterise the east-bank territories of the Mekong as a
monthon in Siam is an anachronism, since this term refers to an
administrative structure first introduced in 1892–93. However,
by invoking this anachronism, the text conveys a clear message: the
east-bank territories used to be as much a part of Siam as all the
monthons found within contemporary Siam, now delimited by inter-
nationally recognised boundaries. While the textbook’s author was a
teacher at the army’s officer training academy, the book was intended
for general use in Siam. Indeed, it had received official approval from
the Department of Education.9 Thus, the fact that the issue of ter-
62

ritorial losses had been excluded from other textbooks published by

this institution did not imply that this was an issue to be banned
from schoolbooks altogether.10
Moreover, the subject of the lost territories can be found in
another geography textbook on Siam published in 1925 by the
Department of Textbooks. Despite its title, Geography Textbook, this
book did not focus exclusively on Siam’s geography; it served, too, as
a general introduction to various aspects of Siam, including religion,
culture, language and history. In several parts of the book, the issue
of the lost territories figures as an intrinsic feature of the knowledge
about Siam passed on to the students. In the section dealing with
the different administrative parts of Siam, for example, several refer-
ences are made to how neighbouring territories now under foreign
rule ‘used to be Thai’ (tae doem pen khong thai) or ‘used to be under
Thai rule’ (tae doem yu nai khwam pokhrong thai).11 Further, in the
part dealing with the history of Siam the issue of the lost territo-
ries figures prominently. On the whole, this part of the textbook
provides an outline of Siam’s history running as a straight spatial
and chronological line from the historical centres of Sukhothai,
Ayutthaya, Thonburi and Bangkok to the present. The making of
this perception of Siam’s history can be traced back to the turn of
the twentieth century and pointed up the emerging of a national
history that went beyond dynastic history.12 When dealing with the
territorial fortunes of Siam in the Thonburi and Bangkok periods,
the Geography Textbook presents a picture of a fluctuating Siam,
in which the knowledge about the loss of the territories emerges.
It associates the reigns of King Taksin of Thonburi and King Phra
Phuttayotfa of Bangkok (Rama I) with a steady process of territorial
expansion, with the latter’s territorial control being ‘more extensive
than in any period’, including the territories east of the Mekong.13
However, that of one of his successors, King Chulalongkorn (Rama
V), appears as follows:
Siam had to withdraw the authority (thon amnat) it held over
Cambodia and give it to France. In addition, France also requested
63

Creating Laos
Siam’s territory on the left-bank of the Mekong, claiming that this

territory used to be a colony of Vietnam which now was a colony of
France. The truth, however, is that the territory in question used to
belong to Lao Vientiane, which was a colony over which Siam held
absolute rights (mueang khuen khong thai doi sithi khat).14
In this manner the issue of the lost territories was incrementally
incorporated into an officially sanctioned knowledge about Siam’s his-
tory and geography. There is a shift from ‘forgetting’ to ‘remembering’.
One of the first to give a more detailed account of the loss was Wichit
Wathakan. As mentioned above, Wichit emerged as the chief ideo-
logue for the nationalist regime in the 1930s, especially in his role as
Director General of the Fine Arts Department and as a prolific writer
of articles, books and plays carrying a highly nationalistic message.
Through this, he pushed the issue of the lost territories to the fore-
front of the nationalist discourse. His first detailed account of the loss
of territories in a general description of Siam’s history appears in his A
Universal History, published in the last years of the absolute monarchy.
The first edition of this monumental work included twelve books,
the first of which appeared in 1929 and the rest being published over
the next two years. In this large collection, the lost territories received
unprecedented treatment. Wichit presents a detailed account of the
territorial losses to France, dividing this process into five phases, each
encompassing various geographical entities. The first covers the loss
of a large part of Cambodia in 1867, followed by Sipsong Chuthai
in 1888, the rest of the east bank in 1893, territories on the Mekong
opposite Luang Phrabang and Champassack in 1904 and finally the
loss of the Khmer provinces of Siamreap, Sisophon and Battambang
in 1907.15 In each case, he enumerates how many square kilometres
had been ceded, explaining that the total added up to the size of
contemporary Siam. The disappearance of the territories was made
more tangible by quantifying the loss and placing it in time and space.
Further, he presents the text of the treaties between Siam and France,
thus rendering very real this part of Siam’s ‘painful’ recent past to his
readers. Second, Wichit emphasises how this issue has to be regarded
as an integrated part of Siam’s national history. Thus, when dealing
64

with the reign of King Chulalongkorn – the reign during which most
of the territorial losses were inflicted – Wichit explains how he finds it
important to study this reign both for what was gained and what was
lost. Here the first point refers to such things as the abolition of slavery,
the introduction of a new educational system and the developments in
Siam’s infrastructure, all of which signalled how King Chulalongkorn
was moving Siam towards a ‘new age’. For this, he called the king a
‘true revolutionary’.16 The second point refers to the loss of territories
inflicted on Siam. Here, however, Wichit shifts his focus:
With regard to the losses, that is the loss of territory, this is not due
to faults of the king or the government of that time. It was a matter
beyond control (rueang hetsutwisai); no one was able to take preven-
tive measures against it. We were forced to give up territory adding
up to half of the country due to one reason – namely that we are a
small country with inferior strength and we could not withstand a
greater power that forced us [to cede these territories].17
In this way, Wichit made sure that the inclusion of this subject
would not be regarded as an attempt to discredit the king. Wichit’s A
Universal History became very popular. Not only was it one of the best
selling publications of the era, but it was also used as a textbook at
Thammasat University until the end of World War II.18 Wichit’s text
can be said to have paved the way for a full integration of the territo-
rial losses into the unilinear historical narrative of Siam as a timeless
national body and a similar treatment can be found in textbooks used
in the period after 1932 on the geography and history of Siam.19
MAKING LAOS ‘OUR’ SPACE: RETHINKING NATIONAL MAPS

The idea of lost territories was even easier to grasp in various so-
called historical maps of Siam popularised after 1932. Generally, the
occurrence of such maps is associated with bringing the irredentist
cause to the forefront of public discourse in Siam in the post-1932
period. At this time, the issue of the restoration of the lost territories
became an important political objective for the military government,
since it gave ‘an embryonic nation-state its pride and wash[ed] out
[the] humiliation it had witnessed in the recent past’, as Somkiat
65

Creating Laos
Wanthana has put it.20 One such map is the Map of the History of
Thailand’s Boundaries, published by the Ministry of Defence in
1935. The map depicts what was perceived as the extent of Siam in
the early Bangkok period and indicates the sequence of territories
later lost to France and Britain. This map was widely used in schools
and military training centres.21
Another graphic representation of the lost territories is found
in a series of maps published by the Royal Survey Department in
1935–36. They depict the territorial extent of historical Thai king-
doms through the ages and include the east-bank territories as a
part of Siam. The most recent map referred to the early Bangkok
period during the reign of King Phra Phuttayotfa (King Rama I),
which predated the territorial encroachment on Siam by European
colonial powers. Therefore, the territorial losses are not explicitly
indicated in this set of historical maps, unlike the map published
by the Ministry of Defense referred to above. If a map of Siam in
the 1930s was compared with any of the historical maps published
by the Royal Survey Department, however, it was clear that Siam
had shrunk in size since the early Bangkok period and thus the tale
of the lost territories was implicitly told. Such a comparison can be
found in Guideline for the Teaching of the History of Siam – a history
textbook used at the military academy – where the boundaries of
contemporary Siam had been plotted upon a map of Siam in the
early Bangkok period, thereby displaying the changing territorial
fortunes of Siam in a recent past.22
These maps all convey the impression that the east-bank terri-
tories formed an integral part of Siam in a recent past, delimited by
boundaries just like the territories making up modern Siam. The same
perception can be found in the booklet Siam in the Ratanakosin Era
Year 112 published by a nationalist group, Khana Yuwasan. A map in
the book makes this clear by showing the northeastern boundary of
Siam before 1893 following the Annamese Cordillera.23 In the text,
the east bank territories of the Mekong and the Khorat Plateau are
collectively referred to as ‘Siam-Isan’ (sayam phak isan) – that is, the
northeastern part of Siam.24 Initially introduced by the Siamese gov-
66

ernment in 1900 as the name of one of the administrative entities on

the Khorat Plateau, the term ‘Siam-Isan’ or just ‘Isan’ became widely
accepted as the designation for the whole of the Khorat Plateau by the
early 1920s.25 By employing this term with reference to a much earlier
period, these authors wanted to play up the similarity between the
historic region and the one region with the same name in a contem-
porary Siam, again delimited by modern boundaries. Furthermore,
the publication throughout the 1920s and 1930s of various historical
documents and accounts related to the suppression of Chao Anou’s
‘revolt’ in Vientiane reiterated the idea of the east-bank territories
forming part of Siam’s historical realm of influence.26
Another characteristic embedded in the perception of the east-
bank territories as lost territories is that the colonial state of Laos is
not perceived as a historically constituted state. Such a perception
is implicit in descriptions of the lost territories. These nationalist
publications define the major part of the east-bank territories con-
stituting Laos as simply a geographical entity – the ‘left-bank ter-
ritories’ – and not as a political entity ‘Laos’. Indeed, the perception
of ‘Laos’ as a ‘non-country’ is conveyed in various textbooks discuss-
ing the reasons why Siam’s neighbours had to succumb to foreign
powers. Take, for example, Guideline for the Teaching of the History
of Siam referred to earlier. Here the reader is informed that King
Chulalongkorn acted wisely by acknowledging the military superi-
ority of the Western powers. He rightly avoided any acts that could
possibly have provoked a military confrontation and could have con-
sequently led to the colonisation of Siam. Contrary to this prudent
policy, Burma and Vietnam, we are told, pursued a disastrous path
of confrontation, while the Cambodian king actually invited French
colonialism into his country because he wished to be under French
rule.27 My point here is that no political state called ‘Laos’, with an
individual political will, is to be found on the historical scene of co-
lonial confrontation. Nor is the king of Luang Phrabang mentioned.
In this way, ‘Laos’ was not a historically constituted state comparable
with Siam or Cambodia on the eve of Western colonial expansion
into the region in the mid-nineteenth century. As the ‘Thai’ Ministry
67

Creating Laos
of the Interior put it in a book published in 1940 on the administra-

tive formation of French Indochina:
France got the district [my emphasis] of Laos (khwaen lao) as a pro-
tectorate after signing a treaty with Siam and not with a local ruler,
since Laos at that time really was a part of Thailand. Therefore,
although Laos in reality has the status of a protectorate, it has a
lower status than Cambodia, which became a protectorate in ac-
cordance with a treaty between France and a local ruler that still
legally rules the country. Accordingly, Laos is only a protectorate ‘in
name’ (nai nam); but in reality it has been treated as a colony (dai
rap kan patibat chen diaokan ananikhom thae).28
In general, the perception of a continuous history of Laos in
terms of state structures stretching from the Lan Xang Kingdom
to the modern state of Laos is impaired by a major problem of
discontinuity. First, the division of Lan Xang into three kingdoms
in the early eighteenth century marks the end of a unified political
structure. Second, of these three kingdoms only Luang Phrabang
survived as a political entity to be incorporated into French Laos.29
What is remembered about the east-bank territories in the narrative
structure discussed above is the period that creates the disconti-
nuity: the period when the territories east of the Mekong, which
became the colonial state of Laos, did not constitute an independent
politically defined entity, but, from a Thai nationalist perspective, an
integrated part of Siam, indeed ‘Thailand’ by the 1930s.
That the colonial state of Laos from a contemporary Siamese
point of view was perceived as an ‘anomaly’, indeed as a ‘non-country’,
is reflected in many maps of Siam and surrounding countries that
can be found in Thai schoolbooks and other official publications
during the 1920s and 1930s. This is the case in yet another Reader
in Geography from 1934. In a section dealing with the neighbour-
ing countries of Siam, students learn that Laos is one of the five
dependencies (prathetsarat) making up the neighbouring French
colonial domain. However, in its Map of Siam, which includes the
adjacent territories, no territorial entity called ‘Laos’ can be found.
(See Figure 2.) The only territorial entities found on this map are
68

Figure 2: Erasing Laos from cartographic representations.

Source: Atlas-Geography of Siam (28 Lessons and Readings) (Orne: Imprimerie de
Montligeon, 1925),
69

Creating Laos
those of Siam, Vietnam and Cambodia.30 Similarly, the first lesson in

a 1925 Atlas-Geography used at the Assumption College (Collège de
l’Assomption) in Bangkok outlines how ‘Siam is limited on the North
by the Shan States of Burma, and Tonkin; on the East by Annam
and Cambodia’; and how the Mekong River separates Siam ‘from the
French territories of Annam and Cambodia’.31 It is hard to believe
that these are simply repeated accidents in cartography. In the same
manner, for the Thai authorities, Laos is erased from the surface of
the earth in an introductory geography book of 1932. In the book it
is noted that in the east Siam shares the border with Vietnam (yuan),
which is a French colony, and in the north with ‘Lao-Vientiane and
Luang Phrabang which are part of Vietnam’.32 From this perspec-
tive the east-bank territories that became the colonial space of Laos
were perceived as having been ceded from being a part of Siam to
becoming part of another overall space, that of Vietnam (itself part
of the colonial state of French Indochina). Within the logic of this
historical framework, the colonial space of Laos was not perceived as
a geopolitical entity that could aspire to an independent nationhood
legitimated with reference to a historical projection or distinctive-
ness delineated with reference to history.
SUWANNAPHUM OR LAEM THONG: THE RACIAL LINK

Rethinking maps and history in nationalist ways was not enough.
Race was also an issue. As Siam came into being as a bounded ter-
ritorial state at the turn of the twentieth century, the people recog-
nised as ‘Lao’ were split into two groups when the Mekong River was
established as an internationally recognized boundary between the
nascent nation-state of Siam and the colonial state of French Laos.
Later, turning Siam into a modern nation-state would be associated
with a process of racial homogenisation set in motion by the Siamese
state. In the words of David Streckfuss, this process implied that
the Lao had to be erased ‘ethnically, historically and demographi-
cally from Siam’. Basically, this was achieved, first, by ‘forgetting’ the
distinctions between the different branches of the Thai race living in
Siam. Instead, they were grouped together simply as ‘Thai’. At the
70

same time the concepts of ‘Thai nationality’ and the ‘Thai race’ were
merged in the term ‘Chat Thai’ whereby the entire population of the
country became ‘Thai’. The Lao in Siam were turned into Thai and
Siam was turned into ‘Thai-land’ (prathet thai), a term which was be-
ing used in Thai language legal documents from the early twentieth
century.33 Officially, in foreign languages ‘Siam’ was the name of the
country until it was changed to ‘Thailand’ by the Thai government
in 1939, a change that was implemented to merge – also in foreign
languages – the name of the country with that of the projected racial
composition of the population: Thai ruled over Thai in Thailand.
However, the change of name from Siam to Thailand was fuelled also
by the pan-Thai nationalist ideology and the irredentist campaign,
which was popularised in Siam during the 1930s, and expressed the
desire to expand the country to encompass the various branches of
the Thai race now living under the colonial yoke in other countries.
The change from ‘Siam’ to ‘Thailand’ can be seen as a prelude to the
military campaign for a return of the lost territories, which material-
ized in 1940–41.
This move to define the Lao out of Siam and to transform Siam
into a ‘Thai-land’ is clearly reflected in the census conducted in Siam in
1904. The census and an explanatory note make up a fascinating text.
It gives us a splendid opportunity to gain insight into not only how the
racial layout of Siam was perceived by the ruling elite in Siam at the
turn of the twentieth century, but also into the fuzziness of racial cat-
egorisation. In the note accompanying the census it is mentioned how
the aim was to do a census in which the race (chat) of each individual
was noted. However, it is cultural and not biological factors that are
used to place the various groups of people within the classificatory
grid. These cultural factors are, however, employed in an inconsist-
ent manner. Thus, with reference to the Chinese segment of Siam’s
population the explanatory note offers the following guidelines:
It means that all men wearing pigtails were counted as real Chinese.
Even men of partly Chinese origin would have been regarded as
Chinese, provided they wore pigtails. All women wearing Thai style
clothes were counted as Thai. Therefore, only the women wearing
71

Creating Laos
Chinese clothes, i.e. those quite numerous women who immigrated

from China, were regarded as Chinese.34
When dealing with Mons and Khmers who had been living
in Siam for a long time, ‘language’ is applied as a distinctive factor.
Whereas these people dressed in the ‘same fashion’ as the Thai they
are singled out from the Thai as a separate ‘language race’ if they use
another language than Thai when communicating with each other.
On the other hand, the Lao are not singled out as a separate group
or race:
But there does exist the case where a separation [into different
races] is not feasible. That is how to separate Lao from Thai, for
even among the general population itself there are no discernible
traits which can be used to differentiate Thai from Lao. If we speak
about languages, Lao and Thai languages are of the same stock.
Only the accent and some vocabulary are different. [. . .] If we base
our supposition on well-known facts, then the people we call pres-
ently Lao, were actually Thai, and not Lao. Furthermore, the Lao
regard themselves as Thai.35
The census referred to here did not cover the whole of Siam,
but only the twelve inner monthons thereby leaving out most of
the administrative entities with a large Lao population – that is,
Phayap, Udon and Isan. What I am looking for, however, is not ex-
act figures, but classificatory patterns, and from this perspective the
considerations presented in the explanatory note are still relevant.
This removal of the Lao from the racial layout of Siam is also re-
flected in Thai schoolbooks from the early twentieth century. Take,
for example, a schoolbook in geography from 1900 written by the
head of the Department of Education. This text takes as its point
of departure the notion that the myriad of countries making up the
world are racially constituted entities, in which Siam is ‘the dwelling
place of the Thai’ (samnak asai haeng khon thai).36 Whenever refer-
ence is made to other races (tang chat tang phasa) living in Siam this
term refers only to foreign people living, for example, in Bangkok.
Here the Lao figure aside other foreigners like Vietnamese, Burmese
72

and Europeans, whereby the Lao are associated with a group com-
ing from the outside.37 In Geography and History of Siam published
by the Department of Textbooks, a text I dealt with earlier in this
chapter, the question of the Lao in Siam is approached in much
the same manner. When discussing the northeastern part of Siam
in the chapter on the population of Siam, the Lao – together with
Vietnamese and Khmers – appear only as people under French juris-
diction (pen khon yu nai bangkhap farangset) who have escaped into
Siam to evade paying tax to the French.38 In a section specifically on
race, however, we encounter the term Lao used with reference to the
people in the northern and northeastern parts of Siam. But in this
instance the distinction is blurred as it is indicated in the text that
these Lao are in fact synonymous with ‘Northern Thai’ (thai nuea)
who in reality are ‘Thai’ (thae ching pen thai).39 So although the term
Lao is employed it is defined so that it does not convey difference.
The conceptual changes brought about by this process of racial
standardisation through manipulation of often confused and confus-
ing classificatory labels, where groups of people first disappear only
to reappear under a new name, is neatly described by the American
missionary William Clifton Dodd in his book The Tai Race. Dodd
opens his chapter on the people of northern Siam in the following
manner:
To our friends and co-workers in the home land, with the exception
of the Siamese, the people of North Siam are the most familiar and
most dear. I wonder if you who have worked so long and faithfully
for them will recognise your dear Laos people in the title of this
chapter [Yûn]. If not let me introduce them to you under a new
name. The old name and the old life of the Laos people have passed
away. The name ‘Laos’ as applied to the people of North Siam was a
mistake, both in pronunciation and application. Even though it has
been used for generations past alike by Siamese, Europeans, and
Americans, it was never used by the people themselves. A few years
ago, the Siamese government expressed a desire, which was equal to
a mandate, that all the people of the realm should be called Siamese.
So in deference to government plans and innovations the name of
our Laos Mission was changed to North Siam Mission, and the
73

Creating Laos
North Laos people passed out of existence. Their country is now

known only as Payap.40
The term Yûn that Dodd applies instead of Lao to the people
of northern Siam figures as the name of a sub-group that appears
aside, among others, Siamese and Lao in Dodd’s layout of the overall
Tai or Thai race. In this way Dodd did not ‘forget’ the differences
between the ‘Yûn’ and the ‘Siamese’ as two distinct branches of the
Thai race living within the boundaries of Siam. On the other hand,
he did erase the Lao from the racial layout of Siam. First, he rejects
the applicability of the term to the people of northern Siam. Hereby
he departed from the practice followed in many Western publica-
tions contemporary with Dodd that still employed the term ‘Lao’ or
‘Laos’ with reference to the people of northern Siam.41 Second, he
only deals with the Lao in relation to the French colony of Laos.
This process of turning the Lao into Thai and Siam into Thailand
had implications not only for Thai perceptions of the Lao in Siam, but
also for the Thai discourse on the Lao in Laos. If we look at school-
books used in Siam in the early twentieth century, we can see how the
Lao in Laos initially had been singled out from the Thai in Siam.42
Through the 1930s, however, a new discourse on the Lao in Laos was
in the making. According to this view, racial kindred between the Lao
in Laos and the Thai in Siam was stressed. Just as the Lao in Siam
had become Thai, the Lao in Laos also became defined as Thai. The
notion of an extensive and common Siam-centred Thai space, includ-
ing, among others, the French colonial space of Laos, was evolving: a
Thai space defined with reference to racial kindred within the overall
Thai race in spite of the fact that an international boundary divided
the two spaces. This pan-Thai ideology that flourished in Siam in the
1930s was heavily influenced by the universe outlined by Dodd in his
book The Tai Race. In nationalist imaginings, presumed origins are
important and in Dodd’s narrative the Thai race is in fact older than
civilisations normally associated with antiquity – both in an Asian
and a Western context. As the subtitle of the book reveals, the Thai
race is not only the ‘elder brother’ of the Chinese, but according to
Dodd the Thai race was also civilised ‘while our ancestors were still
74

wearing skins and using flint knives’.43 Equally important is the ‘spatial
dimension’ of the Thai race depicted by Dodd. Here I have in mind
how Dodd lines up the different branches of the Thai race and locates
them in space, and how the Thai race is quantified with reference
to the grand total of people making up this race.44 In this manner a
‘racially’ defined Thai-space running across state boundaries emerges.
The immense extent of the Thai race, in Dodd’s view, called for a new
definition of missionary work:
Mission policy in the past has been influenced by the prevailing
tendency to deal with peoples according to civil boundaries. The
partition of mission fields according to comity agreements among
the various Boards has usually followed national or provincial lines.
But in the case of our Tai task, we anticipate the broadening effects
of the War by following up a people, regardless of civil boundaries.
With regard to the ‘broadening effects of the War’, Dodd refers
to what he sees as the new perception of the world that had come
into being after World War I, which ‘has taught us to pay less atten-
tion to arbitrary civil boundaries, and more attention to racial lines’.45
Although Dodd most probably thought only in terms of missionary
work, such statements must have given Thai nationalists food for
thought. The book could be read as an important nationalist mani-
festo and in the 1930s it was translated into Thai and was serialised
in journals.46
An examination of two texts by Wichit Wathakan provides a
glimpse into conceptual changes with regard to the perception of the
Lao in Laos, which took place in Siam in the 1930s. In his A Universal
History, Wichit followed what could be called a principle of unity in
diversity. That is Lao and Siamese Thai figure as two branches of the
overall Thai race associated with two different territories – that of
French Laos and Siam.47 In his 1933 book, Siam and Suwannaphum,
a shift in the labelling of racial sub-categories emerges. On the one
hand, Wichit starts by presenting a racial layout expressing the same
principle of unity in diversity as in the earlier text. Thus, he divides the
overall Thai race into two larger sub-categories: the greater Thai (thai
yai) and minor Thai (thai noi). The last category then is further divided
75

Creating Laos
into, among others, Siamese or Siamese Thai (thai sayam) and Lao.48
Furthermore, Wichit singles out Laos (prathet lao) as an individual
country, which could be used to reinforce a notion of distinctiveness
between the Siamese and the Lao.49 On the other hand, the Siamese-
Lao distinction is blurred throughout the text. Wichit points out that
the term Lao actually should be avoided, as it is a misnomer:
As for the Lao [. . .] I refer to the group occupying the upper part
of the left bank of the Mekong today. In reality, however, we should
not call them ‘Lao’ at all. The reason why we call them Lao is that
they are under French rule today and the French call them Lao.
[Therefore] we also have to call them Lao officially. Actually, our
brothers and sisters on the bank of the Mekong are genuine Thais
with no less Thai blood than we Siamese (chao sayam). They [i.e.
Lao and Siamese] are like a married couple and they [i.e. the Lao]
have a history that is intertwined with us Siamese Thai […].50
In conformity with this perception Wichit seldom uses the
term Lao in the text. Even when dealing with the history of the Lan
Xang Kingdom – the founding myth of a distinctive Lao history
– the term Lao is avoided.51 And yet, Wichit does not apply the term
Thai to the Lan Xang Kingdom either. Instead, he associates the
history of this kingdom with the names of kings and cities, not with
any label signalling racial belonging. Finally, as Wichit summarises
the racial composition of mainland Southeast Asia at the end of
the book, he only mentions the Thai, Burmese, Khmer, Vietnamese
and Malay. Wichit explains that Lao and Shan are not singled out,
since these groups are ‘genuine Thai’. They are included in the Thai-
group.52 In this way the differences within the overall Thai race are
forgotten and the Lao in Laos have become Thai. The notion of Laos
as a distinct space from Siam defined with reference to race is thus
contested. In this text Wichit can be said to have set the agenda for
the discourse on Laos as a part of a Thai space and the Lao as Thai,
popularised under the guise of the campaign for a return of the lost
territories in 1940–41. As French Indochina began to crumble, he
would go even further by promoting the idea of a Thai Suwannaphum
(Golden Land) or a Thai Laem Thong (Golden Peninsular).
76

Suwannaphum is a term that occurs in various Buddhist texts as

the name of a region believed to be part of Southeast Asia, to where
King Asoka sent missionaries to spread Buddhism in the third cen-
tury BC. Wichit latched on to this idea for other reasons. In his A
Universal History, he used it as a collective term to refer (vaguely) to
the region made up of Burma, Siam, Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia and
Vietnam. He preferred this term to the one coined by Westerners:
Indochina.53 No explicit reasons are put forward by Wichit, but we
can glean some clues by looking at the connotations associated with
the two terms. First, Suwannaphum represents an indigenous term
as compared with a term coined by a foreign colonial power. Second,
Indochina implies foreign cultural influences from China and India,
which is not implied in Wichit’s term. Third, Suwannaphum refers to
a precolonial space, while the term Indochina is, in his view, linked to
Western colonial borders, especially since the French had borrowed
the pre-existing idea of Indochina to describe their colonial con-
struct made up of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. The term Laem
Thong is used synomously with Suwannaphum – but is a modern
term without the same historical connotations as the latter.
However, in Wichit’s book Siam and Suwannaphum, the term
emerges as more than a mere regional label. It is employed rather as
shorthand for what would have been a ‘greater’ or ‘powerful country’
(maha prathet) encompassing the whole of mainland Southeast Asia
if the various races inhabiting this region had been united. In this
context, Suwannaphum was not linked with a distinct Thai space.
However, Wichit presented some preliminary positions that set the
stage for a later Thai-ification of this spatial layout. Take, for exam-
ple, his proposition that the Vietnamese have Thai origins or are
of Thai stock.54 According to Wichit, the Vietnamese were a Thai
group who had originated in southern China and who moved into
Suwannaphum before the other Thai. Settling on the eastern side of
the Annamese Cordillera, they were separated from the rest of the
Thai who settled in Suwannaphum on the western side of this moun-
tain range: the Annamese Cordillera divided the lives of the Thai
and Vietnamese, who used to be one and the same group, and caused
77

Creating Laos
them to split into different lineages. This difference was enhanced

by the strong Chinese influence that the Vietnamese subsequently
underwent – according to Wichit, an influence so profound that it
‘completely turned the Vietnamese into Chinese’. But when dealing
with ‘racial classification’, the perceived origin counts. Thus, ‘in reality,
if we talk about the lineage in ancient times, the Vietnamese belong
to the same group as the Thai’.55 Or:
For this reason [the Chinese influence] the Vietnamese and the Thai,
who are friends through thick and thin, belong to the same lineage
(chuea sai), had a common life four thousand years ago, but later
became very regrettably estranged because of being separated.56
Whereas this definition actually moved Suwannaphum in the di-
rection of being defined as a Thai space, this was not a point Wichit
stressed in this context. He simply stressed that the similarities were
greater than the differences among the groups of people inhabiting
Suwannaphum.57 However, in many of the plays written by him in the
second half of the 1930s the theme of Suwannaphum as a Thai space
was widely popularised. In the song Golden Peninsula, included in his
play The Battle of Thalang, the space of Laem Thong was linked with
a territory including Siam and the Lao and Shan territories in neigh-
bouring countries.58 Suwannaphum or Laem Thong were, however,
also linked with an even wider Thai space, including not only Siam
and the Shan territories in Burma, but all the territories of French
Indochina: Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. To define this space as
a Thai space involved an inclusion of the Khmers as Thai, which
was a major theme in two of Wichit’s plays, Rachamanu (1936) and
Phokhun Phamueang (1940).
The play Rachamanu was named after a legendary military com-
mander from the sixteenth century who supposedly played a decis-
ive role in the resurrection of the Ayutthaya Kingdom under King
Naresuan and in countering Khmer attempts to break away from
Thai suzerainty. The play contains many of the themes which recur
in Wichit’s plays – personal love has to be sacrificed for love of the
nation and martial qualities are praised.59 But more importantly, the
78

play was intended to present the audience with two important ‘his-
torical truths’ with regard to the Thai-Khmer relationship, as Wichit
put it in his introduction to the play. The first ‘truth’ was that the wars
of the past between Siam and Cambodia should not be seen as bru-
tal warfare between two antagonistic ‘nations’ or ‘races’, but between
two antagonistic kings.60 The second ‘truth’, reinforcing the first one,
was that the Khmers and Thais were of the same ‘race, religion, and
culture’ and are ‘blood relatives’ (yat ruam sailohit). To drive this point
home, Wichit made a basic distinction between the terms ‘Khmer’
and ‘Khom’, where Khom refers to the ‘real Khmers’ (khamen thae),
who inhabited what became Cambodia before the advent of the Thai
people in this region. The term ‘Khmer’ is called an ‘artificial term’
(chue somut), which a group of Thai that settled in the former Khom
territory adopted. To make his point, Wichit further develops his
argument along the ‘scientific’ lines of racial classification:
If we follow the fundamental methods used by historians to discuss
race (chuea chat), namely, face, form of the cranium, food, common
diseases, local literature, songs, and music, and compare these for
current Thai and Khmer, it is clear that the Khmer of today are
Thais. I am prepared to prove this truth to any historian.61
In the play itself this contention is neatly presented at the zenith
of the action in an exchange between a Thai soldier and the military
commander Rachamanu:
Soldier: Khmer and Thai look the same.
Rachamanu: Yes, they are Thai like us! They happened to settle
down in old Khom territory and came to be called ‘Khmer’. The term
‘Khmer’ is an artificial term and in fact we are all Thai brothers.
Soldier: Then we should be friends and not fight each other.
Rachamanu: Yes, there will be no reason to fight for a long time. All
of us on Laem Thong are of the same stock. [...]. We Thai [thai rao,
referring to the Siamese Thais] are the elder brothers. […].62
The same perception is echoed in the play Phokhun Phamueang,
which is set in the early fourteenth century and deals with a legendary
Thai prince, Phamueang, who fought to liberate the Thais from Khmer
79

Creating Laos
suzerainty to establish the first independent kingdom of Sukhothai.

In the final part of the play the same lesson on the Thai-identity of
the Khmer is taught once again as Nang Sikhon – the Khmer wife
of Phamueang – asks Nai Man why her husband refrained from
enthroning himself:
Nai Man: Because [your husband] is uneasy as his wife is of another
race (tang chat). To place him as ruler is not right (mo meng). [. . .]
Nang Sikhon: You are wrong. What an offensive idea. Why does he
hold that I am of another race? This is a major mistake. You should
be able to see that the Khmer are Thai. Khom blood vanished long
ago and of the old Khom only the name remains today. The Khmer
are of real Thai stock because the Thai are divided into many line-
ages. The Vietnamese (yuan kaeo) and the Khmer are Thai through
and through. Take a look! On what points do our face and colour
of skin differ? For several hundreds of years Thai blood has been
running in Khmer veins, making them one race. […].63
The perception of Suwannaphum as a Thai space is also popu-
larized by Wichit in the 1938 song Thai Blood. He compares the
movement of the Thai in historical times to a stream of blood flow-
ing across the Golden Land.64 The same notion of the Thai covering
Suwannaphum as floodwaters is invoked in the opening scene of the
1939 play Nan Chao, presented as a historical lesson describing the
movement of the Thai into Suwannaphum. The scene culminates
with the presentation of a map showing the extent of the Thai race
while one of the persons in the play voices the desire for all Thai to
be united.65 By means of this notion of a steady stream of Thai flow-
ing southwards from China, Suwannaphum thus emerges as a Thai-
land or Thai space with a crucial mythical past providing a sense
of historical legitimacy for the present ‘flows’. Although the various
groups of this Thai people, including the Khmer and Vietnamese,
were later subjected to different developments, they were linked
together in a distant past. That is what counted most. Within this
framework Suwannaphum or Laem Thong became synonymous with
an enlarged Thai space or Thai-land of the past, one which super-
seded the warfare and antagonisms of the more recent past.
80

Researchers writing about Wichit and the pan-Thai ideology of

the 1930s stress that he was influenced by a French-produced map
he saw during a visit to Hanoi showing the extent of the Thai people,
including major areas outside of Siam.66 With regard to the perception
of a Thai-land of a distant past linked with a water-like movement of
the Thais, however, Wichit was influenced by an allegory attributed to
the French scholar Louis Finot. Finot described the movement of the
Thais from southern China in the following manner:
The march of this remarkable race – supple and fluid like water,
seeping along with the same force to take on the colour of all the
heavens and the form of all the shores, yet maintaining through its
diverse aspects the essential identity of its character and language
– spread out like an immense tablecloth over southern China,
Tonkin, Laos, Siam and into Burma and Assam.67
In Wichit’s interpretation, Finot’s allegory not only delineates
the spatial contours of the larger Thai space – including the Khmer
– but it also expresses the notion of a basic quality uniting the Thai,
despite their differences. The common origins still count and, ac-
cording to Wichit, it was Finot’s parable that he popularised in the
song Thai Blood referred to above. Wichit also evoked Finot’s meta-
phor in a speech broadcast on the Thai national radio in November
1940 in defence of the racial kindred between the Thai and Khmer.
Through this programme, Wichit not only hoped to reach his ‘fellow
Thai’ (phuean thai) in his own country, but also the ‘fellow Thai all
over Laem Thong’, including his ‘race-fellows’ in Cambodia.68
This perception of racial kindred between the Thai and Khmer, and
of the larger space of Suwannaphum, was not just a dream for Wichit, it
was in fact widely accepted in military circles. In an article published in
the journal of the Thai Army, Yuthakot, for example, the author praises
the play Rachamanu for reminding the audience about the racial bonds
that exist among all the people inhabiting Laem Thong.69 In his study
of Wichit Wathakan, Scot Barmé also refers to a young army captain,
Phayom Chulanan, who, in a lecture to military cadets, advanced
the notion that the Burmese, Vietnamese, Khmer and Malays were
‘all descendants from […] original Thai stock’. When Rachamanu ap-
81

Creating Laos
peared in 1936, Wichit was hailed in a local newspaper for bringing

this ‘new information’ about the racial identity of the Khmer to public
attention and was, according to Barmé, ‘urged to continue his research
in this area and investigate possible Thai links to other inhabitants of
the Southeast Asian mainland’.70 While the notion of the wider space
of Suwannaphum as a Thai space implied the definition of the Lao as
Thai and Laos as a Thai space, the Lao were brought to the forefront
of the public discourse in 1940 when the irredentist cause gained new
momentum in Thailand.
DEMANDING THE RETURN OF THE LOST TERRITORIES

In August 1939, France proposed the signing of a non-aggression
pact with Thailand, which was designed to guarantee the territorial
integrity of French Indochina at a time when France was confronted
with a growing irredentist movement in Thailand and a war with
Germany in Europe. The Thai government used the occasion to ne-
gotiate an adjustment of the border with French Indochina, propos-
ing that the Mekong River should be adopted as the border, whereby
the territories west of the Mekong ceded in 1904 would be returned
to Thailand. After several months of negotiations the mutual non-
aggression pact was signed on 12 June 1940. The Thai proposed that
the border should be adjusted prior to ratification of the pact. But
then France was defeated by Germany. The new Vichy government
in France was, however, no more supportive of an adjustment of the
border than the Third Republic, and asked for a ratification without
territorial adjustments. In an aide-mémoire from the Legation Royale
de Thailande in France to the Vichy government, the Thai govern-
ment made its position clear. The non-aggression pact would not be
ratified unless the Mekong was adopted as a border and furthermore
it was stated that:
His Majesty’s Government would also be grateful if the French gov-
ernment would be so good as to give them a letter of assurance to the
effect that in the event of a change from French sovereignty, France
will return to Thailand the territories of Laos and Cambodia.71
82

The breakdown in the negotiations between Thailand and France

fuelled the nationalist cause in Thailand. Throughout October 1940,
large demonstrations were staged in most major cities in Thailand
in support of the return of the lost territories. It is not always clear
whether ‘lost territories’ referred to Laos and Cambodia in totality
or just to the territories of Laos west of the Mekong. This ambigu-
ity was no doubt promoted by the Thai authorities. A claim to the
totality of Laos and Cambodia was, however, reflected in semi-of-
ficial publications. On the front page of a pamphlet produced by the
Department of Information, handed out during the celebration of
Constitution Day in December 1940, a map of mainland Southeast
Asia shows the border of an enlarged Thailand at the Annamese
Cordillera, with the Democracy Monument looming large over this
entire space.72 Furthermore, a book containing correspondence from
1893 relating to the loss of the east-bank territories published by
the Ministry of Interior and distributed at a religious festival in Wat
Pathumkhongkha in 1940 contained an ‘historical map’ on the front
page. It depicts the ‘boundaries’ of an historical Siam running along
the Annamese Cordillera.73 Likewise, when speaking to military
cadets in October 1940, Wichit called for a return of the east-bank
territories ceded to France in their totality. As he urged the soldiers:
[W]e shall not limit ourselves to talk just about the frontier or the
area opposite Luang Phrabang and Pakse – we shall talk about the
left-bank of the Mekong River – we shall talk about every piece of
territory we have lost to France.74
Whatever the territory in question, it was in this context that a new
focus was placed on Laos and the Lao. Indeed, by then the Lao were ex-
plicitly defined as Thai. In the speech to military cadets, Wichit alluded to
both the Lao and the Khmer in the following manner:
[…] we have lost half of our country. This territory really belongs to
us. It is not a colony, it is not a foreign territory; rather it is a living
place for Thai people of Thai blood, our relatives, who have a way
of living, mind and culture being identical to ours; they are truly of
our own flesh and blood.75
83

Creating Laos
A reading of the newspaper Prachachat, an official publication,

for the second half of 1940 reveals how the term Lao (khon lao or
chao lao) never seems to have been used when referring to the people
inhabiting the territories making up Laos. Instead, they were simply
referred to as ‘persons of the Thai race’ (bukhon chuea chat thai), ‘Thai’
(chao thai or khon thai) or ‘Thai brethren’ (phi nong chao thai).76 After
the territories on the west-bank of the Mekong had been annexed
by Thailand in March 1941, the inhabitants in what was called the
‘liberated’ areas were referred to as ‘Champassack-Thai’ (thai cham-
pasak)77 or ‘free Thai’ (thai itsara).78 Furthermore, the Lao, Khmer
or Vietnamese soldiers fighting on the French side were typically
referred to as ‘local soldiers’ (thahan phuen mueang).79
When in 1939 Siam became Thailand, this change in the name of
the country indicated a conjoining of the name of the country and the
projected racial composition of the population. That the same merger,
according to the logic of the Thai discourse on Laos and the Lao, did
not exist between the geopolitical entity of Laos and the ethnic–racial
composition of its population, was emphasised by the term khwaen
Laos, which always seems to have been used instead of simply Laos
whenever reference to Laos was made in public in 1940–41.80 The
term khwaen, being an administrative-cum-geographical label mean-
ing ‘district’ or ‘region’, was employed to remove Laos from the orbit of
ethnically distinct countries or nations. Laos was not a country, but
an administrative entity peopled by Thai – not Lao. Phibun clari-
fied this in a speech broadcast over the radio at the end of October
1940:
As for our brethren in khwaen Khmer or khwaen Laos there may
be some people who think that they are of the Khmer race or Lao
race that are different from the Thai race. The truth is that ‘khwaen
Khmer’ or ‘khwaen Laos’ have the same ‘characteristics’ (laksana) as
khwaen Krungthep, khwaen Lopburi or khwaen Chiang Mai, which
are only names of geographical areas. The people living in these
localities – like Chiang Mai – cannot be regarded as belonging
to a different race. They are all Thai people (khon thai). Likewise,
the people living in khwaen Khmer or khwaen Laos are not of the
84

Khmer race or Lao race, but are in reality Thai. They are of Thai
blood – they are our Thai brethren.81
It is also significant that when the term khwaen Laos was em-
ployed for Laos in Thai newspapers and public announcements by
the Department of Information, it was often preceded by the three
words thi riak wa – meaning ‘that is called’ or ‘so-called’ – indicat-
ing that Laos actually was a misnomer in the same manner as we
earlier in this chapter saw how Wichit connected the term Lao with
a French invention.82 It was a misleading name, as this territory did
not constitute a Lao space, but a Thai space.
This message of Laos and the Lao belonging to a wider Thai
space was also popularised across the Mekong. Phibun, for example,
sent Mo Lam singers to Laos in 1940 for propaganda purposes and
pamphlets were either thrown out over Laos from Thai aeroplanes
or distributed by hand.83 In one such pamphlet, written in Lao, the
racial affinities were phrased in the following manner:
Indochinese brothers. We are brothers since we share the same ori-
gin, have the same [colour of the] skin, have the same religion, our
languages have the same roots, in every respect our way of living is
the same. Let us be united as brothers of the same blood and not
fight each other.84
Another pamphlet distributed in the Thakhek region in Laos
gave a radical and Wichit-like interpretation of the Thai discourse
on Laos and the Lao. It was construed as a kind of lesson about the
true nature of the racial identity of the Lao. It explained how the
term Lao was a misnomer that had been applied by foreigners and
subsequently had obscured the true Thai racial identity of the peo-
ple known as Lao. The truth was that they were Thai and previously
were united with the Thai in Thailand in one pays, and according
to the historical lesson propagated in this pamphlet, the Thai in
Thailand and in Laos:
became separated only forty-eight years ago [referring to 1893]
by the French pirates and barbarians who afterwards taught us to
name the people on the left-bank of the Mekong Lao. But the truth
85

Creating Laos
is that the people on the right-bank uphold the same language and
say: ‘We are first cousins and have the same blood in the veins.’85
At the end of 1940 the demand for a return of the lost ter-
ritories was made more concrete as Thai troops were sent to the
Thailand-Indochina border and sporadic fighting developed along
the border. These hostilities ended at the end of January 1941 when
a ceasefire was effected through Japanese intervention. Following
negotiations in Tokyo, France was forced to cede the territories west
of the Mekong opposite Luang Phrabang and Pakse, the Cambodian
province of Battambang and parts of Siemreap and Kampong Thom
to Thailand.
In this chapter we have seen how the French colonial space of
Laos from a Thai nationalist perspective was perceived as essentially
nothing but an integrated part of the nation-state of Thailand. Laos
was defined as a Thai space in terms of history and race – some of
the factors brought forward normally to define a national identity.
From a Thai nationalist perspective Laos was a ‘non-country’.86 In
the next chapters we shall see how another discourse on Laos and
the Lao was set in motion under French colonial rule. This discourse
served to buttress Laos as a separate ‘Lao space’ – both in relation to
Thailand and within French Indochina.
NOTES
1. In relation to the process whereby the Kingdom of Siam was transformed
into the nation of ‘Thai-land’ in the early part of the twentieth century,
David Streckfuss has noted that the year 1902 could be recorded on its birth
certificate. This is the year when the term ‘Thai’ started to replace ‘Siam’ or
‘Siamese’ in Thai language versions of treaties with foreign powers. Reflecting
this change I will be using ‘Thai’ and not ‘Siamese’ in the chapters dealing with
the post-1902 period. See David Streckfuss, ‘The Mixed Colonial Legacy in
Siam: Origins of Thai Racialist Thought, 1890–1910’, in Laurie J. Sears (ed.),
Autonomous Histories, Particular Truths: Essays in Honour of John R. W. Smail
(Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Monograph No. 11, Madison: University
of Wisconsin, 1993), pp. 139–140.
2. Still, we need to employ the term ‘lost territories’ with prudence. What be-
came Laos can be regarded as a lost territory in the sense of being a territory
86

‘lost’ by a nascent nation-state trying to establish modern territorial rights in

an area where such rights had not existed before. It is not a territory ceded by
a timeless nation-state, as Thai nationalist historiography claims. In order to
clarify this distinction I should have kept the term ‘lost territories’ in quotation
marks throughout the text. However, for reasons of typographical simplicity I
have dropped the quotation marks.
3. Thamrongsak Phertlert-anan, ‘Kan riak rong din daen pho so 2483’ [The de-
mand for territories in 1940], Samut Sangkhomsat, 12:3–4, 1990, pp. 57–58.
The seaboard provinces of Chanthaburi and Trat bordering Cambodia were
occupied by French troops until Siam had complied with the stipulations in
the 1893 treaty.
4. Quoted in ibid., p. 57.
5. Thongchai Winichakul, Siam Mapped. A History of the Geo-Body of a Nation
(Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1994), p. 150.
6. Thamrongsak, ‘Kan riak rong din daen’, p. 58.
7. See Kitiyakorn Woralag, Phumisat khong prathet sayam – samrap rongrian thai
[Geography of Siam for Thai schools] (Bangkok: no publisher, 1900); or a
textbook in the history of the five first Bangkok kings: Krom Rachabandit
[Department of the Royal Academy], Thetsana phra rachaprawat phong-
sawadan krungthep [A sermon on the history of the kings and of Bangkok]
(Bangkok: Nangsuephim Thai, 1913).
8. Inthara Prasat, Baep rian phumisat lem nueng wa duai thawip asia [Textbook
in geography, book one: about the Asian Continent] (Bangkok: Rongphim
Akson Nit, 1908), p. 162. ‘Yuan’ is the Thai word to refer to what has become
the present-day state of Vietnam.
9. Ibid., front page.
10. For another example where references to the loss of territories can be found
in publications from the pre-1932 period, see Thamrongsak, ‘Kan riak rong
din daen’, pp. 48–49.
11. Krom Tamra [Department of Textbooks], Baep rian phumisat – phumisat
prathet sayam [Geography textbook: the geography of Siam] (Bangkok: Krom
Tamra Krasuang Sueksathikan, 1925), p. 153 (territory east of Chiang Rai),
p. 165 (the Mekong), p. 167 (territory east and south of Khukhan), p. 168
(Khmer territory), and p. 175 (territory north of Loei).
12. For a discussion of the emergence of this perception of Siam’s history, see
Somkiat Wanthana, ‘The Politics of Modern Thai Historiography’ (PhD
thesis, Melbourne: Monash University, 1986).
13. Krom Tamra, Baep rian phumisat, pp. 499–500.
87

Creating Laos
14. Ibid., p. 508. For an example of another contemporary publication where the
same knowledge is incorporated in the historical narrative, see Souvenir of the
Siamese Kingdom Exhibition at Lumbini Park (Bangkok: no publisher, 1925).
15. Wichit Wathakan, Prawatisat sakon [A universal history] (Bangkok: Rong
Phim Rung Watthana, 1971), Vol. V, p. 519.
16. Ibid., pp. 536, 548.
17. Ibid., p. 536.
18. Scot Barmé, Luang Wichit Wathakan and the Creation of a Thai Identity
(Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1993), p. 45; Somkiat, ‘The
Politics of Modern Thai Historiography’, p. 289.
19. See, for example, Luean Asanan, Nangsue an phumisat lem song (wa duai
prathet sayam – tam pramuan mai) samrap chan mathayom thi song kap prathom
thi hok [A reader in geography, book two (about Siam – according to the new
syllabus) for secondary school year two and primary school year six] (Bangkok:
Bamrung Nukunit, 1934); Krasuang Kalahom [Ministry of Defence], Naeo
son prawatisat sayam [Guideline for the teaching of the history of Siam]
(Bangkok: Rong Phim Krom Yuthasueksa Thahanbok, 1935).
20. Somkiat, ‘The Politics of Modern Thai Historiography’, p. 274. For a detailed
discussion of these maps and the perception of history embedded in them, see
Thongchai, Siam Mapped, pp. 150–156.
21. Barmé, Luang Wichit Wathakan, p. 125.
22. Krasuang Kalahom, Naeo son prawatisat sayam, without page.
23. Khana Yuwasan, Sayam ro so 112 [Siam in Ratanakosin Era year 112] (Bangkok:
Samnak-ngan Khana Yuwasan, 1935), p. 130. Formed during the early 1930s,
Khana Yuwasan included young Thai journalists, who primarily published
books on wars and biographies of foreign political leaders like Hitler.
24. Ibid., p. 68.
25. Volker Grabowsky, ‘The Isan up to its Integration into the Siamese State’,
in Volker Grabowsky (ed.), Regions and National Integration in Thailand
1892–1992 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 1995), p. 107.
26. Chotmai het rueang prap kabot wiangchan [Accounts of the suppression
of the Vientiane rebellion] (Cremation volume for Major Thaem Chuto,
Bangkok: 1958 [1923]); Thipakorawong, Phraracha phongsawadan krung ra-
tanakosin rachakan thi sam [The royal chronicles of the third reign] (Bangkok:
Department of Fine Arts, 1995 [1934]).
27. Krasuang Kalahom, Naeo son prawatisat sayam, pp. 244–247.
28. Krasuang Mahatthai [Ministry of Interior], Kan pokhrong khwaen lao lae
khamen [The administration of the district Laos and Cambodia] (Bangkok:
Railway Department, 1940), p. 15.
88

29. For a discussion of this issue of continuity and discontinuity in the percep-
tion of Lao history, see Martin Stuart-Fox, ‘On the Writing of Lao History:
Continuities and Discontinuities’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 24:1,
1993, pp. 106–121.
30. Luean, Nangsue an phumisat lem song, p. 45, without page (map).
31. Atlas-Geography of Siam (28 Lessons and Readings) (Orne: Imprimerie de
Montligeon, 1925), pp. 2, 4.
32. Phumisat bueang ton: wa duai prathet sayam yang sangkhep [An introductory
geography: On Siam in brief ] (Bangkok: Rong Phim Akson Nit, 1932). For
another official publication including the same map, see Ministry of Commerce
and Communications, Siam. Nature and Industry (Bangkok: Ministry of
Commerce and Communications, 1930).
33. David Streckfuss, ‘The Mixed Colonial Legacy in Siam’, pp. 139–142.
34. Volker Grabowsky, An Early Thai Census: Translation and Analysis (Institute
of Population Studies, Chulalongkorn University, Publication no. 211/93,
1993), pp. 52–53.
35. Ibid., pp. 53–54.
36. Kitiyakorn, Phumisat khong prathet sayam, p. 8.
37. Ibid., p. 51.
38. Krom Tamra, Baep rian phumisat, p. 77.
39. Ibid., p. 383
40. William Clifton Dodd, The Tai Race. Elder Brother of the Chinese (Cedar
Rapids, Iowa: The Torch Press, 1923), p. 252.
41. For publications where Lao is employed with reference to northern Siam,
see for example George Cœdès, ‘Documents sur l’histoire du Laos occidental’,
Bulletin d’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 25, 1925, pp.1–202; Reginald le
May, An Asian Arcady. The Land and Peoples of Northern Siam (Cambridge:
Heffer & Sons, 1926).
42. See, for example, Krom Tamra, Baep rian phumisat, p. 77; Kitiyakorn, Phumisat
khong prathet sayam, p. 51.
43. Dodd, The Tai Race, p. 339.
44. Ibid., p. 344.
45. Ibid., p. 340.
46. Parts appeared, for example, in Withayacharn published by the Department of
Education in 1929–30. See Withayacharn, 30:21, 1929–30, pp. 1665–1680;
31:9, 1930–31, pp. 720–727; 31:14, 1930–31, pp. 1175–1194.
89

Creating Laos
47. Wichit Wathakan, Prawatisat sakon [A universal history] (Bangkok: Rong

Phim Rung Watthana, 1971), Vol. III, pp. 15–16.
48. Wichit Wathakan, Sayam kap suwanaphum phak nueng: adit [Siam and
Suwannaphum, part one: the past] (Bangkok: without publisher, 1933), p.
87.
49. Ibid., p. 20.
50. Ibid., pp. 45–46.
51. Ibid., pp. 189–199.
52. Ibid., p. 245.
53. Actually the French term also includes Indonesia – but this is not mentioned
by Wichit. See Wichit, Prawatisat sakon, Vol. III, p. 30.
54. Wichit, Sayam kap suwanaphum, pp. 37–38.
55. Ibid., p. 245.
56. Ibid., p. 38.
57. The same perception is expressed in Khana Yuwasan, Sayam ro so 112.
58. ‘Bot lakhon rueang suek thalang’ [The battle of Thalang: A play], in Wichit
wannakhadi [Wichit literature] (Cremation volume for Lady Praphaphan
Wichitwathakan, Bangkok: 1993), p. 156.
59. For a general discussion of Wichit’s plays, see Pra-onrat Buranamat, Luang
wichit wathakan kap bot lakhon prawatisat [Luang Wichit Wathakan and the
historical plays] (Bangkok: Thammasat University Press, 1985); and Jiraporn
Witayasakpan, ‘Nationalism and the Transformation of Aesthetic Concepts:
Theatre in Thailand during the Phibun Period’ (PhD thesis, Ithaca: Cornell
University, 1992).
60. ‘Bot lakhon rueang rachamanu’ [Rachamanu: A play], in Wichit wannakhadi,
p. 25.
61. Ibid., pp. 26–27.
62. Ibid., p. 67.
63. ‘Bot lakhon rueang pho khun pha mueang’ [Phokhun Phamueang: A play], in
Wichit wannakhadi, pp. 524–525.
64. Text in Wichit Wathakan, ‘Khwam samphan thang chuea chat rawang thai
kap khamen’ [The racial relationship between Thai and Khmer], in Prachum
pathakatha khong luang wichit wathakan kiao kap rueang riak rong din daen khuen
[Collected lectures of Luang Wichit Wathakan related to the call for a return of
the Thai territories] (Bangkok: Rong Phim Phra Chan 1941), pp. 48–49.
65. ‘Bot lakhon rueang nan chao’ [Nan Chao: A play], in Wichit wannakhadi, pp.
342–343.
90

66. Barmé, Luang Wichit Wathakan, pp. 147–148; Somkiat, ‘The Politics of
Modern Thai Historiography’, p. 271.
67. Quoted in Wichit, ‘Khwam samphan thang chuea chat rawang thai kap kha-
men’, p. 47.
68. Ibid., p. 45–49.
69. ‘Khwam rusuek khong khaphachao muea du rueang lueat suphan lae racha-
manu’ [My feelings when I watched Suphan’s Blood and Rachamanu], Yuthakot,
5:6, 1936, pp. 87–91. See also ‘Kho sangket khong rao’ [Our viewpoint],
Yuthakot, 46:11, 1938, pp. 172a–172b.
70. Barmé, Luang Wichit Wathakan, p. 126–127.
71. ‘Aide-memoire, Legation Royale de Thailande, Hotel de Lilas, 17 September
1940’, d. 1148, c. 128, NF, CAOM.
72. Reproduced in Kambuputra, ‘Comment les Siamois comprennent l’indépen-
dance’, Indochine (20 January 1941), p. 2.
73. Krasuang Mahatthai [Ministry of Interior], Chodmai to top bang chabap
rueang prathet thai sia din daen [Some correspondance related to Thailand’s
loss of territories] (Bangkok: Rong Phim Rotfai, 1940), front page.
74. Wichit Wathakan, Pathakatha rueang sia din daen thai hai kae farangset
[Lecture about the loss of Thai territories to France] (Bangkok: no publisher,
1940), pp. 37–38.
75. Ibid., pp. 2–3.
76. ‘Ton rap thai tang dao’ [Welcoming Thai from abroad], Prachachat (19 July
1940), pp. 1–2; ‘Khon thai nai indochin’ [The Thai in Indochina], Prachachat
(20 August 1940), pp. 1, 16.
77. ‘Nam thiao champasak’ [Guide to Champassack], Prachachat (15 March
1941), p. 7.
78. ‘Thai mi chai samkhan nai prawatisat esia’ [Important victory for Thailand in
the history of Asia], Prachachat (20 March 1941), p. 3.
79. ‘Kamlang chai thahan’ [The spirit of the soldier], Prachachat (18 December
1940), p. 2.
80. This is the practice that can be found in articles in Prachachat throughout
1940. See, for example, ‘Thai yuen kham to farangset’ [Thailand gives an
answer to France], Prachachat (14 September 1940), p. 12; ‘Khon thai nai
indochin’ [The Thai in Indochina], Prachachat (20 September 1940), p. 9;
‘Rathaban thai chuai ratsadon lum mae nam khong’ [The Thai Government
helps the people in the Mekong Basin], Prachachat (21 September 1940), p. 7;
‘Withi haeng santiphap’ [The road to peace], Prachachat (4 October 1940), p.
91

Creating Laos
11; ‘Prawatisat yom ubat sam’ [History always repeats itself ], Prachachat (11
October 1940), p. 9.
81. ‘Kham prasai khong nayok ratamontri klao kae muan chon chao thai thang
withayu krachai siang wan thi 20 tulakhom 2483’ [Speech by the Premier to the
Thai public broadcast over the radio, 20 October 1940], in Krom Kosanakan
[Department of Information], Thai riak rong khwam yutitham [The Thai
demand justice] (Cremation volume for Mr That Vibuncan, Ayutthaya: no
publisher, 1941), p. 119.
82. For the inclusion of the words thi riak wa, see articles referred to in note 80.
For public statements by the Department of Information, see for example,
‘Rueang rathaban damnoen kan chuai luea ratsadon tam mae nam khong
thi ophayop khao ma yu nai racha anachak thai’ [The government carries on
support to the people from the Mekong River basin escaping into the Thai
Kingdom (19 September 1940)], in Krom Kosanakan, Thai riak rong khwam
yutitham, p. 292.
83. Jiraporn, ‘Nationalism and the Transformation of Aesthetic Concepts’, p. 294;
‘Télégramme officiel, Résuper à Gougal, no. 4710, Vientiane, 28 December
1940’, d. 563, CM, CAOM, reporting Thai planes over Vientiane throwing
out pamphlets.
84. ‘Pamphlet in Lao, no year’, d. 563, CM, CAOM.
85. ‘Des tracts lancés à Hinboun: Evénements importants pour le Siang Thai,
dated September 1940’, d. 563, CM, CAOM.
86. This ‘colonising view’ has also influenced Thai thinking on Laos and the Lao
in the second half of the twentieth century. For a discussion of how Thai
Princess Maha Cakri Sirindhon’s official visit to the Lao People’s Democratic
Republic in March 1990 forms a counter-narrative that legitimates the exist-
ence of Laos as an independent state of Thailand and the existence of a Lao
national identity, see Charles F. Keyes, ‘A Princess in a People’s Republic: A
New Phase in the Construction of the Lao Nation’, in Andrew Turton (ed.),
Civility and Savagery. Social Identity in Tai States (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon,
2000), pp. 206–226.
92

CHAPTER THREE
Roads, History, Religion and Language,

1893–1940
When Laos came into existence as an unprecedented territorial en-

tity at the turn of the twentieth century it was incorporated in the
overall colonial space of French Indochina. Besides Laos, Indochina
consisted of Cambodia, Tonkin, Annam and Cochinchina. Only
limited French investments and resources found their way to Laos
and social and economic development there lagged behind that of
other parts of Indochina. Reflecting this situation, in the literature
dealing with the history of Laos in the French colonial period the
epithet ‘colonial backwater’ or ‘neglected colonial backwater’ is often
invoked to characterise French colonial priorities towards Laos vis-
à-vis the other parts of French Indochina.1 Despite this perception
of Laos as a neglected colonial backwater, the French project in
Laos in the pre-World War II period in a most fundamental way
buttressed the notion of a specifically Lao cultural identity distinct
from that of Siam. In the last chapter we saw how a potent nation-
alist discourse flourished in Siam in the 1920–30s. On historical
and racial grounds, it contested the existence of Laos as a country
independent of Siam. This chapter details how the French colonial
project in Laos in the pre-World War II period was part of a wider
attempt to de-link ‘French Laos’ from this ‘Greater Siam’ in the mak-
ing. This process involved two things. First, the integration of Laos
in an Indochina-wide infrastructural network intended to sever the
93

Creating Laos
closeness of Laos to Siam in terms of infrastructure. Second, the

formation of a ‘cultural frontier’ between Laos and Siam by attrib-
uting a unique historical, religious and linguistic distinctiveness to
Laos. The nationalist character of these policies is obvious. While
these endeavours contributed to carving out a separate space for
Laos within French Indochina, we shall also see how the notion of a
‘Laos Annamite’ was expressed in the pre-World War II period and
contested the existence of a ‘Lao Laos’ within Indochina.
LAOS BETWEEN SIAM AND INDOCHINA: LINKING SPACE

When Laos came into existence at the turn of the twentieth century
the new colonial space did not constitute a unified political entity.
The organisation of Laos as a separate administrative unit within
Indochina was a piecemeal process. In the years 1893–94 individual
commissionerships were established throughout Laos in order to
secure co-operation with local leaders. A further step towards
organisational consolidation was taken in 1895 when Laos was di-
vided into two administrative parts – Upper and Lower Laos – each
administrated locally by a Commandant Supérieur. Finally, in 1899
the French merged Laos into a single administrative entity under a
Résident-Supérieur. The latter was based first in Savannakhet but
in 1900 the administrative headquarters were moved to Vientiane
when this defunct city was resurrected from the ashes of the
Siamese destruction decades earlier. The consolidation of Laos as
a separate administrative entity within Indochina formed part of
the major reorganisation of Indochina undertaken by Poul Doumer
when he served as governor-general from 1897 to 1902. While an
Indochinese Union had been established in 1887 no administrative
or political organs had been created to consolidate such a structure.
It was only with Doumer’s reforms that an administrative structure
was defined and put in place. Although Laos in this manner was con-
solidated as an independent administrative unit within Indochina,
no attempt was made to develop an indigenous political structure
to unify Laos in the pre-World War II period. Of the royal families
which the French colonised – Luang Phrabang, Xiengkhuang and
94

Roads, History, Religion and Language, 1893–1940
Champassack – only the first was recognised officially and given an

administrative identity. While the Luang Phrabang Kingdom was
administrated as a protectorate, the rest of Laos was ruled directly by
the French as a colony or as military territories. Until the unification
of Laos under the King of Luang Phrabang in 1946, the question of
the legal status of Laos remained a puzzle, despite repeated debates
in French colonial circles during the first three decades of the twen-
tieth century. The discussions centred on whether the legal status
of Laos as a whole should be considered as a colony – which would
imply that the Kingdom of Luang Phrabang should be regarded as
and administered as a colony – or as a protectorate.2 In 1923 an in-
digenous consultative assembly was formed but no representational
government followed.
The new colonial space of Laos was part of the overall colonial
space of Indochina and from the outset the French colonial project
in Indochina was guided by a vision to make this wider space a real-
ity. In his book Turning Peasants into Frenchmen, Eugen Weber has
discussed the importance of infrastructure – roads, railways and
bridges – as an agent of change in the modernisation and nationali-
sation of rural France at the turn of the twentieth century. According
to Weber, infrastructural developments not only make space man-
ageable but can be linked with movements in time and mind as well.
He sees roads and railroads as ‘great motors of civilization’ and as im-
portant tools in the formation of the modern French nation-state. In
his words: ‘there could be no national unity before there was national
circulation’.3 Infrastructure bound the national space together and
contributed to making it a living reality. In the same manner, the for-
mation of French Indochina was also associated with endeavours to
make the Indochina-wide space a reality through the development of
transport, infrastructure and communications networks. Historically,
access to the territories that became Laos had been primarily via the
Khorat Plateau to Bangkok. Therefore, to make Indochina a reality
and make Laos a viable part of an Indochina-wide space implied a
de-linking of Laos from Siam in terms of infrastructure. Attempts to
nationalise Laos itself in terms of infrastructure came later. Initially,
95

Creating Laos
in French colonial thinking railways were envisaged to form the

basic infrastructural skeleton of Indochina. Thus, a 1898-scheme
projected a line running north–south between Saigon and Hanoi
which would be connected with other lines running east–west link-
ing the coastal areas with parts in the interior of French Indochina.
It was hoped that this railway-network would link not only the
French colonial space together but would also divert trade to and
from adjacent territories – northern and northeastern parts of Siam
– away from Bangkok.4 This scheme was never achieved and only
the line running along the coast was constructed. Instead, an overall
network of roads across the Annamese Cordillera was envisaged to
form the arteries linking Laos with the coastal areas in Indochina
breathing life into the colonial space of Indochina.
However, the construction of durable roads binding Indochina
together progressed only slowly. At the same time, in Siam roads and
railways stretching out towards Laos were built. In 1921, Chiang Mai
was linked with Bangkok by railway and Chiang Mai was linked to
Chiang Rai further north by road. According to the French Resident
Commissaire in Huoixai in northern Laos this created a situation
where goods from Bangkok could reach Huoixai in 20 days while
the same goods would take at least three to four months travelling up
the Mekong.5 In 1900, Khorat was linked to Bangkok by railway and
a network of roads and tracks running towards the Mekong River
meant that Vientiane was only an estimated four days transport
from Bangkok. In terms of infrastructure Laos was evolving within a
larger Siamese space. That Laos was placed in such position vis-à-vis
Siam was repeatedly pointed out in reports in the first half of the
1920s to the Résident-Supérieur in Laos by Roland Meyer – Chef
de la Sûreté in Laos. According to Meyer the closeness between
Siam and Laos in terms of infrastructure caused French returning
to France from Laos to travel through Siam and not Saigon.6 But
he notes also how Laos in an economic sense formed a hinterland
of Siam as the major part of Laos’s exports and imports ‘converged
on Bangkok as the fingers on a hand’.7 From a French point of view
this linkage between Siam and Laos was further aggregated when
96

a Siamese air service and truck service between Nong Khai and
Khorat was introduced in early 1924. Hereby Vientiane was only
25 days from France via Bangkok as compared with 50 days via
Saigon. If these services were consolidated, Laos would, according to
Meyer, become in reality ‘the country within Indochina the closest to
Europe’. In order to keep Laos within the French sphere of influence
Meyer called for a speed-up of the infrastructural developments
within Indochina, including an upgrading (empierrement) of the
road between Thakhek and Vinh and the construction of a railway
between Tanap and Thakhek.8
The inauguration of Route Coloniale No 8 from Thakhek over
the Nape Pass to Vinh (280 km) in late 1924 and Route Coloniale
No 9 between Savannakhet and Dong-ha just north of Hue (330 km)
in 1926 can be seen as measures to de-link Laos from Siam in the
field of infrastructure. These roads certainly served to shorten past
itineraries for transport across the Annamese Cordillera. (See Figure
3.) In 1910, the previous route between Vinh and Thakhek implied
the use of four different means of transport – rail, samphan, horse or
elephant, and finally pirogue – and it was estimated to take 14 days.9
In reality, however, these new roads left much to be desired. Only
Route Coloniale No 9 was passable all year around. Route Coloniale
No 8 could be driven by trucks only in the dry season and was im-
passable in the rainy season due to flooding. Therefore, according to
a French traveller on Route Colonial No 8 in 1925, the new roads
running across the Annamese Cordillera did not imply a reversal of
trade from Bangkok. In his words, it was only the French who bought
their provisions in Saigon, while local traders acquired foreign goods
in Bangkok. In short, transport through Siam remained cheaper and
quicker.10 Looking to the northern parts of Laos, the region of Luang
Phrabang was also evolving clearly within a Siamese-centred space.
While a road between Vinh and Xiengkhuang existed by 1925 this
road could only be travelled on for five months a year due to rain and
flooding in the remaining part of the year. Further, travel beyond
Xiengkhuang to Luang Phrabang was very difficult and supported
no transportation of goods. Therefore, the shortest itinerary for the
97

Creating Laos
transport of goods to Luang Phrabang was through Siam along the

following route: from Bangkok to Lampang by railway, then by car
to Chiang Rai, and finally by river to Luang Phrabang. This route
was considerably quicker than the eight months calculated for goods
travelling to Luang Phrabang from Saigon.11 Reflecting the same spa-
tial orientation, in a book on Laos published on the occasion of the
Exposition Coloniale in 1931, tourists travelling to Laos were advised
that the quickest way from Europe to Laos was to go through Siam.12
In the 1930s the closeness between Siam and Laos in terms of infra-
structure was further accentuated when the Bangkok–Ubon railway
was constructed with its terminus merely about 30 kilometres from
Pakse.
From the middle of the 1930s attempts to counter the Siam–Laos
nexus were also made with recourse to air transport. From February
1935, Vientiane was placed on the schedule of Air France implying that
Vientiane was only nine days from Paris and three hours from Hanoi,
as compared with twenty and six before.13 Still, it was within the field
of road construction that Laos should be de-linked from Siam. Thus,
the opening of the road between Xiengkhuang and Luang Phrabang in
the middle of the 1930s was widely regarded as the means to achieve
the de-linking. Following this development in Laos’s infrastructure the
layout of Indochina’s network of roads was dominated by two major
arteries. One was the so-called Route Mandarine running between
Saigon and Hanoi along the coast. The other was Route Coloniale No
13 – or Route René-Robin as it was also called – linking the same two
cities but following the Mekong Valley. This road was hailed as bring-
ing Laos firmly into the Indochinese family and implying a definite
break away from Siam. In the words of a contributor to the journal Le
Monde Colonial Illustré:
The antique kingdom of Lan Sang [Xang] that became Laos under
the French protectorate was until 1926 more or less isolated from
the rest of Indochina. Separated from the ports in Tonkin and
Annam by the Annamese Cordillera and only linked to the rest
of the world by the Mekong the destiny of this country seemed to
be the economic satellite of Siam as the politics seemed to link by
98

CHINA VIETNAM
Phongsaly
Dien Bien Phu
A
Hanoi
RM
Luangnamtha
BU
Haiphong
andarine
Huoixei Luang Xamneua
Mekong Phrabang
te M
Rou
Xiengkhuang R.C. 7
Xayaburi An
nam
.C. 13
ese Vinh
R Paksane Nape
Phonhong
Vientiane R.C. 8 Tanap
Co
rd
ille
Nongkhai
ra
R.C.
Udon Thakhek 12
Dong-ha
Sepone
R.C. 9
Savannakhet Hué
R.
Saravane
C.
13
SIAM Khorat
Plateau Ubon Bolaven
Pakse Plateau
Khorat Attapeu
Bangkok
CAMBODIA
R.C. 13
Mekong
Border
Road VIETNAM
Phnom
Railway Penh
ute Mandarine
Uplands Ro
0 50 100 km Saigon
© NIAS Press 2008
Figure 3: Infrastructure of Laos in the colonial period.
99

Creating Laos
railroad the various locations of the Mekong with Bangkok instead

of with the French ports, especially Saigon.
But now, according to the same author, due to the new roads
Laos has ‘entered the economic unity of the colony’. The roads have
led to:
[…] a veritable miracle of spatial and moral rapprochement. Laos
has taken its place with the other countries in the Union and now
the Indochinese communauté is complete.14
Under the headline Le réveil du Laos the same achievement with-
in the field of road construction was extolled in another article in Le
Monde Colonial Illustré as:
[…] the beginning of a new era where Laos liberated from its isola-
tion, freed from hindrances will occupy its legitimate position in the
Indochinese family. […] by this work Laos has been awakened from
its nightmare that has oppressed it for a long time.15
Still, we have to distinguish between imagination and reality.
Whereas the cartographic representation of these roads reflects an
imagined integrity of Indochina in terms of infrastructure, they still
had many shortcomings. First, the road between Xiengkhuang and
Luang Phrabang was passable for motorcars in the dry season only.
Second, central parts of Route Coloniale No 13 were only passable
in the dry season and other parts simply were not constructed yet –
this included 70 kilometres on the leg between Vientiane and Luang
Phrabang and the entire stretch between Thakhek and Paksane. So
despite the endeavours to de-link Laos from Siam, Laos remained a
contested space caught at the intersection of two conflicting spatial
layouts – Siam and Indochina. However, from an intra-Indochina
perspective the new roads led to an unprecedented movement of
Vietnamese civil servants and workers within Indochina.
LAOS IN INDOCHINA: THE VIETNAMESE LINK

In French colonial thinking and practice the Vietnamese were closely
associated with the Indochina-wide colonial space as they were sup-
100

posed to form the indigenous backbone of this construction. This

pro-Vietnamese aspect of French colonial policies found expres-
sion in a westward movement of Vietnamese in order to staff the
administrative apparatus in Laos and Cambodia with Vietnamese
civil servants, and to exploit local resources by means of Vietnamese
peasants and workers. In absolute numbers the Vietnamese in Laos
remained small. The size of the Vietnamese population in Laos in-
creased from an estimated 4,000 people in 1912 to 44,500 in 1943
when they made up around merely four per cent of the total popula-
tion of Laos.16 Nonetheless the Vietnamese had a disproportionate
impact on Laos’s society, as they were concentrated in urban areas.
Thus, in 1937 the Vietnamese in Vientiane numbered 12,400 people
in comparison to only 9,570 Lao. The same pattern was reproduced
in other urban centres in Laos with an even more radical discrepancy
between the Lao and the Vietnamese. In Thakhek and Savannakhet
respectively the Vietnamese accounted for 85 and 72 per cent of
the total urban population in 1943. The only exception was Luang
Phrabang, where the Lao population accounted for 61 per cent of
the total in the same year.17 In the urban centres the Vietnamese
worked as traders and workers or were employed as civil servants in
the colonial administration and by the middle of the 1930s a little
more than half of the posts in the French administrative level of the
administration in Laos was staffed with Vietnamese civil servants.18
The presence of the Vietnamese in Laos was a most tangible indi-
cator of how the newly constructed roads running in an east–west
direction across the Annamese Cordillera had broken down earlier
barriers to the movement of people. For the Vietnamese civil servants
travelling on these roads, Indochina constituted an overall space in
which they roamed around in pursuit of employment within the
colonial administration. By 1930 a situation existed, when, in the
words of Christopher Goscha:
[…] thinking in Indochinese terms for an Annamese [Vietnamese]
was not as hard as it once seemed or as it might seem to us today.
Traditional barriers to his mobility were being eroded by French
101

Creating Laos
colonialism, eschewed or expanded by the necessity of creating

and running a modern Indochinese political, economic and admin-
istrative space. The automobile, the map, the bureaucracy, and an
unprecedented Indochinese network represented a major reorienta-
tion in traditional conceptions of time and space by 1930.19
This policy of bringing Vietnamese into Laos could be seen
as a rational solution to a practical problem within the confines of
an Indochina-wide colonial space. Since Laos had come into being
French colonial administrators had repeatedly complained about the
lack of human resources in this part of the French colonial empire.
For example, Lucien de Reinach – who served as Commissaire du
Gouvernment in Laos in the early twentieth century – estimated
that only around 30,000 of the 80,000 square kilometres of farm-
able land found in Laos was under cultivation in the first decade
of the twentieth century due to manpower shortage. Based on this
calculation Reinach believed that an increase in the population of
Laos amounting to about 500,000–600,000 people was needed to
put the land in Laos under full cultivation.20 In order to alleviate
this under-population of Laos the French made early attempts to
populate the east-bank territories with people who had been moved
from these territories by the Siamese prior to the establishment of
Laos. To this end Chao Lek – a prince from Luang Phrabang who
had been sent to Bangkok for education in the late 1880s – was at-
tached to the French delegation in Bangkok as a kind of ‘chef for the
numerous Lao in Siam’. In this capacity he travelled around Siam
to recruit Lao to return to the east-bank territories at the turn of
the twentieth century.21 This was allowed in accordance with the
convention attached to the 1893 treaty. According to Reinach only
a total of around 2,000 families – amounting to approximately
8,000 people – returned to the east-bank territories following such
initiatives.22 Against this background, Reinach argued for the move
of Vietnamese into Laos in order to profit from what he saw as
the under-populated plains in southern Laos and to put an end to
the ‘ostracism’ which Laos had experienced for too long. To move
Vietnamese into Laos made sense from an Indochina-wide per-
102

spective. For, as Reinach put it: ‘isn’t [Laos] today part of the large
Indochinese family; [and aren’t] all the people forming [this family]
in the same way French subjects?’.23 In the same manner, Gosselin,
who served also as Comissaire du Gouvernement in southern Laos
at the end of the nineteenth century, saw the Vietnamese peasants as
the key to the exploitation of Laos’s agricultural resources and linked
the movement of Vietnamese into Laos with a ‘natural expansion’ of
a people in constant growth.24 At the same time such a movement
of people was expected to lessen the problem of overpopulation,
especially in Tonkin. A French colonial administrator in Laos hoped
that roads constructed across the Annamese Cordillera linking the
overpopulated parts of Annam and Tonkin with the areas with a
lower population density on the Mekong would create a situation
where the different regions were connected as ‘communicating ves-
sels’ (vases communicantes).25
The population of French Indochina, 1921

Population (%) Area (km2) (%)
Cochinchina 3,795,613 20 66,000 9
Annam 4,933,426 26 150,000 21
Tonkin 6,850,453 36 105,000 15
Laos 818,755 4 214,000 30
Cambodia 2,402,585 13 175,000 25
Kouang-Tcheou-Wan 182,371 1 842 –
Source: Albert Sarrault, La mise en valeur des colonies francaises (Paris:
Payot, 1923), p. 131.
However, this need to bring Vietnamese into Laos in order to

gain economic benefits from this part of Indochina was linked also
with concerns other than the demographic setup of Indochina. First,
when the French strove to establish colonial rule in eastern Indochina
– Cochinchina, Annam and Tonkin – they were faced with armed
resistance and Chinese incursions. To associate Vietnamese bu-
reaucrats with the new colonial construction of Indochina formed
103

Creating Laos
one way to convince them that their interests were compatible with
the French colonial project and thereby gain their support. As Jules
Harmand argued in 1885:
The day that this race [the Vietnamese] see that its historical
ambitions can, thanks to us, come to fruition in ways that it never
imagined; when [the Vietnamese] sees that our aid allows him to
take vengeance for the humiliations and defeats that he has never
forgiven his neighbours; when he feels definitely superior to them
and sees his domination expand with ours, only then will we be able
to consider that the future of French Indochina is truly assured.26
Second, the centrality of the Vietnamese to the French colonial
project was reinforced also by the stereotypical dichotomy between
the Lao and the Vietnamese that crystallised within the French co-
lonial discourse on Laos and the Lao in the late nineteenth century:
between the dynamic and industrious Vietnamese as opposed to the
decadent and lazy Lao. The designs of Governor-General Paul Beau
(1902–08) to settle Vietnamese farmers on the fertile plains of the
Mekong was, for example, not only intended to solve a demographic
problem but was also envisioned as an important means to counter
what was perceived as Siamese designs to absorb western Indochina
in a greater Thai entity. Beau’s perception of the Vietnamese versus
the Lao was framed with reference to a perception of the history of
mainland Southeast Asia characterised by the battle for superiority
between two major races. The Vietnamese and the Thai constituted
these two combatant races while the Lao and Cambodians figured as
races on the verge of extinction. Within Indochina it was, according
to Beau’s vision, only the Vietnamese who were numerous enough,
cohesive enough and had the right personality to ‘take up the battle
successfully and smash this effort towards a unity of the Thai race
before it can be realised’ – and potentially undermine the integrity of
French Indochina.27 Taken to its logical extreme, such an association
of the development of Laos with that of the dynamic Vietnamese
manifested itself in a vision of a future Laos turned into a Vietnamese
space – ‘Laos Annamite’ – rather than a Lao space. Reflecting this
negation of a ‘Lao Laos’, plans to split up the administrative structure
104

of Laos and attach the separate parts to the administration found

in neighbouring territories within Indochina was aired in 1902–03
under the governorship of Paul Beau.28
As is evident from the figures for the Vietnamese population
in Laos found at the beginning of this section, great numbers of
Vietnamese farmers never moved into Laos and a ‘Vietnam-ification’
of Laos, as Paul Beau desired, did not take place. The idea of turning
Laos into a Vietnamese space was, however, brought forward not
only at the turn of the twentieth century. In the 1920s, at a time
when the numbers of Vietnamese in Laos increased rapidly, this idea
was strongly supported by influential French colonial administrators
in Indochina and Vietnamese nationalists. One ardent advocate of
the formation of a ‘Laos Annamite’ was Jean Marquet – a longtime
civil servant in eastern Indochina and author of several texts extol-
ling Vietnamese tradition. In 1925 Marquet travelled to Laos on the
newly constructed Route Coloniale No 8 running between Vinh
and Thakhek and he was thrilled with what he saw:
The Annamese [Vietnamese], who are marvellous colonisers, have
begun to invade Laos. There are already 3,000 of them in Vientiane.
Placed before them, the Laotians, gentler and less organised, have
drawn away. The Annamese [Vietnamese] peddler wrests or buys
up everything he can in the most remote of places. Despite the
wild animals, some of them make 15-day road trips to bring back
to the Delta a sow and her piglets, whipping them along the way.
Soon, thanks to trucks the Annamese [Vietnamese] will push the
Laotians into the unhealthy forests.29
With the roads Marquet believed that more Vietnamese would
follow and with them the development of Laos:
Very mild temperatures, the great silence of mountainous banks
and the ‘susu’ peace of gentle and happy Laos. For the Laotians are
perfect beings, on one condition: that you do not ask them to work!
This country is horrified by [physical] exertion like a mad dog is
by water. And this leads us into a terrible blind-alley: either doing
nothing in order to conserve the Laotian or developing the country
and the Laotians will disappear. They have already fled Vientiane;
105

Creating Laos
3,000 Annamese [Vietnamese] have replaced them. They [the

Laotians] increasingly abandon Luang Phrabang, whose population
has decreased by half over the last ten years. On the other hand,
400 Annamese [Vietnamese] have now settled in and work there.
The development of this country, whose potential is nonetheless
enormous, cannot be done without the Annamese [Vietnamese]
race. Without considering this saving fact and until it happens,
Laos will continue to be what it is, to use the words of the late Van
Vollenhoven: a blister on the foot of the peasants from Annam.30
The same year, Marquet aired similar views in a lecture to the
Education Society of Tonkin as he called for a full-scale colonisation
of Laos by the Vietnamese who were ‘superior both in number and
worth to the other Indochinese peoples’, who, he argued, ‘would be
fatally absorbed’ one day or another by the Vietnamese. Reflecting
the same view on Vietnamese expansion within Indochina he
wrote later in a personal dedication to Bao Dai: ‘Soon the Mekong
River will be the final western wall of your three clawed Empire!
Cochinchina, Annam and Tonkin.’31 In arguing so Marquet set the
stage for Indochina as the geographical framework for a Vietnamese
nationalism which was advocated also by many Vietnamese nation-
alists in the 1920–30s, implying the transformation of Laos from a
‘Lao Laos’ to that of a ‘Laos Annamite’.
Such a perception of Laos was contested from various positions.
For many a Vietnamese nationalist the geographical delineation of
their nationalism was ‘limited’ to Cochinchina, Annam and Tonkin
and did not imply a ‘Vietnam-ification’ of Laos.32 It was, however,
also rejected by a prominent Lao voice. In March 1931 the Hanoi-
based newspaper France-Indochine published an interview with
the Prince Phetsarath which addressed the issue of Vietnamese
immigration into Laos. Prince Phetsarath was born into the royal
family of the Luang Phrabang Kingdom as son of Viceroy Boun
Kong in 1890. After having been educated abroad – in Vietnam,
France and England – he returned to Laos as a young man. Here
he pursued a career in the colonial administration and rose to the
post of Inspector of Lao Political and Administrative Affairs – the
106

highest post for a Lao in the colonial administration in Laos. His

education, position, travels and curiosity put him in touch with the
country, its peoples, their needs and Laos’s future. Up until the end
of World War II, Prince Phetsarath emerged as one of Laos’s most
important modernisers under French colonial rule and an ardent
nationalist. In the interview, Prince Phetsarath stated that he was
not totally opposed to Vietnamese immigration into Laos. But he
stressed that the immigration had to be controlled and the immi-
grants had to be subjected to the current law and institutions in Laos
so that they should not end up forming a state-within-the-state. In
that connection Prince Phetsarath also stated clearly his opposition
to the existing split-up of Laos into two separate entities. For him
Laos did exist and should be united as one political entity under the
King of Luang Phrabang.33 What we have here is a clash between a
French administrative and a local nationalist perception of the state.
From a French Indochina administrative point of view Laos formed
a viable administrative entity – no matter if it was split into two
separate administrative entities or whether Vietnamese dominated
its administrative apparatus and major towns. From a nationalist
point of view, however, such a situation was highly untenable.
A similar critical stance towards the prospects of Laos as a
potential receptor of Vietnamese immigrants was shared and ad-
vocated by French serving in the colonial administration in Laos.
Some years before the interview with Prince Phetsarath appeared
in the press, a report dealing with the prospects of Vietnamese im-
migration into Laos was submitted to the Résident-Supérieur of
Laos. The report was written by J. Dauplay, who served as Inspector
of Political and Administrative Affairs in Laos. At that time Prince
Phetsarath also held the position as the Lao Inspector of Political
and Administrative Affairs in Laos and there is a basic agreement
between Dauplay and Prince Phetsarath concerning the role they as-
sign for the Vietnamese in Laos. The main conclusion of the report
was that the influx of Vietnamese into Laos should not be stopped
but controlled so that the Lao were not squeezed out of Laos – as
Marquet hoped. Dauplay had decided to submit the report as a reac-
107

Creating Laos
tion to what he had witnessed during a trip to Tonkin in 1924. There

he had been appalled by the perception of Laos he had encountered
among his colleagues working in this part of Indochina – a percep-
tion he believed could be linked with what he called the ‘myth of
Laos’. He summarised this myth in the following three points. First,
Laos is a poor country without interest for the French except as a
spillway for the surplus Vietnamese population. Second, there is no
need to worry about the population increase in Tonkin as Laos with
its immense fertile – but yet uncultivated areas – can absorb this
population. Third, the French need only be inspired by the work of
Gia Long and do with Laos what he had done in Cochinchina.
According to Dauplay most of the land in Laos that could be
farmed was already occupied by Lao farmers and only a limited
quantity of uncultivated land of poor quality was available. Therefore
he called for the making of an inventory of land actually available
in Laos for Vietnamese peasants. The stream of Vietnamese peas-
ants had to be moderated in accordance with the reality of available
resources rather than mythical perceptions of Laos. For, as Dauplay
puts it, ‘nobody in Laos wants the Lao to disappear and supports
the invasion of the Annamese [Vietnamese] race’.34 Dauplay’s point
of view was seconded by the French Commissioners in Thakhek,
Savannakhet, Pakse, Vientiane, and Saravane.35 Later, he became
Résident-Supérieur in Laos per interim. In this position he passed
on his report to the Governor-General of Indochina and recom-
mended that no more than 10,000 Vietnamese families should be
allowed to settle in Laos, which, he pointed out, was an amount far
from what was ‘presumed by many Indochinese personalities’.36 In
the report Dauplay does not state who these ‘Indochinese personali-
ties’ include but from a note he later wrote to the Governor-General
of Indochina it is clear that he had Marquet in mind. In the note he
asked for permission to send the relevant dossiers to Marquet ‘in or-
der to open his eyes’. This was authorised by the Governor General.37
The position of Dauplay was therefore not to call for a total stop to
Vietnamese immigration into Laos but to ensure that this immigra-
tion was controlled in accordance with local needs and resources,
108

instead of being framed by social-Darwinist perceptions of the Lao

versus the Vietnamese, a call that also implied the preservation of a
Laos for the Lao.
In public, Marquet’s position was also countered implicitly in an
article in the journal Le Monde Colonial Illustré by a Doctor Legendre,
who had also travelled on the newly opened Route Colonial No 8
in 1925. On the one hand, Legendre hailed the new road and the
possibilities it offered in relation to the exploitation of resources in
Laos by bringing in people from Tonkin who he characterised as ‘a
group of people more active than the Lao’, a position that fits well
with Marquet’s vision of a ‘Laos Annamite’ and the metaphor of con-
nected vessels. On the other hand, Legendre also offered a notable
reservation as he pointed out that this Vietnamese immigration
should only involve a limited amount of Vietnamese so that they
did not exert any influence on the ‘social environment’ of the Lao. In
fact, Legendre held that the construction of new roads would in fact
make Vietnamese immigration into Laos unnecessary, as the roads
would make it possible for the Lao to export their products, which
in turn would induce diligence among the Lao.38
In a book on Laos published as part of the official publications
on the occasion of the Exposition Coloniale in Paris in 1931 we are
presented with the same opinion that a balance has to be reached
between, on the one hand, the need for harvesting economic gains
from Laos by employing Vietnamese manpower, and, on the other
hand, for Laos to be a function of the Lao. In the words of the author,
Roland Meyer:
Laos for the Laotians? Without a doubt. The Laotians are the eth-
nic majority and the first occupiers of the land. They will remain
the real masters. But, as a scattered race or a not very prolific one,
they will not be able to elude the demographic phenomenon of [in-
creasing the population] through [bringing in] non-natives, which
will develop and regenerate their country [pays].39
For Meyer there was no doubt that the Vietnamese constituted
the non-native element necessary for the economic development of
109

Creating Laos
Laos. By constructing roads across the Annamese Cordillera the

French had created the necessary conditions for opening up Laos
for the Vietnamese. In this process, however, Laos was opened up
for a population more ‘bold, enterprising, [and] ready to fight’ than
the Lao and a population that may make a ‘mouthful’ of the Lao.
According to Meyer, it was the responsibility of the French to avoid
this. It was the duty of the French to safeguard the Lao in Laos
against this non-native element:
As long as our protected [the Lao] have not learned to defend
themselves, we will have to exercise a guardianship [over them],
unless we want to see them eliminated by coming into contact with
more audacious races and disappear from their own patrie.40
To present Laos as a distinct Lao patrie within Indochina was
in conformity with the political orientation taken especially under
the governorship of Pierre Pasquier, who served as Governor-
General of Indochina in the period 1928–34. For Pasquier French
Indochina was to be developed along federal lines, implying that the
French colonial project should be linked with the preservation of
local identities, languages and traditions, to be bound together by
French colonialism.41 While Pasquier had already taken this posi-
tion in the late 1920s it was strengthened by the communist and
nationalist revolts in Tonkin and Annam in the early 1930s. In the
light of these revolts, a Vietnamese dominance of Indochina figured
no longer as an dynamic factor to buttress French colonial rule. An
Indochina dominated by the Vietnamese could now be seen as a
threat to continued French colonial rule. From this point of view,
French preservation of cultural traditions within Indochina other
than the Vietnamese made sense. Such an orientation in French poli-
cies was well understood by Prince Phetsarath, who, in the interview
mentioned earlier in this section, did not miss the chance to air it in
public. Thus, Prince Phetsarath argued that his proposition to but-
tress Laos as a Lao space within the overall Indochina-wide colonial
project from a French colonial point of view was politically more
opportune than turning it into a Vietnamese space. Here he played
110

up the vision of the Lao as a loyal and pro-French population while

the Vietnamese were associated with anti-French communism.42 In
this manner a new dimension was added to the Lao–Vietnamese
dichotomy, which placed the Lao in a more favourable light than the
Vietnamese, and supported the idea of a Laos for the Lao. Later,
Tzenas du Montcel, Inspecteur des Colonies, alluded to the same
aspect of the Lao–Vietnamese nexus in a 1937 report on the advan-
tages of gradually replacing the Vietnamese in the French adminis-
tration in Laos with Lao:
The Laotian element represents an unquestionable loyalty and at
this moment when the pays annamite is deeply wrought by revolu-
tionary elements it seems not very [wise] politically to avoid playing
an excellent card.43
Therefore, Montcel also welcomed various initiatives undertaken
in the 1930s to safeguard the place of the Lao in the administration
in Laos. Here Montcel for example referred to various arrêts passed
in the 1920s–30s in order to ensure that specific positions in the
administration in Laos were occupied solely by Lao, measures that
all pointed in the direction of strengthening the idea of Laos as a
Lao space within Indochina as opposed to a ‘Laos Annamite’. In the
following section we shall see how life was breathed into the notion
of a ‘Lao Laos’ in a cultural sense by buttressing the notion of a dis-
tinct Lao cultural identity with reference to perceptions of history,
religion and language. This process carved out a place for a ‘Lao Laos’
within Indochina and implied a de-linking of Laos from Siam from
a cultural point of view.
TOWARDS A NATIONAL HISTORY OF LAOS

In the words of Benedict Anderson, one of the intriguing paradoxes
of the modern nation-state is ‘the objective modernity of nations to
the historian’s eyes vs. their subjective antiquity in the eyes of nation-
alists’.44 This paradox derives from the overt contradiction between,
on the one hand, the modern and contingent nature of the nation,
and, on the other hand, the nation as the subject of a linear and evolu-
111

Creating Laos
tionary history rooted in a distant past. The linear and evolutionary

perception of history has its roots in the Enlightenment’s teleologi-
cal model of history. Subsequently, it was spread to the colonial do-
mains where it formed part of new knowledge forms that conquered
other ways of conceptualising the past. The colonial state’s diffusion
of historical narratives includes not only the concept of historical
time as linear and evolutional but also, as Dipesh Chakrabarty has
discussed, the validation of colonisation as a necessary dynamism
that modernises regions lagging behind.45 In the same vein, Penny
Edwards has argued that in Cambodia the new historicist narratives
introduced in the French colonial period comprised ‘visions of de-
scent from a glorious Angkorean past, and prospects of ascent to a
thoroughly modern future which deviated from an indigenous read-
ing of time as at once cyclical and, in its accommodation of spirits
and living beings in the same temporal space, multilayered’.46 With
the advent of French colonialism a new way of writing history fol-
lowed also in Laos and challenged and replaced the local chronicle
tradition, which presented the history of a kingdom or dynasty, with
a history of the modern state written along the lines of a modern
national history.47 The development of this kind of historical writ-
ing can be traced back to French colonial historiography in the early
1930s when the first comprehensive French history of Laos was
written. This is the history of Laos produced by Paul Le Boulanger
on the occasion of the Exposition Coloniale in Paris in 1931, in
which a narrative locating the early roots of the modern state of
Laos in a distant past is expressed. The major part of this book is
dedicated to the treatment of the history of the Lao kingdoms in
the Mekong region prior to the formation of Laos in 1893. Only
in the last chapter is the history of French Laos treated, in merely
fifty of the book’s almost 400 pages.48 Due to the cursory treatment
of the modern state of French Laos found in this book, it could be
argued that its title, Histoire du Laos Français, is in fact misleading.
However, the apparent discrepancy between the title and content
of the book expresses in fact the essence of the historical narrative
– adding historical depth to the modern state. Thus, the history of
112

the modern state of French Laos is not limited to the history of the
territorial state after it was founded by the French in the end of the
nineteenth century. Rather, in the historical narrative proposed by
Le Boulanger the history of French Laos is linked with the history of
the Lao kingdoms in the Mekong region. In this manner the forma-
tion of French Laos becomes the culmination of a linear history in
which the Lao kingdoms in the Mekong region form the constituent
parts of the past and French colonialism forms the necessary dyna-
mism safeguarding Laos.
It is also in the 1930s that the first history books in Lao adopt-
ing a national framework were written and used in schools in Laos.
A good example of this shift in writing history is the course-book
entitled A Lao History/Chronicle from 1934 written by two teachers
in Vientiane. Another is a A Lao Reader published the same year in
which a condensed presentation of Laos’s history can be found in
one of the chapters.49 In these two text-books the history of Laos is
depicted as following a chronological axis, in which the ancient Lan
Xang Kingdom constitutes the early beginnings of Laos’s history in
terms of state structures. With reference to a pantheon of legendary
Lao hero-kings personalising different epochs, we can divide the his-
tory into the following parts. Legendary King Fa Ngum (1353–73)
represents the formative period and is hailed as the king who brought
unity to the country by bringing the many hitherto independent
principalities in the Mekong region under the sway of the King of
Lan Xang to form the first independent Lao kingdom. In this process
of state-formation Fa Ngum is also praised for bringing Buddhism
to the kingdom to enhance the unity of the population. Proceeding
along the chronological axis and the list of legendary Lao kings we
encounter King Samsenthai (1373–1417), son and successor to Fa
Ngum, who personalises a period of consolidation. Unlike his father,
Samsenthai was not a warrior king or conqueror but a religious king
who brought peace and tranquillity to Lan Xang. Society was put
in order, military service improved, and the king cultivated friendly
relations with neighbouring countries. Under his reign Lan Xang is
characterised by peace and harmonious co-existence.
113

Creating Laos
Proceeding further along this list of legendary Lao kings of

Lan Xang we encounter the reign of King Setthathirat (1548–71),
which marks a transitory step on the road to the apogee of the Lan
Xang Kingdom, to be experienced later under the reign of King
Souligna Vongsa. Although the capital city of Vientiane flourised
under Setthathirat, his reign was marred by continued warfare
against Burmese invaders. After a brief period when the Lan Xang
Kingdom was under Burmese rule there followed a period of chaos
and disorder, which gave way to the reign of King Souligna Vongsa
(1637–94). This king personifies the golden age. His rule marks a
period when the kingdom is more flourishing than ever. The account
of Van Wuysthoff – the Dutch trader who visited Vientiane in the
1640s – is presented to give a colourful portrait of Vientiane as a
joyful and pleasant city adorned with many temples. This reign is
also a period in which much literature was produced by the many
learned people residing in Vientiane.
From this point the accounts presented in the two books dif-
fer slightly. In A Lao History/Chronicle we encounter an elaborate
account of how this golden age is followed by a period of gradual
decline and an almost total annihilation of an independent Lao state.
First, this process of decline is marked by the breaking up of the
unity of the Lan Xang Kingdom as it is divided into ‘two countries’
(kan baengpan pathet pen song fai) or two ‘autonomous states’ (dai
baeng pen song ekarat).50 Champassack is mentioned as another state
breaking away from the Lan Xang Kingdom, but as it quickly be-
came integrated into Siam it is not dealt with as an independent
Lao state on a par with Vientiane and Luang Phrabang.51 Following
the disintegration of the Lan Xang Kingdom the history of Laos
is tainted by increased Siamese intervention from the late eight-
eenth century, and finally by the destruction and disappearance of
the Vientiane Kingdom in the early nineteenth century. The only
bright spot in this process of decline was the reign of King Anou
of Vientiane (1804–28). Not only did he reign over a prosperous
Vientiane, but he also embodied the desire to free his country from
the yoke of Siamese domination. But his efforts to liberate Vientiane
114

from the Siamese were unsuccessful. The result was devastating,

symbolised by the sacking of Vientiane by Siamese forces. All that
was left of the great and prosperous Kingdom of Lan Xang was the
small Kingdom of Luang Phrabang. But the process of decline con-
tinued as the Luang Phrabang Kingdom is compared with a ‘district
in Siam’ (khet khwaeng khong sayam) and the status of the King of
Luang Phrabang with that of a ‘district official in Siam’ (kha rachakan
khwaeng nai pathet sayam).52 Despite the disastrous outcome of King
Anou’s fight against the Siamese he emerges as a genuine hero-king
in the history of Laos due to his desire to free his country from the
Siamese. In comparison, the contemporary King Manthathurat of
Luang Phrabang is proclaimed the great villain of Lao history as
he, due to selfishness (chaj khaep), refrained from supporting King
Anou’s crusade against the Siamese.53 In the short account found
in A Lao Reader the text deals with King Anou immediately after
King Souligna Vongsa, with no explicit reference to the break-up of
the Lan Xang Kingdom that happened in early eighteenth century.
Neither is it mentioned that King Anou’s kingdom was a vassal of
Siam.54 After praising the greatness of King Anou we are just told
that he fought a war against Siam that marked the end of the ‘civili-
sation of the Vientiane kingdom’.55 Thus, while the split-up of Lan
Xang is mentioned implicitly, the text nonetheless conveys a notion
of continuity. Later in the text, however, reference is explicitly made
to the fragmentation of Lan Xang into ‘two countries’.56
Finally, this pitiful phase in the history of Laos is followed by
re-constitution under French rule. The French are linked with the
liberation and resurrection of Laos and the first chapter covering
this period of Laos’s history in A Lao History/Chronicle is illustra-
tively called ‘The French Come to Help’ (falang khao ma suai).57 Just
as the history of Laos preceding this period of re-constitution has
been personified with reference to Lao kings, the French interven-
tion is in the same way personified by Pavie to whom the King of
Luang Phrabang and the people voluntarily entrusted themselves.
Subsequently the accomplishments in the fields of health, education,
and economy under French rule are cherished and the text leaves
115

Creating Laos
no doubt about how France brought happiness to Laos.58 The same

interpretation of French rule is found in A Lao Reader where, for
example, it is stated that under French rule the Lao have ‘gained con-
fidence in their own strength and wisdom’.59
This narrative of Lao history is plagued by a great sense of dis-
continuity. From being a major kingdom, Lan Xang was first split up
and later the smaller parts were either destroyed or integrated into
Siam. Nonetheless, a pretence of continuity is presented in the narra-
tive. First of all, throughout the text-books the term ‘country’ (pathet)
is used as a prefix with both the historical kingdom of Lan Xang
(pathet lan sang) and the modern state of Laos (pathet lao).60 Secondly,
the term for the modern state ‘Laos’ (pathet lao) is also employed
with reference to the historical state. In A Lao Reader Fa Ngum is,
for example, identified as the person who successfully ‘unified Laos’
(huap huam pathet lao hai pen an nueng an diao).61 In the same book,
the link is stressed further by calling Lan Xang ‘our country Lan
Xang’ (prathet lan sang hao).62 So despite the split-up preceding the
reign of King Anou and the destruction of Vientiane, ‘Lan Xang’
is made synonymous with a timeless entity that continues to exist
despite all the apparent changes. In the same vein it is mentioned in
A Lao Reader how Vientiane – the capital of Setthathirat that the
Siamese destroyed so utterly – has become the ‘capital of Laos again’
and even though it has changed, the temples and religious monu-
ments are ‘souvenirs of the glory of Lan Xang’.63 The narrative brings
Laos into being as a historically constituted state and what we have
here is the outline of a proto-national history where the historical
roots of the modern state are ‘discovered’ in the ancient past. What
we have also, of course, is a nice example of a colonial legitimising
discourse where the survival of a timeless ‘Laos’ is intimately linked
with French colonialism.
In the last chapter we saw the importance of historical maps in
representing Laos as a ‘non-country’ in Thai nationalist discourse in
the 1930s. In A Lao History/Chronicle we encounter a sequence of
maps similar to the ones discussed in the previous chapter for Siam.
A map of Lan Xang (pathet lan sang) during the reign of King Fa
116

Ngum encompassing most of what is today northern and north-

eastern Thailand and Laos is included, as well as one showing the
boundaries of a much smaller contemporary Laos.64 Whereas such
maps express the historical greatness of ‘Laos’ they also accentuate
how the history of Laos is a tale of decline. In the book this decline
is, however, not linked with a wise strategy adopted by the king for
the survival of the nation, and neither is a call for a return of the ‘lost’
territories voiced, which would have put the tale of decline in a posi-
tive light – as it was in Siam in the 1930s. To call for a ‘return of the
lost provinces’ was impossible in this colonial representation of Laos’s
history because such a call potentially could have led to blaming the
French for not ‘resurrecting’ all of Lan Xang. By invoking only the
aspect of decline and the French as liberators the narrative becomes
an important element in the colonial legitimising discourse. Through
this historical narrative the lesson is taught that without the French
Laos would not have existed in the modern period, a fact that haunts
modern Lao historians who remember the ‘lost’ provinces.65
The historical narrative and its associations with a colonial le-
gitimising discourse are expressed forcefully in the fate of the city of
Vientiane. Associated with the reigns of Setthathirat and Souligna
Vongsa, Vientiane symbolises the apex of the golden age of the Lan
Xang Kingdom. The destruction of this city by the Siamese thus
expresses the quintessence of the Siamese oppression and tyranny
that brought Laos to the brink of extinction. Resurrected by the
French, Vientiane becomes a carrier of continuity in the history of
Laos and a symbol of the resurrection of Laos under French tute-
lage. As this defunct city was resurrected from the past the streets
were given the names of French colonialists and Lao kings of the
past, expressing the close inter-linkage between Laos and the French
in the present.66 In the general survey of Laos published together
with Le Boulanger’s account of Laos’s history on the occasion of the
Exposition Coloniale in Paris in 1931, Roland Meyer neatly summa-
ries the role of Vientiane in the colonial logic. Due to the historical
position of this city devoid of links to the other parts of Indochina
other than the Mekong River, the resurrection of Vientiane was not
117

Creating Laos
an easy task to accomplish. But this ‘task of a magician’ – as Meyer

calls it – was accomplished because of the important symbolism as-
sociated with this city:
[…] this leaderless country [Laos] should have a capital, a political
centre [capable of ] rallying the weak forces of the ancient genera-
tions and the hopes of the new. The site of Vientiane, the dead city,
was chosen as a symbol for the renaissance of Laos and this bold
initiative was what we needed to win all the hearts.67
Furthermore, the link between the past and present was accen-
tuated as the new premises of the French Résident-Supérieur were
built on top of the remains of King Setthathirat’s palace to form
a new ‘political heart of Laos called for to compensate for the van-
ished monarchy of Lan Cang [Xang]’.68 All this was lost upon Jean
Marquet. Reporting on his trip to Laos in 1925 he notes that he had
seen instead the capital of Laos situated further south in Thakhek,
which was the locality supposed to become the terminus of the pro-
jected – but never constructed – railway running from Tan Ap on
the coast south of Vinh.69 Whereas Marquet’s idea might make sense
from the perspective of infrastructure his suggestion does not take
into account the potent symbolism associated with Vientiane – a
symbolism that is meaningless in Marquet’s perspective of a ‘Laos
Annamite’.
Later, after Vientiane had been resurrected, the link to the
past was further accentuated through the restoration of religious
monuments and temples. Of special interest were That Luang and
Wat Phra Kaeo, dating back to the reign of Setthathirat, and Wat
Sisaket, erected during the reign of Anou.70 These were monuments
that formed the last remains of a ‘flourishing civilisation’ and could
give back to ‘the ancient capital of the kings of Vientiane a part of
the monuments that survive as testimonies of its splendour’, as
the Résident-Supérieur of Laos in 1911 noted to the Governor-
General, requesting financial support for the restoration of these
monuments.71 The restoration of monuments, however, not only
supplied Laos with symbols representing a glorious past. As an inte-
118

grated part of the resurrection of Vientiane, they expressed also the

essence of the historical narrative outlined above where the survival
of the Lao was closely linked with French colonial rule. Thus, the
monuments were relics of a glorious past that it has been possible to
resurrect only because of the French. In relation to Wat Sisaket the
Résident-Supérieur in Laos expressed the symbolic importance of
the resurrection of this temple in the following manner:
Wat Sisaket, the doyen of the Laotian temples and the only survivor
from the glorious kingdom of Vientiane, remains in the middle of
the vestiges of the temples and ruined buildings as a symbol, to in-
stil into modern Laos a remembrance of its history and the hope of
a renaissance under the aegis of the French protectorate.72
The problem of the resurrection of Vientiane from a national
perspective was, however, that it endorsed the division of Laos into
two separate spaces – that of the Kingdom of Luang Phrabang and
the rest of Laos – with reference to the past. But what needs to be
stressed is how the immediate past of the Siamese presence and ex-
pansion is bypassed with reference to a more distant past symbolised
by an autonomous Lao past – whether this is done with reference
to a united Lao political structure (Lan Xang), or separate Lao po-
litical structures (the kingdoms of Luang Phrabang and Vientiane).
This perception of Laos’s history clearly formed a counter-narrative
to the Thai perception of Laos as a ‘history-less’ colonial construct.
Through this narrative ‘Laos’ is placed on the historical scene and
the discontinuities of a recent past are played down with reference
to a distant past. This perception also formed a counter-narrative
to what could be called a Vietnamese or Indochina-oriented ap-
proach to the history of Laos, which, for example, is expressed in a
schoolbook on the history of Annam used for primary education in
schools in Indochina. According to this text Laos ‘had never formed
a unified state placed under the authority of a single government’
and when the French established protectorates over Annam and
Cambodia it was only natural that the French also intervened in the
Lao territories considered as vassals of these two kingdoms.73 Here
119

Creating Laos
we are confronted with a historical deconstruction of the modern

state of Laos in accordance with a ‘Laos Annamite’ approach. The
historical narrative found in schoolbooks and the monumental past
represented by Vientiane as a whole and the temples of this town
served not only to define Laos as a Lao space distinct from Siam
but also singled it out as a separate, historically constituted country
within Indochina. And this is also where religion could be used to
serve nationalist ends.
TOWARDS A NATIONALISATION OF RELIGION:

THE BUDDHIST INSTITUTE
Vientiane formed an important regional centre for religious stud-
ies during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, attracting
monks from Siam and Cambodia. But this position naturally was
eclipsed after the town was destroyed by the army from Bangkok
in 1828. Subsequently, Lao monks from the Khorat Plateau started
travelling to temples in Bangkok for religious studies.74 The revival
of Vientiane by the French did not lead to Vientiane regaining its
position as a centre for religious studies of regional importance. Yet,
when a teachers’ training college for monks (école normale de bonzes)
was established in Vientiane in 1909 Vientiane became the centre
where monks from all over Laos met for secular studies.75 The foun-
dation of this school was linked with the scheme of using the pagoda
schools to diffuse secular education in the vast territories of Laos,
and in the early 1930s more students were enrolled in pagoda schools
than government schools.76 At the school in Vientiane monk-teach-
ers received instruction preparing them for their task as teachers of
reading, writing, and calculation. A similar school was established in
Luang Phrabang, while additional ones planned for other localities
in Laos – in Pakse and Savannakhet – never materialised. Therefore,
while Vientiane in this sense was revived as a secular educational
centre for Lao monks this was not linked with religious education
as in the past. Rather, in the religious sphere it was Bangkok that
constituted the religious metropolis attracting monks not only from
Laos but also from Cambodia for higher religious studies. According
120

to a French anonymous note from 1918, a situation existed where

Laos and Cambodia,
due to their religious brotherhood [with Siam] are exposed to becom-
ing spiritually dominated by Siam. Bangkok is a religious metropolis
that exerts a major attraction on all Lao and Cambodian monks, edu-
cated as well as uneducated. Up to the present [Siam] has – in this
part of the Far East – been the centre of Buddhist studies, the guard-
ian of religious traditions, and the centre for a recognised ecclesiastic
hegemony. It is there [in Siam] that the sacred texts are compiled and
printed; it is from there they [the texts] are dispersed.
Such a close relationship between Laos and Siam in the reli-
gious sphere was de facto running against the integrity of French
Indochina. This was a situation that potentially could be worsened
if Thai monks were granted freedom to conduct missionary activity
in Indochina, as the Franco-Siamese treaty of 1925 allowed. The
note referred to above neatly summarised the political implications
that could arise from such a religious association:
The consequences of such a liberty, appearing simply as being
religious, may prove disastrous, as for Siam, Buddhism is before
anything else a Siamese religion closely associated with Siamese
patriotic ambitions. To prevent that a real nationalism unifies the
two parts of French Indochina with Siam, we have to make Phnom
Penh the base for all Buddhist propaganda.
The newly established Royal Library in Phnom Penh was con-
ceived to form the centre for the efforts to counter the Siamese re-
ligious and political influence. With regard to the efforts to counter
the Siamese influence in Laos it was stressed that a Buddhist revival
in Laos could not be based on the initiatives in Cambodia exclusively.
Therefore,
[i]t is advisable that the Royal Library in Phnom Penh is replicated
in Vientiane or Luang Phrabang. This institution will be charged
with distributing among the population in Laos Buddhist texts in
Lao to replace the publications of the same order that derive from
Bangkok. The danger of Siamification is much greater in Laos than
121

Creating Laos
in Cambodia due to the geographical situation of our Mekong

provinces and the closeness between the Lao and Siamese people
who have related languages. So measures are necessary especially in
this respect to protect our populations against Siam’s spiritual and
intellectual ascendancy [. . .].77
It is interesting to note how the desire to de-link Laos from the
religious sphere of Siam had also been stressed in connection with
the plans for the restoration of Wat Sisaket a few years earlier. This
temple was full of a potent symbolism related to a golden age in the
history of Laos. For the Résident-Supérieur in Laos the restoration
of this temple had suggested turning it into a museum. This plan
was, however, met with disapproval by Lao monks and civil servants,
who, in a petition signed by 57 of them in Vientiane – among these
Prince Phetsarath – asked that the temple should instead become
the domicile of the leading monk of the Vientiane region. By doing
this the petitioners intended to resurrect Wat Sisaket as a centre for
ceremonial practices that would attract Lao monks and laymen who
used to go to Siam for religious festivals and ceremonies.78 Taking the
desire to de-link Laos from Siam in the religious sphere into consid-
eration it will come as no surprise that these words were not wasted
on the Résident-Supérieur. Rejecting the initial plan of turning the
temple into a museum the Résident-Supérieur gave his full support
to the project desired by the Lao as it implied a rehabilitation of the
local religion that ultimately would serve as the best means to ‘defend
the Laotian personality against various influences that threaten to
destroy it’.79 Wat Sisaket was to be turned into ‘the Buddhist cathe-
dral of Laos’, the centre for an ‘artistic, cultural and intellectual renais-
sance, the base for the revival of the Laotian people’.80 Subsequently,
the Résident-Supérieur praised the way that this endeavour to turn
the temple into an important ritual centre not only had contributed
to stopping Lao monks from going to Siam for ceremonial purposes
but also had even brought the chief-monk in Bangkok to visit the
temple to perform his devotions, symbolising how Laos was about to
‘regain’ a position of regional importance in the religious sphere.81 It
is interesting to note that according to a French sûreté report of May
122

1924 the abbot of Wat Sisaket had been approached by two Siamese
civil servants who had delivered a letter to him. The letter was from
relatives of the abbot who were government officials in Bangkok and
who asked him to leave Vientiane and settle in Bangkok. It is not
clear whether this request was motivated by personal motives or was
linked with official designs of trying to counter the popularity of Wat
Sisaket by removing a charismatic and influential monk. According
to the sûreté report the abbot preferred to remain in Vientiane.82
In Cambodia the formation of the School of Pali in Angkor in
1909 marked the beginning of attempts to reconstruct and popular-
ise a local religious textual tradition and improve the education of
Khmer monks. At the same time a Royal Ordinance of 1909 placed
a near-total ban on Khmer monks travelling to Siam for study, in or-
der to ‘erect a clear, cultural boundary around Cambodia’. However,
the School of Pali in Angkor had a short life as it was closed in 1910,
but later the establishment of the School of Pali (1914) and the
Royal Library (1925) in Phnom Penh formed part of the same trend
of de-linking Cambodia from Siam in the religious sphere.83 In Laos
no specific initiatives seem to have been undertaken until the late
1920s. The re-organisation of the Buddhist clergy in Laos in 1928
may have been part of this scheme for a religious revival in Laos, but
it is as Buddhist institutes were formed first in Phnom Penh in 1930
and later in Laos – Vientiane in 1931 and Luang Phrabang in 1933
– that the endeavours to de-link Laos from Siam in the religious
sphere gained momentum.
With an arrête of 25 January 1930 the outline of the Buddhist
Institute was established. The name Buddhist Institute was a short-
hand for a hierarchy of various institutions encompassing Buddhist
libraries and museums in Phnom Penh, Vientiane and Luang
Phrabang, a School for Preparatory Studies in Pali (Écoles prepara-
toires de Pali) in Laos, Cambodia and Cochinchina, and a Higher
School of Pali (École superieur de pali) in Phnom Penh.84 The section
in Vientiane was opened with great ceremony in February 1931 and
the speeches presented at that occasion neatly set the stage for the
establishment of this institute.85 First, the formation of the institute
123

Creating Laos
embodies the positive impact of France on Laos’s culture and soci-

ety by acting as a guardian of local religious traditions. Second, it
should serve to suspend the close relationship that previously had
existed between Laos and Siam in the religious sphere. This was to
be achieved, on the one hand, through a strengthening of the reli-
gious connections between Laos and Cambodia under the auspices
of the Buddhist Institute, and, on the other hand, by establishing the
section of the Buddhist Institute in Vientiane as a centre for the col-
lection of old Lao religious manuscripts, for the writing of new texts
and of learning for Lao monks. A Lao religious tradition was to be
resurrected within the confines of Indochina devoid of Siamese in-
fluence and the inauguration of the institute in Vientiane was hailed
as the beginning of a ‘new era in Laotian intellectual development’.86
As chairman of the institute in Vientiane we encounter Prince
Phetsarath and as secretary Maha Sila Viravong, who was to have an
immense impact on Lao culture over the next nearly six decades.87
Born in Roi Et in Northeast Thailand in 1905, Maha Sila received
his education in Siam, first in a local temple and later in Bangkok.
In 1930 he decided to settle in Vientiane, crossed the Mekong River
and became closely connected with the ‘resurrection’ of a Lao nation-
al heritage, first under the French and later under both the Royal
Lao Government and post-1975 in the Lao People’s Democratic
Republic. In this endeavour it is very clear how he brought an intel-
lectual framework from Siam into Laos and applied this in his effort
to establish a Lao national heritage. Maha Sila is the author of the
first Lao national account of Laos’s history, which was supposedly
written while he was in exile in Thailand during World War II, and
his text is clearly influenced by the conceptual framework applied by
contemporary Thai nationalist writers like Wichit Wathakan.88
As the author of or translator-compiler of many of the textbooks
intended for religious studies in Laos, the work of Maha Sila was
intimately linked with the endeavours to resurrect Buddhism in
Laos orchestrated by the French under the auspices of the institute
in Vientiane. Among the texts produced by Maha Sila we find gram-
mars of both Pali and Lao, Jataka tales, and a book of Buddhist
124

chants intended to serve as a standardisation-key for chants used in

Laos. In the section of the Buddhist Institute in Luang Phrabang an
ambitious project of translating the Tripitaka from Pali into Lao was
undertaken. By 1939 the three first volumes had been published, but
then the translator and compiler Maha Phal retired. No one suit-
able to continue the project apparently could be found and it was
terminated. In terms of students attending the various Pali schools
in Laos in 1939 it was reported that 115 students studied in Luang
Phrabang while a total of 411 students attended the various Pali
schools in Laos outside of Luang Phrabang, developments that were
praised not only for the amount of students in absolute numbers
but also for the fact that of the students attending the Pali school in
Vientiane one came from Cambodia and twenty-two from Siam.89
In the attempt to de-link Laos from Siam it was deemed neces-
sary to establish an additional elementary Pali school in Bassak to
stop monks from this locality going to Bangkok – easily accessible
because of the Ubon–Bangkok railway – for religious studies. To
establish a Pali school in this locality was therefore necessary, ac-
cording to the minutes of the first meeting of representatives of the
Buddhist Institute from Phnom Penh and Vientiane, from both a
‘moral and political point of view’.90 Although the political aspect of
the construction of the Pali school in this locality had been stressed
at this meeting, this theme was, however, not popularised. In the
report of the meeting published in the Bulletin d’École Française
d’Extrême-Orient, for example, the political aspect of founding a
new Pali school in this locality was not touched upon.91 Likewise,
in the copy of the minutes of the meeting found in the Archives of
the École Française d’Extrême-Orient the word ‘politique’ has been
crossed out and substituted with ‘practique’ – probably by the then
director of this institution.92 The importance of the political agenda
associated with the Buddhist Institute, however, is clearly reflected
in the discussions concerned with the removal of the long-time gen-
eral secretary of the institute in Phnom Penh, Suzanne Karpelès, in
1941. In a note to the Governor-General written by the Résident-
Supérieur of Cambodia shortly after the Thai attacks on areas in
125

Creating Laos
Cambodia and Laos in 1941 the need is emphasised to dismiss

Karpelès because of her lack of understanding of the ‘political char-
acter’ of the Buddhist Institute, as she had been associated with an
attempt to renew the relations to Siam in the religious sphere that
‘we intended to break’.93 Given the political situation in the wake
of the Thai attacks George Cœdès, the director of École Française
d’Extrême-Orient, recognised the need to replace Suzanne Karpelès
and at the same time he also recognised the political implications of
the work undertaken by this institution aiming at ‘counterbalance
the Siamese influence’. For Cœdès this kind of ‘indirect counter-
propaganda’ being a product of scientific work was not incompatible
with the objectives of the École Française d’Extrême-Orient, but he
objected to the proposal of replacing her with Manipoud, Inspector
for Traditional Education (Inspecteur de l’Enseignement Traditionnel)
in Cambodia, as he found that this would transform the Buddhist
Institute into an outright political organ.94 It has to be noted, how-
ever, that other factors also were behind the removal of Karpelès
from her position in Cambodia. Not only had she encountered op-
position from French-educated members of the Khmer elite, but she
was also among fifteen Europeans forced from office in Indochina
for being Jewish during the Vichy period.95
While the foundation of the institute in Vientiane was associ-
ated with an attempt to stop Lao monks from going to Siam for
religious studies, it is, however, significant that Lao monks still had
to go outside Laos for higher studies in Phnom Penh. In this way
Laos was still placed in a subordinate position in the religious hier-
archy. In terms of learning the inferior position of the institutions
in Laos had also been expressed at the initial meeting in Vientiane
between monks from the institutes in Phnom Penh and Vientiane.
When it was discussed what material should be used in Laos leading
monks from Cambodia recommended that books in Khmer written
by Cambodian monks for use at the institute in Phnom Penh should
be translated and used by the institutions undertaking Buddhist
teaching in Laos.96 At the opening of the institute in Vientiane two
of the books in Lao distributed were texts based on Khmer transla-
126

tions of Pali texts.97 A third text distributed at that occasion was

a booklet on Buddhist discipline attributed to the King of Luang
Phrabang.98 This booklet may have been distributed to invoke not
only the notion of royal patronage of the Sangha but also the no-
tion of the intellectual monarch as represented, for example, by King
Mongkut of Siam (1851–68). While the use of Lao translations of
Khmer texts presented a practical solution to the problem of build-
ing up an indigenous religious Lao textual tradition, this solution
would embody the subordinate position of Laos vis-à-vis Cambodia
and not stimulate the development of a Lao intellectual tradition.
In fact, Maha Sila’s endeavours to write textbooks can be seen as
an attempt to build up a Lao textual tradition based on a Lao intel-
lectual tradition independent of the Khmer. That the perceiving of
Laos in a subordinate position with regard to Cambodia within the
confines of the Buddhist Institute had been a source of conflict is
evident from a comment made by Cœdès when he proposed Paul
Lévy as successor to Karpelès as General Secretary of the institute
in Phnom Penh. He believed that Levy’s close relationship with
Laos could ease the view held by people attached to the institute in
Vientiane that the Buddhist Institute in general was too exclusively
Khmer in nature.99 Closely linked with this endeavour to build up a
Lao religious textual tradition was the problem of the standardisa-
tion of the written Lao language.
TOWARDS A STANDARDISATION
OF THE WRITTEN LAO LANGUAGE
The Lao and the Thai languages are closely related. In their spoken
forms they only display minor deviations with regard to tones and
the pronunciation of specific vocals and combinations of vocals. In
the written form, though, these languages have been submitted to
different trends and at the turn of the twentieth century they dis-
played different characteristics. In this manner, spelling would come
to reflect national differences, a vector for emerging Lao nationalism
during the colonial period, and an important cultural battle for Lao
nationalists both at that time and today.
127

Creating Laos
Over a long period the Thai alphabet and orthography had

gradually been modified and at the turn of the twentieth century the
Thai writing system appeared as a quite fixed system. Tone-signs had
been employed in order to indicate the five tones of the language and
through an enlargement of the alphabet and use of the karan an ety-
mological orthography was in the making.100 The process towards a
standardisation of Thai orthography can be traced back especially to
the reign of King Mongkut, when the king personally took an interest
in regulating or fixing the language through royal edicts as the print-
ing of Thai texts increased – a development which, in turn, raised the
need for a fixing of the orthography. Later, at the turn of the twentieth
century, a series of dictionaries were published by the Department of
Education. Although these were not intended as an authoritative and
complete key to a standardisation of Thai spelling, they served defi-
nitely as a checklist for the meaning and irregular spelling of words of
foreign origin.101 Likewise, a contemporary series of school textbooks
contributed to delineate the framework for a spelling of Thai follow-
ing an etymological principle.102 Although these texts were officially
sanctioned none of them represented complete standardisation keys
to a fixing of the Thai orthography. Still, they indicate how a process
of standardisation of Thai spelling in accordance with an etymologi-
cal principle was in the making in Siam at the turn of the twentieth
century.103 At the same time various dictionaries and grammars of the
Thai language produced by Westerners appeared in the second half
of the nineteenth century. In these the structures of the Thai language
were presented to foreigners and thereby they contributed to present-
ing Thai as an ‘ordered’ or ‘fixed’ language in the eyes of foreigners.104
Further steps towards a standardisation of the Thai language were
taken in the 1920s as the Department of Texts was authorised to
standardise spellings and create Pali-Sanskrit neologisms to replace
some of the more commonly used English loan words. These changes
were codified with the publication of the second and expanded version
of the Department’s dictionary in 1928.105
In comparison, the contemporary Lao writing system was far less
complex, as the orthography was related to the phonetic rendering
128

of the word. While this orthographic principle made writing easy it

also made it impossible to distinguish between homonyms in writ-
ing, a tendency further aggravated by written Lao being devoid of
tone-signs. Consequently, reading was made difficult and for many
words it was not possible to determine the exact meaning when read
outside a context. The difference between the two writing systems is
stressed by the compilers of the first Lao word lists or dictionaries
that appeared in the early period of the French colonial adventure in
the Mekong region.106 While it was emphasised how the spelling of
Siamese was so complex that it was difficult to spell correctly – even
for learned Siamese – what followed implicitly from this comparison
of the two languages was a hierarchical ordering in which Siamese
represented a more developed language in comparison to a more
primitive and basic Lao. Of course, this is a theme that linked up
nicely with the notion of the process of degradation experienced by
the Lao vis-à-vis the Siamese. Estrade, for example, in the introduc-
tion to his Dictionaire et Guide Franco-Laotiens, neatly summaries
the relationship between the two closely related languages in the
following manner:
According to Laotian scribes, their language has varied little
from its original [form]. The same cannot be said of the Siamese
language, which has considerably changed in terms of its writing
[system]. Pushed into the poorest and most uncultivated parts [of
the country] by the inevitable flow of things, the Laotian has in no
way been associated with the progress of the mother race [la race
mère, Siam]. Reduced to the brutish state of a savage by that part
which the environment made more intelligent [Siam], he [the Lao]
could only obey obsequiously his master and in no way expressed
the need to develop his intellect.107
The expression of Lao as being subordinate to Siamese was car-
ried to the extreme in a dictionary published by the French mission-
ary Cuaz in 1904. In this dictionary Lao was presented as a dialect of
Siamese and thereby denied the status of an independent language.108
Cuaz introduced this Lao–French dictionary as a ‘mere supplement’
to his French–Siamese dictionary published earlier.109 Further, in
129

Creating Laos
cases where there existed a difference between the Lao and Siamese
forms of a word, the Siamese form was given in order not to ‘confuse
people’ who already had studied this language.110 Further, he informs
the readers, as Siamese is the ‘mandarin language’ used by the nobles
in Laos he urges foreigners to study this language in preference to
Lao if they wish to pass as ‘learned’ in Laos.111
In nationalist discourses language is generally perceived as the
crucial criterion for nationality. Any discourse on the perception of
Laos as a country independent of Siam with its own cultural identity
had to reverse this relationship between Lao and Siamese and place
the Lao language in a position on a par with Siamese. With regard to
this process the Lao–French dictionary compiled by the French mis-
sionary Guignard represented an important break with the above-
mentioned hierarchical ordering of Siamese and Lao.112 Guignard
placed the two languages side-by-side as different dialects within the
overall ‘Thay’ language family. In his introductory chapters we find
a systematic presentation of the Lao language that was intended to
parallel the French-produced dictionaries of the Siamese language
already in existence.113 In this manner Lao was established on an
independent basis and Guignard further drew a dividing line be-
tween the two languages as he identified a sixth tone in Lao whereas
Siamese only has five tones.114 To establish Lao as an independent
language implies a process whereby the language is standardised and
its structure codified with regard to its orthography and grammar.
The existence of an officially sanctioned dictionary or grammar
serving as an inventory of the language is the most tangible represen-
tation of language standardisation. Guignard’s dictionary, however,
did not fulfil this role as it was intended for foreign students of the
Lao language and it never received official status. Consequently, it
did not serve as an official guide to the Lao language. Furthermore,
it did not solve the problem concerning the use of tone-signs. In its
own right, however, it can be seen as an important symbol of the lib-
eration of Lao from its subordinate position in relation to Siamese.
In the same manner the French linguist Henri Maspéro distances
himself from the, according to him, erroneous perception of Lao
130

as a dialect of Siamese in a study contemporary with Guignard.115

He thereby reconstitutes Lao as a separate language on the same
hierarchical standing as Siamese – a relationship between the two
languages that subsequently became generally accepted.116
At the same time, in Laos we encounter early attempts to give
written Lao a more fixed form. The responsibility of carrying out
the work necessary to standardise written Lao was left in the hands
of various committees appointed by the Résident-Supérieur in Laos
in the first half of the twentieth century. Although none of these
committees were able to produce the needed key – that is an of-
ficial grammar or dictionary – to standardise the language, written
Lao was slowly acquiring a more fixed form. We have seen how
Guignard’s dictionary of the Lao language had been devoid of tone-
markers. However, the use of these signs to indicate the tones of
words had been recommended by a language commission in 1908.117
The use of tonemarkers was probably first institutionalised when a
commission for schoolbooks in the Lao language, formed in 1917,
stressed the need for tone markers and also set up a framework for
the spelling of Lao. The guidelines put forward by this commis-
sion received the blessing of the educational authorities in Laos
and Indochina and consequently were employed in schoolbooks in
Laos.118 Thus, written Lao was achieving a more fixed form although
a formal standardisation key was still missing.
A leading person behind this attempt to standardise written Lao
was Pierre Lê-Ky-Huong – one of the numerous Vietnamese em-
ployed in the colonial administration in Laos who played a significant
role in the formation of a national discourse in Laos. Lê-Ky-Huong’s
role in the standardisation of Lao was linked with his occupation
as translator for the Résident-Supérieur in Laos and as director of
the Government Printing Office in Laos. Here he used the fonts for
printing Lao that the King of Luang Phrabang had purchased from
Schneider and Co.119 It was, furthermore, also Lê-Ky-Huong who
took the initiative to publish the Bulletin Officiel du Laos in Lao under
the title Codmaihet, which, of course, also pointed to the need for a
standardised written language. The aim of Codmaihet was to publish
131

Creating Laos
documents of a official nature in Lao in order to show how taxes

claimed by the French not were transferred to France, but – contrary
to what the Lao according to Lê-Ky-Huong believed – were used
for the betterment of economic and social conditions in Laos.120
In 1917 he published a course in the Lao language and also co-au-
thored many of the first Lao schoolbooks used in franco-indigenous
schools in Laos.121 Unfortunately, I have not had access to either the
documents outlining the orthographic principles employed or to the
schoolbooks in Lao written by Pierre Lê-Ky-Huong from the early
1920s. A reading of schoolbooks from the 1930s indicates, however,
how tonemarkers have been adopted and how the karan and irregu-
lar finals only occur to a limited extent.122
Although this endeavour to standardise Lao spelling can be
approached as a practical problem, it is important to stress how
the question of language standardisation was of a highly politico-
ideological nature with regard to the relationship between Laos
and Siam, between Lao and Siamese culture. This is reflected in
the reactions to a language reform of a rather radical nature sug-
gested by Meillier, Government Commissioner (Commisaire du
Gouvernement) in Luang Phrabang, in 1918. In short, Meillier pro-
posed the use of Siamese letters to write Lao in order to facilitate
the printing of books, particularly schoolbooks, in Lao.123 Not sur-
prisingly, this proposal caused strong reactions from, among others,
Prince Phetsarath, who resisted such a scheme as it would ‘hasten
the disappearance of the Lao writing system and thus undermine
our Lao literature and our Lao language’. With the Siamese alpha-
bet Siamese literature would follow and consequently the ‘spiritual
influence of the Siamese would win over the Lao “spirit”’.124 In other
words, what was at stake was the survival of two important cultural
denominators that could serve to detach Laos from Siam – language
and literature. Only one year earlier, Finot’s study of Lao literature
had appeared and served to dissociate Laos from Siam within the
sphere of classical literature.125 Were the Lao language and literature
to vanish this would seriously weaken any Lao claim to be a country
independent of Siam. As Prince Phetsarath put it:
132

Whereas the improvement of public instruction, that is, the recover-

ing of Lao literature and language, is the raison d’être for this reform
[proposed by Meillier], it will produce the opposite results of the
envisaged. The implementation will be more regrettable as for only
a minor sacrifice on behalf of the administration the printing house
can be given the medium to spread books exclusively all over Laos
and thereby restore the language of the country.126
Instead, Prince Phetsarath called for a standardisation and codi-
fication of the structures of the Lao language. In the same vein Pierre
Lê-Ky-Huong, adducing practical reasons, also objected strongly to
Meilleir’s proposal without ‘going into the political considerations’.127
It was obvious that any attempt to consolidate the Lao language
as different from Siamese had important political implications for
the Lao–Siamese nexus. This close connection between language
engineering and national politics was also well known to leading
members of the École Française d’Extrême-Orient. In 1918 George
Cœdès was asked to participate in the work to standardise Lao. At
that time he was acting as the director of the Vajiranana Library in
Bangkok, and he asked for certain precautions as he did not want
letters to fall into the hands of the Siamese censors indicating his
participation ‘in a project which had as its goal to defend Laos against
Siamese political influence’.128
What none of the above-mentioned committees had been able to
accomplish was carried out by the Buddhist Institute in Vientiane,
which published the first grammar of the Lao language in 1935.129
This grammar was compiled by Maha Sila Viravong, who – as we
have seen – was one of the key figures in the Buddhist Institute in
Vientiane since its foundation in 1931. As mentioned earlier this
institute was explicitly concerned with building up a Lao religious
textual tradition. Given this emphasis on local tradition it can there-
fore come as no surprise that the first manual to codify the rules
of the local language also should emanate from this institute. The
first volume of the grammar presents a basic outline of some of the
fundamentals of the Lao language: the alphabet, tone-signs and the
basic rules for their use, and some basic rules concerning spelling
133

Creating Laos
– e.g. the use of the karan, consonant-clusters and irregular Pali-

finals. It has to be noted that this grammar was not only intended
as a guide to the contemporary language but it also introduced
important new elements. Formerly two alphabets had been in use
in Laos. One was the ordinary alphabet used in secular texts. The
other was the so-called Tham alphabet used to transcribe religious
Pali-texts. Through an enlargement of the ‘secular’ alphabet with
14 new letters, Maha Sila’s intention was to introduce the use of
only one alphabet suited to render all the sounds of vernacular Lao
as well as the religious texts in Pali. The motivation for this reform
has to be sought in the above-mentioned endeavour to establish a
Lao religious textual tradition. Just as the religious texts were to be
‘localised’, it was also the intention to make them more easily acces-
sible by writing them with the same alphabet that was used in daily
life. This was in conformity with the practive in Siam where only
one alphabet was employed. Therefore, it was to be regarded as an
attempt to ‘do as the Siamese but by means of what the Lao possess
and have possessed’, as it was put by Prince Phetsarath.130 Or, as it
was put by Maha Sila in the foreword to this Grammar, the reform
of the Lao alphabet was linked with an attempt to reverse a situation
where religious texts in Laos only were written with the ‘alphabet of
another nation/race’.131
Maha Sila’s grammar was never granted official status, however,
and consequently it never became the master key to a standardisa-
tion of the Lao language. The reason for this has to be sought in
the fact that the undertaking to standardise Lao was caught in the
cross-fire between two contradictory approaches. On the one hand,
we find the approach of the Buddhist Institute, seeking to be able
to produce Lao in a written form rendering the non-Lao words in
conformity with the orthography of their Pali-Sanskrit origins,
implying the introduction of new letters in the alphabet. On the
other hand, we find an approach seeking to adopt a more simple
and uncomplicated system of writing in conformity with the one
already in use in schoolbooks in Laos. These were the two positions
that crystallised during the sessions undertaken by the Commission
134

for the Fixing of Official Lao Writing and Orthography that went
to work in 1938–39.132 Following intense discussions the demand
for simplicity became the victorious principle and consequently the
Lao alphabet already in existence, with some minor modifications,
was confirmed as the national alphabet.133 From the proceedings it
is clear that a spelling in conformity with some kind of phonetic
principle was opted for, although no exact rules were laid out.
That the alphabet and grammar devised by Maha Sila were
rejected in this way was, however, not only linked with practical con-
siderations. Politico-ideological considerations were also at stake.
For whereas the ultimate aim of Maha Sila’s scheme was to de-link
Laos from Siam in the cultural-religious sphere, the new strategy
was to use Siam as a model and ‘Lao-ify’ the Siamese experience. It
is significant that Maha Sila had relied heavily on Thai scholarship
when writing his grammar: it was modelled closely on the influential
Fundamentals of the Thai Language, produced by Phaya Uphakit in
Siam over several decades.134 Thus, an inherent problem in the model
for the Lao language envisioned by Maha Sila was that it brought
the spelling of Lao very close indeed to the spelling in use in Siam.
This is reflected in a Syllabaire Laotien from 1936, where the author
acknowledges the need for a regulation of the spelling of Lao but
stresses that this should not imply a ‘blind subjugation’ to Siamese
orthography – implicitly referring to Maha Sila’s standardisation
key.135 Later the reform proposed by Maha Sila was interpreted
as an outright attempt to adopt the Siamese etymological spelling
system.136 Although the politico-ideological aspect of the rejection
of Maha Sila’s model was never referred to in the proceedings of
the Commission’s work, this view no doubt contributed to the
downfall of the Maha Sila model. However, the alphabet devised
by Maha Sila was allowed to be used in religious texts published by
the Buddhist Institute and in Pali schools in Laos.137 But this did not
include Luang Phrabang, where the Tham alphabet still was used in
religious texts. So, all in all, three alphabets were in use in Laos in
late 1930s and two orthographic principles. Still, these endeavours
undertaken to standardise written Lao can be linked with the proc-
135

Creating Laos
ess of de-linking Laos from Siam by protecting and promoting the

written Lao language as a carrier of distinction in relation to Siam.
In his book on Laos published on the occasion of the Exposition
Coloniale in 1931, Roland Meyer characterised the Lao as a peo-
ple whom ‘centuries of historical calamities had deprived of their
strength and national unity, government, institutions, and erased
the exact memory of their glorious past, their religion and even lan-
guage’.138 A unification of Laos under an indigenous political institu-
tion was not effected in the period dealt with in this chapter. Still,
as the chapter has shown, in the 1893–1940 period we can discern
the early contours of a Lao national tradition that emerged under
French tutelage; a tradition that served to carve out a space for a
‘Lao Laos’ in relation both to a ‘Greater Siam’ and within the overall
colonial space of Indochina; a tendency that was further accentuated
during World War II.
NOTES
1. The term ‘colonial backwater’ is, for example, invoked by Geoffrey Gunn in
the title of one of his books on Laos, Rebellion in Laos. Peasant and Politics in a
Colonial Backwater (Boulder: Westview Press, 1990).
2. In his doctoral thesis the French lawyer François Iché gives a good overview of
this discussion. He argues for the legitimacy of upholding the dual structure,
see François Iché, Le statut politique et international du Laos Français. Sa con-
dition juridique dans la Communauté du Droit des Gens (Toulouse: Imprimerie
moderne, 1935).
3. Eugen Weber, Peasants Into Frenchmen. The Modernization of Rural France,
1870–1914 (London: Chatto & Windus, 1977), p. 218.
4. See, for example, ‘Le développement des grandes voies de communications en
Indochine’, Le Monde Colonial Illustré, 50, 1927, pp. 228–229.
5. ‘Résident Commissaire Houeisai à Monsieur le Résident Supéieur, Houeisai,
le 11 Janvier, 1924, telegramme no 38’, d. 40590, GGI, CAOM.
6. ‘Note confidentielle, no 144/2, Vientiane, le 8 Avril 1924’, d. 40590, GGI,
CAOM.
7. ‘Note Confidentielle de la Chef de la Sûreté du Laos résumant la situation
des relations politique administratives et économiques entre le Laos et le Siam,
Vientiane, le 31 Janvier 1924’, d. 39634, GGI, CAOM.
136

8. ‘Note confidentielle no 16/s de la sûreté du Laos, Vientiane, le 9 Janvier 1924’,

d. 40590, GGI, CAOM.
9. ‘Itineraire de Vinh à Hin-boun, corigé et mis à jour au 1er aoùt 1910’, c. H1,
RSL, CAOM.
10. Jean Marquet, ‘Une excursion au Laos’, Le Monde Colonial Illustré, 23, 1925, p.
182. Later, the president of the Chambre Mixte de Commerce et d’Agriculture
du Laos reached the same conclusion, see ‘Extrait d’une letre du président de
la Chambre mixte de commerce et d’agriculture du Laos, juin 1937’, c. 27, CG,
CAOM.
11. Jean Marquet, ‘Voyage au Laos’, Le Monde Colonial Illustré, 27, 1925, pp.
280–281.
12. Roland Meyer, Le Laos (Hanoi: Imprimerie d’Extrême-Orient, 1930), p. 80.
13. M.B., ‘Le développement des voies de communication au Laos’, Le Monde
Colonial Illustré, 143, 1935, p. 77.
14. François Marty, ‘De Saigon à Luang-Prabang – La route au secours du Laos’,
Le Monde Colonial Illustré, 179, 1938, p. 72.
15. ‘Le réveil du Laos’, Le Monde Colonial Illustré, 155, 1936.
16. Eric Pietrantoni, ‘La population du Laos de 1912 à 1945’, Bulletin de la Société
des Études Indochinoises, 28:1, 1953, pp. 26, 34.
17. Eric Pietrantoni, ‘La population du Laos en 1943 dans son milieu géographi-
que’, Bulletin de la Société des Études Indochinoises, 32:3, 1957, p. 230.
18. ‘Rapport fait par Monsieur Tzenas du Montcel, Inspecteur de 3ème classe des
colonies, utilité du remplacement par étapes des auxiliaires annamites de l’ad-
ministration française au Laos par des Laotiens, Vientiane le 13 Mars 1936’, d.
2494(2), c. 287, NF, CAOM.
19. Christopher E. Goscha, Vietnam and Indochina? Contesting Concepts of Space
in Vietnamese Nationalism, 1887-1954 (NIAS Report, No. 28, Copenhagen:
Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 1995), p. 42.
20. Lucien de Reinach, Le Laos (Édition posthume, revue et mise a jour par P.
Chemin Dupontès) (Paris: Librairie Orientale & Américaine, without year),
pp. 116–118.
21. ‘Chao Lek à Monsieur le ministre de France à Bangkok, Bangkok, le 25
Novembre 1901’, d. 25598, GGI, CAOM.
22. Reinach, Le Laos, p. 118.
23. Ibid., p. 388.
24. Gosselin, Le Laos et le protectorat français (Paris: Librairie académique Didier,
1900), p. 211.
137

Creating Laos
25. Pietrantoni, ‘La population du Laos de 1912 à 1945’, p. 34.

26. Quoted in Goscha, Vietnam or Indochina?, p. 17.
27. Quoted in ibid., pp. 17–18.
28. The 1902–03 plan is mentioned in Kennon Breazeale, ‘Laos Mapped by
Treaty and Decree’, in Mayoury Ngaosrivathana and Kennon Breazeale
(eds), Breaking New Ground in Lao History. Essays on the Seventh to Twentieth
Centuries (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2002), pp. 328–329. In 1911–12
similar designs occurred again, see ‘Résident Supérieur au Laos à Monsieur
le Gouverneur Général, Vientiane, le 30 Novembre 1912, No 273’, d. 21383,
GGI, CAOM.
29. Marquet, ‘Une excusion au Laos’, p. 182.
30. Marquet, ‘Voyage au Laos’, pp. 280–281.
31. Quoted in Goscha, Vietnam or Indochina?, pp. 59–60.
32. This is documented by Goscha in his reading of the Vietnamese press, see
Goscha, Vietnam or Indochina?, pp. 46–62.
33. F.I., ‘La question laotienne. Opinions du Prince Phetsarath’, France-Indochine,
3.416, 1931, p. 1. For a discussion of this article and its context, see Christopher
E. Goscha, ‘L’Indochine repensée par les “Indochinois”: Pham Qùynh et les
deux débats de 1931 sur l’immigration, le féderalisme et la réalité de l’Indo-
chine’, Revue Française d’Histoire d’Outre-Mer, 82:309, 1995, pp. 421–453. See
also Søren Ivarsson and Christopher E. Goscha, ‘Prince Phetsarath (1890–
1959): Nationalism and Royalty in the Making of Modern Laos’, Journal of
Southeast Asian Studies, 38:1, 2007, pp. 55–81.
34. ‘J.J. Dauplay, Inspecteur des Affaires Politiques et Administratives au Laos, à
Monsieur le Résident Supérieur au Laos, Thateng, le 2 Mai 1924’, d. 42054,
GGI, CAOM.
35. See letters in d. 42054, GGI, ANSOM.
36. ‘J.J. Dauplay, Résident Supérieur au Laos p.i., à Monsieur le Gouverneur Général
de l’Indochine, Vientiane, le 10 Septembre 1925’, d. 42054, GGI, CAOM.
37. ‘Telegramme Officiel, Résident Supérieur à Gouverneur Général, Vientiane
le 30 Octobre 1925’, d. 42054, GGI, CAOM.
38. A. Legendre, ‘Coup d’œil sur l’Indo-Chine’, Le Monde Colonial Illustré, 20,
1925, pp. 106–107.
39. Meyer, Le Laos, p. 62.
40. Ibid., p. 63.
41. Goscha, Vietnam or Indochina, pp. 53–54.
42. F.I., ‘La question laotienne. Opinions du Prince Phetsarath’, p. 1.
138

43. ‘Rapport fait par M Tzenas du Montcel’, d. 2494(2), c. 287, NF, CAOM.
44. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origin and
Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 1991 [revised version]), p. 5.
45. Dipesh Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical
Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000). See also the discussion
in Prasenjit Duara, Rescuing History from the Nation. Questioning Narratives of
Modern China (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1995).
46. Penny Edwards, ‘Making a Religion of the Nation, and its Language: The
French Protectorate (1863–1954) and the Dhammakay’, in John Marston and
Elisabeth Guthrie (eds), History, Buddhism and New Religious Movements in
Cambodia (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2004), p. 66.
47. For examples of chronicle texts, see Charles Archaimbault, ‘L’histoire de
Champassak’, Journal Asiatique, 4, 1961, pp. 519–595; Charles Archaimbault,
‘Les annales de l’ancien Royaume de S’ieng Khwang’, Bulletin de l’École
Française d’Extrême-Orient, 53:2, 1967, pp. 557–673; Saveng Phinith,
Contribution à l’histoire du Royaume de Luang Prabang (Paris: Publications de
l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 1987); Michel Lorrillard, ‘Les chroniques
royales du Laos. Contribution à la connaissance historique des royaumes lao
(1316–1887)’ (PhD thesis, Paris: École Pratique des Hautes Études, 1995).
For a discussion of some of the problems related to the writing of Laos’s his-
tory, see: Michel Lorrillard, ‘Lao History Revisited: Paradoxes and Problems
in Current Research’, Southeast Asia Research, 14:3, 2007, pp. 387–401.
48. Paul Le Boulanger, Histoire du Laos Français (Paris: Plon, 1931), pp. 319–362.
49. Blanchard de la Brosse and Lê-Duy-Luong, Phongsawadan lao [A Lao his-
tory/chronicle] (Vientiane: Imprimerie Gouvernmentale, 1934); Baep son an
[A Lao reader – cours préparatoire] (Hanoi: Imprimerie d’Extrême-Orient,
1934), pp. 148–174.
50. Brosse and Lê, Phongsawadan lao, p. 43.
51. Ibid., p. 46.
52. Ibid., pp. 52, 64.
53. Ibid., p. 60.
54. Baep son an, pp. 159–161.
55. Ibid., p. 160.
56. Ibid., pp. 165, 167.
58. Ibid., pp. 80–93.
59. Baep son an, p. 165.
139

Creating Laos
60. Brosse and Lê, Phongsawadan lao, passim; Baep son an, passim.
62. Ibid, p. 155.
65. See for example, Krasung Sueksa lae Kila [Ministry of Education and Sport],
Pawatsat lao lem 3 (1893 thoeng pachuban) [History of Laos – volume 3 (1893
to today)] (Vientiane: Social Research Institute, 1989), p. 3.
66. E.g. Quai Pavie, Quai Francis Garnier, rue Doudart de Lagree, rue George
Mahé, Avenue de France, rue Setthathirat, rue de roi Anou, see ‘Extension de
la Ville de Vientiane, 1930’, c. R, RSL, CAOM.
67. Meyer, Le Laos, pp. 47–48.
68. Ibid., p. 48.
69. Marquet, ‘Voyage au Laos’, p. 281.
70. For a discussion of the symbolism of That Luang in contemporary Laos, see
Grant Evans, The Politics of Ritual and Remembrance. Laos Since 1975 (Chiang
Mai: Silkworm Books, 1998), pp. 41–48.
71. ‘Monsieur Ernest Outrey, Résident Supérieur au Laos, à Monsieur le
Gouverneur Général de l’Indo-Chine, Vientiane, le 3 Fevrier 1911, No 43’, d.
R61, c. 30, AEFEO.
72. ‘Résident Supérieur au Laos à Monsieur le Directeur de l’École Française
d’Extrême-Orient, Vientiane, le 5 Mars 1924, No 68’, d. R61, c. 30, AEFEO.
73. ‘Histoire du Annam’, Bulletin général de l’instruction publique, 3:8, 1924, p.
437.
74. Kitirat Sihaban, ‘Phrasong isan khao krung thep samai raek’ [When north-
eastern monks first came to Bangkok], Sinlapa-Wathanatham, 12:9, 1991, pp.
112–119.
75. Roger Monteil, ‘La pénétration scolaire au Laos’, Bulletin général de l’instruction
publique, 10:1, 1930, pp. 1–6.
76. Gunn, Rebellion in Laos, p. 38. See also Etienne Boulé, La rénovation des écoles
de pagodes au Laos (Saigon: Direction de l’instruction publique, 1933); and
‘Circulaire relative aux écoles de pagodes au Laos’, Bulletin général de l’instruc-
tion publique, 12:3, 1932, pp. 60–64.
77. ‘Note au sujet de l’application eventuelle en Indochine des dispositions de
l’article 4 du traite 14 fevrier 1925 relatives à la propagande religieuse, Hanoi,
20 octobre 1928’, d. K3, c. 23, AEFEO.
78. ‘Le résident supérieur au Laos à Monsieur le directeur de l’École Française
d’Extrême-Orient, Vientiane le 1er Août 1922’, d. R61, c. 30, AEFEO.
140


d’Extrême-Orient, le 3 Août 1923’, d. R61, c. 30, AEFEO.
d’Extrême-Orient, le 5 Mars 1924’, d. R61, c. 30, AEFEO.
81. ‘Le résident-supérieur au Laos à Monsieur le directeur de l’École Française
d’Extrême-Orient, le 6 Avril 1925’, d. R61, c. 30, AEFEO.
82. ‘Note confidentielle no 235/s. L’administrateur chef de la sûreté à Monsieur le
chef du SCR et SG, Vientiane le 14 mai 1924’, d. 39762, GGI, ANSOM.
83. See Edwards, ‘Making a Religion of the Nation’, p. 70 for quote.
84. ‘Arrête, 25 Janvier 1930, le Gouverneur Général de l’Indochine’, d. K3, c. 23,
AEFEO.
85. The speeches are printed in Bulletin d’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 31,
1931, pp. 334–342.
86. Speech by Susanne Karpelles, secrétaire de l’Institut Bouddhique in Phnom
Penh, printed in Bulletin d’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 31, 1931, p. 338.
87. For a brief outline and a very Lao nationalistic interpretation of Maha Sila’s
life and deeds, see Pheuiphanh Ngaosyvathn, ‘Maha Sila Viravong et la litéra-
ture classique lao’, in Khana Kamakan Withayasat Sangkhom [Social Science
Committee], Maha sila wirawong – siwit lae phon ngan [Maha Sila Viravong
– life and work] (Vientiane: Rongphim Haeng Lat, 1990), pp. 245–253.
88. For a concise analysis of the impact of Thai modernist notions of history on
Maha Sila’s work, see Chalong Soontravanich,‘Sila Viravong’s Phongsawadan Lao:
A Reappraisal’, in Christopher E. Goscha and Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting
Visions of the Lao Past: Lao Historiography at the Crossroads (NIAS Studies in
Asian Topics, No. 32, Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2003), pp. 111–128.
89. ‘Rapport moral sur l’exercise 1939’, d. K3, c. 23, AEFEO.
90. ‘Institut Bouddhique, Proces Verbal de la Séance du 19 Fevrier 1931, Vat
Chan, Vientiane’, AEFEO, d. K3, c. 23, AEFEO.
91. ‘Inauguration de l’Institut Bouddhique’, Bulletin d’École Française d’Extrême-
Orient, 31, 1931, p. 335.
92. ‘Institut Bouddhique, Proces Verbal de la Séance du 19 Fevrier 1931, Vat
Chan, Vientiane’, d. K3, c. 23, AEFEO.
93. ‘Le Résident-Supérieur au Cambodge à Monsieur le Gouverneur Général
de l’Indochine, Phnom Penh, le 4 fevrier 1941, No 360 Px’, d. K3, c. 23,
AEFEO.
94. ‘Le Directeur de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient à Monsieur le Directeur
du Personnel, Gouvernement Général, Hanoi, le 9 avril 1941, No DC II/22’,
d. K3, c. 23, AEFEO.
141

Creating Laos
95. Edwards, ‘Making a Religion of the Nation’, pp. 79–80.

96. See, for example, ‘Institut Bouddhique, Proces Verbal de la Séance du 19
Fevrier 1931, Vat Chan, Vientiane’, d. K3, c. 23, AEFEO.
97. Kalamasutta (Vientiane: Imprimerie du Gouvernement, 1931); and
Traypranam (Vientiane: Imprimerie du Gouvernement, 1931).
98. Athi phommacharyakasikkha: petit manuel de discipline bouddhique (Vientiane:
1931).
99. ‘Le Directeur de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient à Monsieur le Directeur
du Personnel, Gouvernement Général, Hanoi, 14 Fevrier 1941, No 421’, d.
K3, c. 23, AEFEO.
100. Placed above a consonant the karan indicates that the letter underneath – or
several in connection with it – is not pronounced.
101. See for example Phochananukrom pen kham plae sap phasa thai samrap khian
kham chai hai thuk tong tua sakot [A dictionary giving a translation of Thai
words to be used to write final consonants correctly] (Bangkok: 1901). A
general outline of the history of dictionaries in Thailand is given in Thiraphan
Thongkham, Kan tham phochananukrom thai-thai: adit-pachuban (pho so
2389–2533) [The production of Thai-Thai dictionaries: past and present,
1846–1993] (Bangkok: Khrongkan Phoeiphrae Nganwichai, 1995).
102. See for example Krom Sueksathikan [Department of Education], Baep khon
tua sakot chuai nai baep rian reo [A textbook of final consonants to be used
with the rian-reo system] (Bangkok: Rongphim Bamrung Nukunkit, 1899).
103. See Anthony Diller, ‘Thai Syntax and “National Grammar”’, Language
Sciences, 10:2, 1988, pp. 273–312 and ‘What Makes Central Thai a National
Language?’, in Craig J. Reynolds (ed.), National Identity and its Defenders
(Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 1991), pp. 87–132 for an analysis of various
aspects of this process.
104. E.g. J. Taylor-Jones, Brief Grammatical Notices of the Siamese Language
(Bangkok: The Mission Press, 1842); Jean Baptiste Pallegoix, Grammatica
Linguae Thai (Bangkok: Assumption College, 1850); Jean Baptiste Pallegoix,
Dictionarium Lingua Thai (Paris: Jussu Imperatoris Impressum, 1854); B.
Bradley, Dictionary of the Siamese Language (Bangkok: 1873).
105. Matthew Copeland, ‘Contested Nationalism and the 1932 Overthrow of
the Absolute Monarchy in Siam’ (PhD thesis, Canberra: Australian National
University, 1993), p. 210.
106. See for example J. Taupin, Vocabulaire Franco-Laotien (Hanoi: Schneider,
1893 [deuxieme édition]); and Estrade, Dictionnaire et Guide Franco-Laotiens
(Toulouse: Imprimerie G. Berthoumien, 1895).
107. Estrade, Dictionnaire et Guide, p. 10.
142

108. J. Cuaz, Lexique Français-Laocien (Hong Kong: Imprimerie de la Société des

Missions étrangères, 1904), pp. xi–xii, xiv.
109. Ibid., p. vi.
110. Ibid., pp. xii–xiii.
111. Ibid., p. xv.
112. Théodore Guignard, Dictionnaire Laotien-Français (Hong Kong: Imprimerie
de Nazareth, 1912).
113. For example Pallegoix, Dictionarium Lingua Thai and J. Cuaz, Essai de
Dictionnaire Français-Siamois (Bangkok: Imprimerie de la Mission Catholique,
1903).
114. Guignard, Dictionnaire Laotien-Français, p. xx.
115. Henri Maspero,‘Contribution à l’Étude du Systéme Phonétique des Langues
Thai’, Bulletin de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 11:1–2, 1911, pp. 6–7.
116. See for example ‘Les langues tai’, in A. Meillet and Marcel Cohen (eds), Les
langues du monde (Paris: Librairie ancienne Édouard Champion, 1924), pp.
379–384; George Cœdès, Tamnan akson thai [A history of the Thai script]
(Bangkok: Khrongkan Phathana Kan Sueksa, 1961 [1925]).
117. ‘Note par Lê-Ky-Huong sur la reforme de l’ecriture laotienne, Vientiane, le 6
Février 1918’, d. F4, c. 33, AEFEO.
118. ‘Vers la réforme de l’orthographe laotienne par Pierre Nginn, sd’, d. F4, c. 33,
AEFEO.
119. A. Raquez, ‘Les rois de Luang Prabang’, Revue Indochinoise, ns. 1:7, 1904,
pp. 426–438.
120. ‘L’interprete au titre Europeen Lê-Ky-Huong en service au commisariat de
Viengchan à Monsieur le Résident Supérieur au Laos, le 11 Février 1907’, c.
F.10, RSL, CAOM.
121. ‘Vers la réforme’, d. F.4, c. 33, AEFEO. The language course book was entit-
led L’Essai de Cours de Langue Laotienne.
122. See for example Baep son an san triamsueksa phasa lao [A Lao reader – cours
enfantin] (Hanoi: Imprimerie d’Extrême-Orient, 1934).
123. ‘M. Meillier à Monsieur le Résident Supérieur au Laos, Luang Prabang, le 10
Janvier 1918, No 93/5’, d. F4, c. 33, AEFEO.
124. ‘Note sur la reforme de l’ecriture laotienne par Phetsarath, Vientiane, le 8
125. Louis Finot, ‘Recherches sur la littératur laotienne’, Bulletin d’École Française
d’Extrême-Orient, 17:5, 1917, pp. 1–218.
126. ‘Note sur la reforme de l’ecriture laotienne par Phetsarath’.
143

Creating Laos
127. ‘Note par Lê Ky Huong sur la reforme de l’ecriture laotienne, Vientiane, le 6

128. In ‘Le Directeur de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient à Monsieur le
Résident Supérieur au Laos, le 12 Septembre 1918, No 872’, d. F4, c. 33,
AEFEO.
129. Maha Sila Viravong, Wainyakon lao [Lao grammar] (Bangkok: Kramol
Tiranasaw, 1957 [1935]). The grammar was divided into four parts of which
only the first was published in 1935.
130. ‘Proces-Verbal, 3 Mars 1938’, d. F4, c. 33, AEFEO.
131. Sila, Wainyakon lao, pp. ix–x.
132. Similar discussions took place in Siam in the 1920s when various articles
in Thai newspapers reflected a demand for a simplification of Siamese spell-
ing. For an account of this perspective, see Matthew Copeland, ‘Contested
Nationalism’, pp. 209–215.
133. ‘Proces-Verbal, le 6 Juin 1938’, d. F4, c. 33, AEFEO.
134. Uphakit Sinlapasan, Lak phasa thai: akharawithi, wachiiwiphak, wakaya-
samphan, chanthalaksana [Fundamentals of the Thai langauge: Akaravithi,
Vaciviphak, Vakayasamphan, Chantalaksana] (Bangkok: Thai Wathana
Phanit, 1995 [reprint]). For a discussion of Maha Sila’s use of Uphakit’s work
in relation to an analysis of Lao literature, see Peter Koret, ‘Books of Search:
The Invention of Traditional Lao Literature as a Subject of Study’, in Grant
Evans (ed.), Laos. Culture and Society (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 1999),
pp. 226–257.
135. Quoted in Katay Sasorith, Alphabet et ecriture lao (Vientiane: Éditions du
‘Pathet Lao’), 1943, p. 14.
136. Ibid., p. 3.
137. ‘Arrête No 1021, Résident Supérieur au Laos, le 9 Août 1939’, d. F4, c. 33,
AEFEO.
138. Meyer, Le Laos, p. 27.
144

CHAPTER FOUR
The Campaign for a National ‘Re-awakening’,

1941–1945
Following the Franco–German armistice in June 1940 the newly ap-

pointed Pétain regime in Vichy launched a campaign for what was
known as a national revolution in France. Clad in ultra-conservative
ideology this campaign set out to reform the French nation and its
collective identity, erase the stain of the national humiliation of the
German invasion, and secure the political legitimacy of the new re-
gime. Central to the politico-cultural aspects of the campaign was an
emphasis on folklore and rural culture, an idealised national birth,
the cult of the leader, and condemnation of the former French regime
for bringing decadence to French culture and society. Youth move-
ments served as important means to spread the ideals of the national
revolution and bring about the regeneration of French culture and
society through a resuscitation of virile virtues. The Pétain regime
exported this campaign throughout the French colonial empire.1
In Indochina the campaign for a national renovation was
launched under the enthusiastic leadership of Admiral Decoux,
Governor-General of Indochina 1940–45.2 In metropolitan France
the national revolution addressed the humiliation of the German
invasion and occupation. In the same manner, the campaign for a
national renovation in Indochina can be linked with attempts to
wipe out the stain of defeat and to alleviate French insecurity in
145

Creating Laos
this part of their colonial empire. Since 1940 Japanese troops had
been positioned throughout Indochina. In other parts of Southeast
Asia Japanese troops deposed the European colonial powers and
supported local nationalist movements. The situation was differ-
ent in Indochina. Until March 1945 Indochina remained under
French colonial rule. In return the Japanese army was granted ac-
cess to resources in Indochina necessary to fuel their war-machine.
Still, the presence of Japanese troops challenged French colonial rule
in Indochina throughout the World War II period. In early 1941
French prestige in Indochina received a further blow when Japan
intervened in the Thai–French border war and forced the French
to accept Thai annexation of areas in Laos and Cambodia. In addi-
tion, in the end of 1940 the French were faced with upheavals several
places in Indochina.3
Faced with Japanese and Thai pretensions and local unrest, the
aim of the campaign for a national renovation in Indochina was to
enrol the support of the local population – especially the local elites
– to keep French Indochina under French suzerainty. In a most tan-
gible way, the loyalty of the local elites was to be secured by opening
up to them more and higher positions in the colonial administration
in Indochina and increasing the wages of the civil servants. In co-
operation with the traditional elites, the campaign also involved the
cultivation of pro-French nationalisms in each part of Indochina.
Hereby the French sought to take control of emerging Indochinese
nationalisms and use them to legitimise the colonial status quo at
a time when revolutionary nationalisms were plotting another fu-
ture for Indochina. These pro-French nationalisms were to become
integrated in a federal Indochina nourished by French colonialism.
From this perspective, Laos was to be brought into and be made
part of the Indochina-wide project as a full-fledged patrie with its
own ‘personality’ or cultural identity. This chapter details how the
discourse on Laos and the Lao encompassed in this campaign for a
national renovation in Laos rested on and contributed to the idea of
Laos already in existence.
146

The Campaign for a National ‘Re-awakening’, 1941–1945
OUTLINE OF THE CAMPAIGN FOR A NATIONAL

RENOVATION IN LAOS
The campaign for a national renovation was directed towards
the revival of the individual patries making up French Indochina
without moulding these into a uniform entity. ‘Federalism’, as Eric
Jennings has put it, ‘became the catchword for Vichy’s new “idyllic”
Indochina.’4 Still, as Christopher Goscha has shown, the visions of
a wider Indochinese space linked up with an ‘Indochinese personal-
ity’ or a ‘superior Indochinese nationalism’ were also reflected in the
Vietnamese and French press in Indochina in the first half of the
1940s.5 According to this view Indochina was no longer just to con-
stitute a territorial and administrative entity. It should be turned into
a ‘living reality’ where the Cambodians, Lao and Vietnamese would
be fused into ‘one unique personality’, as it was argued in an edito-
rial in the newspaper Annam Nouveau in late 1941.6 Likewise, an
article in the journal Indochine – the mouthpiece of the Vichy regime
in Indochina – supported the idea that civil servants in Indochina
should be granted an Indochinese citizenship, as it was believed that
such a measure would pave the way for the formation of a wider
‘Indochinese nationality’.7 The issue of the journal Indochine where
this article appeared carried a small map of Indochina without an
indication of the local territories of Cochinchina, Annam, Tonkin,
Cambodia and Laos in the upper left-hand corner of the front-page.
It was repeated in the next ten issues.
There can be no doubt that the notion of an ‘Indochinese nation-
ality’ must have caused concern among many Lao and Cambodians.
The formation of such an identity could imply a de facto ‘Vietnam-
ification’ of the cultures of the western part of Indochina. In compar-
ison, the emphasis on the federal aspect of Indochina left room for
cultural diversity. Decoux must have had such Lao and Cambodian
concerns in mind when he, in an address to the Conseil Fédéral
Indochinoise, clarified the meaning of the term ‘federalism’. According
to Decoux ‘federalism’ was not to be linked with terms such as ‘central-
isation’, ‘invasion’ or ‘absorption’. Rather, ‘federalism’ was synonymous
with the ‘blossom’ of the ‘local personalities’. Accordingly,
147

Creating Laos
[t]he thought of levelling the nationalities by weakening the proper

character of each of them is far away from us. On the contrary, we
intend to rest on the Government of the protégés and work closely
with their indigenous chiefs – the sovereigns – safeguarding the
civilisations that your ancestors have moulded.8
Or, as Decoux phrased it in retrospect, each pays in Indochina
had not only the right but even the duty to develop a local iden-
tity in conformity with its religion, history and sovereign to form
individual ‘small homelands’ (petite patrie).9 Just as the Bretons,
Basques, and Corsicans were allowed to live within France guard-
ing their ‘traditions’ and ‘souvenirs’, so were the individual patries to
be integrated in a ‘federal Indochinese nation’, as it was argued in
an editorial in Indochine in December 1942.10 The individual patries
were to be united in and remain loyal to the higher entity of the
Indochinese Federation and ultimately to the French Empire that
was presented as the guarantee for the survival of each patrie. Laos
was to be brought into the Indochinese family as a full-fledged
member, thereby making it a more viable part of the multi-layered
structure, with the individual patries at the bottom, the Indochinese
Federation at the intermediary step, all united under the protective
shade of the greater French Empire.
This way of addressing Laos’s future was not met with approval
by all French colonial administrators in Indochina. George Gauthier
– Vichy’s secretary-general in Indochina – voiced a strong critique
of the programme launched in Laos. In a very Marquet-like manner
he argued that the Lao population of the Mekong Valley should be
allowed to leave Laos to settle in Thailand and be replaced by immi-
grant Vietnamese. Gauthier believed that it was only through such
an undertaking that it would be possible to de-link effectively Laos
‘psychologically’ and economically from Thailand.11 While Gauthier’s
critique actually encompassed a destruction of the very idea of Laos,
the programme for a national renovation launched in Laos aimed
at the precise opposite. Laos was to become a more viable member
of the Indochinese Federation by improving its economy and social
conditions and by stimulating the resurrection of a Lao cultural her-
148

itage. This was to convince the Lao that Laos had a place within an
Indochina under French colonial rule. The campaign for a national
renovation should show how any uncertainties that may have been
associated with the future of Laos in the past were pushed aside.
A ‘New Laos’ was in the making in which the Lao elite had a
future within the framework of French–Lao co-operation, at a
time when the rise of Thai power had caused members of the Lao
elite to look favourably on Thai expansion into Laos if this would
grant Laos a form of independent status in relation to Thailand. In
1940, according to Maha Sila Viravong, Prince Phetsarath informed
a Thai government official that if Laos were to be ‘given back’ to
Thailand he would welcome this move if the Lao kingdom could
co-exist in a kind of Thai–Lao confederation without being inte-
grated in Thailand the same way as the Lao territories of Isan had
been.12 Although an anti-French coup plotted by young Lao students
at College Pavie in 1940 was never carried out, it indicated how the
changing political situation around the time of the World War II
nourished anti-French feelings among members of the Lao elite.13 In
fact, a group of around forty Lao crossed from Laos into Thailand in
1940–01, many of whom later returned to Laos to become leading
figures in the first attempts to build up an independent Lao govern-
ment in 1945–46.14
Under the auspices of the campaign for a national renovation in
Laos more resources from the general budget were channelled into
diverse sectors of society.15 In order to better the standard of living
various measures were taken in the economic sphere to boost Laos’s
economy and integrate it more firmly into the wider Indochinese
economy. The completion of roads to link different parts of Laos with
each other and Laos with other parts of Indochina was speeded up.
At the same time local agricultural production was to be stimulated.
To this end the former Agricultural Service was resurrected and
put in charge of the agricultural extension on the Boloven Plateau
and of the establishment of agricultural co-operatives. Likewise, the
Forestry Service was reopened in order to improve the use of the for-
est resources. In the social sphere the program aimed at an improve-
149

Creating Laos
ment of the educational system through the opening of more village

and temple schools. According to a French scholar more schools were
opened in Laos between 1940 and 1945 than in the previous half
century of French presence in Laos.16 Similarly, the health situation
was to be improved through the establishment of mobile medical
units. In the administrative-political sphere several important issues
were addressed. The Lao elite were to be granted a greater role in
the administration of their country. To achieve this the stream of
Vietnamese immigrants into Laos was temporarily suspended and
the Administrative College in Vientiane was reformed to secure a
steady flow of well-educated Laotian civil servants. Lao were also
assigned to the newly instituted posts of provincial governor. Finally,
the Luang Phrabang Kingdom, which had been forced to cede its
territories on the west-bank of the Mekong River to Thailand after
the Thai attacks in 1940–41, was compensated for this territorial
loss by being given suzerainty over all of northern Laos, including
the provinces of Vientiane and Xiengkhuang. At the same time the
administration of the kingdom was modernised and the status of
the kingdom was settled by designating it a protectorate on a par
with Annam and Cambodia. In this process of reorganisation the
king’s council was abolished and replaced with a ministerial system
in which Prince Phetsarath was appointed prime minister.
Concurrently a politico-cultural campaign was carried out un-
der the auspices of the newly founded Lao Propaganda Service. In
the words of the Résident-Supérieur in Laos the aim of this service
was to ‘awaken among the Lao a national spirit (amê nationale) and
progressively realise the moral unity of the country’.17 Or, as Decoux
put it in 1940, the Lao shall know that from now on ‘they belong to
the great Lao people’ that France had decided to resurrect.18 Laos
was to be buttressed as a patrie with a unified territory and a popula-
tion possessing a unique and common identity. To this end a cultural
renovation was carried out through which a specific Lao cultural
heritage was to be unearthed, reformed and resurrected in order
to communicate the common identity of the Lao people as defined
through a specific Lao cultural identity. That is, an identity defined
150

in pure ethnic-Lao terms to which the other ethnic groups were to

be assimilated.19 It is important to remember how the French were
up against a potent pan-Thai nationalist and anti-French campaign,
stressing the sameness of the Lao and the Thai in historical, racial
Figure 4: Lao Nhay – Laos’s first newspaper.

Source: Lao Nhay, 2 (March 1941).
151

Creating Laos
and cultural terms. To build up a specifically Lao identity – distinct

from the Thai – was an important strategy to counter Thai propa-
ganda and de-link the Lao patrie from Thai nationalist pretensions.
As an important medium for propagating this new Lao identity
and the vision of a unified space in the making, the Lao Propaganda
Service launched Laos’s first newspaper in the Lao language, Lao
Nhay, in January 1941. (See Figure 4.) At first it appeared as a hand-
written journal, but soon the hand-written characters were replaced
by printed characters and Lao Nhay achieved a more professional
appearance. In its pages readers could, among other things, read
news from the various regions of their country (marriages, deaths,
births, appointments, meetings, celebrations etc.), news from the
world, poems of both modern and classical origin, information about
agriculture, and practical information about the administration of
the country. The latter information was often presented in the form
of dialogue between Mr. Phed (diamond) and Mr. Kaew (jewel).
Although without the same political and nationalist connotations,
the application of the dialogue-form in Lao Nhay may have been
inspired by dialogues between Mr. Man Chuchat and Mr. Khong
Rakthai which in the 1939–44 period were broadcast over the Thai
radio popularising the policies of the Phibun regime.20 Originally,
some of the articles also appeared in French, but this practice was
brought to an end in 1943 when the French readers were directed
towards a new newspaper, Le Nouveau Laos. Lao Nhay was pub-
lished until the Japanese occupation in March 1945, making up a
total of a little fewer than 100 issues. In 1941, Lao Nhay was sup-
plemented with a journal entitled Pathet Lao (‘Lao-land’). Pathet Lao
was published in French and was destined for the Lao elite, while
Lao Nhay was intended as a newspaper for the masses or ‘our unin-
formed brethren’, as it was stated in Pathet Lao.21
In Vientiane committees for literature, music and theatre were
formed to stimulate a resurrection of the Lao cultural heritage and
to write new poems, songs and plays that could propagate the vision
of a ‘New Laos’ in the making. Lao Nhay was, however, not only the
name of the newspaper, but also synonymous with a group of people
152

attached to it who frequently travelled throughout Laos on propa-

ganda tours. They participated in festivals where poems, songs, plays
and speeches addressed the theme of national renovation in Laos.
Associations – the so-called Cercles Lao – were formed in all major
cities in Laos and served as a meeting place for local civil servants.
These associations were often visited by people from Lao Nhay to
ensure that the newspaper, songs, pamphlets and other material
produced in Vientiane in support of the campaign for a national
renovation reached beyond the capital. The Pétain regime was closely
associated with a physical fitness cult and placed great emphasis on
character building through the physical education of the youth in
various youth and sports associations. In Laos, the organisation of
youth was relatively underdeveloped in comparison with the other
parts of Indochina.22 Still, youth groups were formed all over Laos
and the plays written by the Theatre Committee in Vientiane were
typically put on stage by local youth or sport associations.
A central figure in the Lao Nhay movement was Charles Rochet,
then director of public education in Laos. Rochet arrived in Laos in
the early 1930s and is known to have developed a deep affection for
the country and its population.23 His book Pays Lao, Le Laos dans la
tourmente 1939–1945 gives a very personal account of the campaign
for a national renovation in Laos.24 It stands not only as a monument
to his devotion to the Lao and Laos, but it expresses also a deep-felt an-
tipathy towards official French colonial policies pursued in Indochina
prior to 1940. For Rochet the campaign for a national renovation
undertaken in Laos during World War II was an attempt to save Laos
from extinction in a situation where it potentially could be engulfed
either by the Vietnamese or the Thai. The Lao Nhay movement had
a very broad appeal among civil servants in Laos. Among its principal
members we find people who later played central roles in the anticolo-
nial struggle, and ended up on different sides in the long civil conflict
that ravaged Laos in the post-World War II period to 1975 – people
like Katay Don Sasorith, Nhouy Abhay, and Phoumi Vongvichit.25
The campaign for a national renovation stressed how Laos was
to emerge as a full-fledged patrie and member of the Indochinese
153

Creating Laos
Federation with a specific cultural identity, but it implied also a

movement towards the formation of a unprecedented sense of uni-
fied Lao national space. In the next section we shall see how this
sense of unified space was expressed and represented, and look at
the problem that a de facto political and administrative unification
represented.
TOWARDS A NEW NATIONAL SPACE:
THE PROBLEM OF UNIFICATION
It could have been expected that political unification under the
suzerainty of the Luang Phrabang King would be accomplished by
this undertaking to build up an unprecedented sense of unified Lao
space and a notion of a common Lao identity among the popula-
tion. Actually, such a move had been proposed by the king himself
as compensation for the territory the kingdom had been forced to
cede to Thailand in 1941.26 Even though this move would have given
the politico-cultural campaign an important unifying symbol, this
suggestion was turned down by the French. It was believed that a
unification of Laos under the King of Luang Phrabang would cause
problems due to loyalty to the former royal house of Champassack
in southern Laos.27 In the words of Hugh Toye:
[. . .] the haughty northerners of Luang Prabang were not liked in
the south, where, furthermore the arbitrary retirement in 1935 of
Prince Nhouy, head of the old royal house of Champassak, who
had served as governor of the former kingdom under the French,
was still widely resented. [. . .] The union of the whole country was
something the French could not yet concede.28
The existence of the same kind of regionalism is also reflected in
a French report on the political situation in Laos during the first half
of the 1940s. In the report the author comments that in southern
Laos he had met people, who, maybe not without exaggerating, held
the opinion that they preferred to ‘become Siamese rather than be
under the rule of the Satou [the King of Luang Phrabang]’.29 Likewise,
Rochet also ruled out the court of Luang Phrabang as a factor on
which the campaign in Laos could be based as it did not ‘represent
154

anything for the Lao of the centre and the south’.30 So, creating a
unified Lao space had some serious pre-existing regional divergences
to overcome.
It could have been expected that the politico-cultural campaign
launched in Laos would address and alleviate this problem of re-
gionalism that apparently barred the way for a political unification
of Laos by making the King of Luang Phrabang well known and
favoured throughout Laos. A reading of the early issues of Lao Nhay
indicates that such a campaign promoting the king and making him
more visible seems to have been set in motion. The readers could,
for example, read about Decoux’s visit to Luang Phrabang in April
1941 and could follow the king on trips first to Hanoi and later to
Phnom Penh.31 The last trip was the first time the king ever visited
the urban centres in the south – Thakhek, Savannakhet and Pakse
– where he addressed the population at public meetings. In Lao
Nhay it is remarked that the king’s trip to Phnom Penh was intended
to strengthen the relationship between Cambodia and Laos, which
gives the impression that the king actually travelled as an official
representative of Laos.32 Likewise, in 1941–42 we also encounter
articles in the journal Indochine focusing on the Kingdom of Luang
Phrabang and emphasising the antiquity and the historical roots of
the kingdom.33 These were all measures that all could be linked with
an attempt to make the king visible – both locally within Laos and
regionally within Indochina – in order to pave the way for a unifica-
tion of Laos. Further, in connection with the installation of Prince
Phetsarath as prime minister in the reorganised Luang Phrabang
Kingdom Lao officials from all over Laos participated and through
these rituals the kingdom symbolically claimed the whole of Laos.34
On the other hand, when the king appeared on a stamp in the
end of 1942 it was still as King of Luang Phrabang, and by 1943
this focus on King Sisavang Vong and the Lao monarchy disap-
peared from the columns of Lao Nhay and Indochine.35 Moreover,
it is quite significant that the king and royalty were absent from the
song regarded as the national anthem of Laos – Hymne Lao or Lao
Hak Sat – written in 1941 and from other songs written as part of
155

Creating Laos
the campaign for a national renovation in Laos. When Hymne Lao

appeared in the official publication Hymnes et pavilions d’Indochine
in 1941, the Lao king figured as ‘King of Luang Phrabang’ – not
‘King of Laos’.36 Likewise, the king did not appear as promoter or
sponsor of the various contests launched by Lao Nhay, a role which
would have linked him closely with the national renovation. This
role was rather associated with Prince Phetsarath, who was a fre-
quent speaker at the meetings of Lao Nhay in Vientiane and sponsor
of the prizes offered for the best Lao translation of a French literary
work.37 Apart from the early period the King of Luang Phrabang was
not presented as an important symbol in the campaign for a national
renovation. Therefore, whereas a unification of Laos under the king
still presented a possible option in a distant future, the French did
not perceive the king as instrumental for the achievement of this
unification.
What form the unification of Laos should take remained ob-
scure, and the problem of the practical means to achieve it remained
foreign to the French propaganda.38 It was the ‘idea of Laos’ that
gained momentum under the auspices of the campaign, but this
idea was never allowed to manifest itself in the unification of Laos.
Rochet touched upon this problem in a letter to Decoux written in
early 1943. For Rochet there was no doubt that the campaign in
Laos had been a major success so far. According to him, the cam-
paign had succeeded in turning the attention of the Lao away from
Thailand towards the Patrie Lao. It had brought the population in
Laos closer together and aroused among them a ‘new mysticism and
a feeling of union’. In doing so, he believed the campaign had col-
lected the Lao elite around the French cause by convincing them
that a Lao nationalism could only be viable under French protection.
Rochet, however, also pointed out that the time was not yet ripe
for outright unification. As a step towards the desired unification
of Laos he proposed the formation of a Lao Congress that should
‘embody the idea of Laos’ and be an important step towards an ad-
ministrative unification of Laos. In Rochet’s view the formation of
such an institution, where representatives from all the provinces of
156

Laos should meet, would ‘support’ and ‘symbolise’ the idea of Laos so
that this idea ‘did not remain a sentimental dream that never would
become a reality’. In conformity with the ideals of Vichy, Rochet
stressed that this institution was not supposed to be a political or-
gan, but should be devoted to the examination of issues of a social
character. As a first step towards the realisation of a Lao Congress,
Rochet wanted to form a Committee for the Study of Social Issues
in Laos that later could be transformed into the Lao Congress. The
meetings of the members of this institution should be accompanied
by ceremonies and celebrations of a national character that would
‘strike the imagination’.39 The resurrection of the defunct Association
of Friends of Laos (Association des Amis du Laos) – which formerly
had published the journal Bulletin des Amis du Laos – as the Society
for Laotian Studies in October 1943 may have been the association
that Rochet envisaged to form a first step towards the formation
of the Congress.40 The theatrical celebrations that Rochet called for
were, however, never realised under the auspices of this society and a
Lao Congress never came into existence during World War II.
Although the notion of a unprecedented unified Lao national
space was not expressed in terms of an unified administrative struc-
ture, it was expressed in the real world of road development. As noted
in the last chapter, in the 1920–30s priority had been given to the
construction of roads running east-west so as to integrate Laos with
the overall colonial space of Indochina and de-link it from Siam. In
that period Laos had not been nationalised in terms of infrastruc-
ture. This happened during the early 1940s. In 1942 the section of
Route Coloniale No 13 between Thakhek and Paksane was finished
and linked Vientiane with the urban centres further south in the
Mekong Valley. Later, Vientiane was linked with Luang Phrabang
and Xiengkhuang when the section of Route Coloniale No 13 be-
tween Dendin and Phoukhun was finished in 1943. Hereby, the iso-
lation of Vientiane was over in Laos. Route Coloniale No 13 formed
the ‘longitudinal artery’ linking the most important urban centres
in Laos for the first time ever by road.41 The formation of a unified
Lao space was now a reality in terms of roads. The administrative
157

Creating Laos
divide had been bridged and a national circulation was made pos-
sible. But these new roads served not only to link the diverse parts
of Laos together, they also served to de-link Laos from Thailand.
Before the section of Route Coloniale No 13 south of Vientiane was
completed in 1942 it had been normal practice for cars travelling
between Thakhek and Vientiane to cross the Mekong and use the
newly constructed road between Lakhon to Nongkhai via Oudorn
in Thailand in preference to the much slower river transport. This
detour into Thailand was now no longer necessary. Another political
aspect of the need to finish the road between Paksane and Thakhek
was also raised by André Touzet – Résident-Supérieur in Laos – in
a note to the Governor-General. In this note Touzet pointed out
that road building in Laos would serve the French cause at a mo-
ment when,
[…] some indigenous authorities in Laos do not hide their admira-
tion for the development efforts pursued in Thailand and let us hear
that our realisations in Laos are far from being comparable with
what has been achieved on the right-bank of the Mekong.42
In this manner, road development also served as an important
symbol of the dynamism and development linked with French colo-
nialism. Embedded in this infrastructural development was not only
a new sense of Lao space, but also a closer integration of this territorial
entity into a wider Indochinese space. The completion of the section
of Route Coloniale No 13 between Pakse and Savannakhet – where
it merged with Route Coloniale No 9 – was hailed from the wider
spatial perspective of Indochina. Now transport over land between
Hanoi and Saigon was 200 kilometres shorter than the normal route
following the coastline.43 Laos was taking its place in the Indochinese
Federation by means of the development in infrastructure and the
administrative centre of Laos – Vientiane – was placed at the Route
Coloniale network that bound Indochina together.
As Laos’s first newspaper, Lao Nhay can also be assigned an
important role in creating a sense of a unprecedented unified space,
and not only because it carried articles that propagated the vision of
158

unity. As the first country-wide newspaper published in Laos, it was

also a symbol of the new space in the making. In the column News
from Laos the diverse regions of the country were linked together to
make up the territory of Laos and the local news filled up this space
with people similar to the reader. A united Laos was no longer an
abstract and empty space but was taking shape before the eyes of
the readers. In an open letter to Lao Nhay published in Pathet Lao,
the newspaper was applauded for opening up a new horizon for the
people of Laos:
What people like to find in Lao Nhay is news, and, first and fore-
most, news from the country [pays]. This is where they start to read.
In Laos, especially among the civil servants and notables, we know
each other fairly well. Someone who, for example, is in Mahassay
has a brother in Xiengkhuang, a cousin in Pakse, and some friends
just about everywhere. He was at first surprised when he read news
about them in the newspaper. But he quickly got used to it and
now he waits for the newspaper to know if it is true that this one
has changed his post, that that one has been hospitalised and that
another one has received an award. It is the same for information
about villages or provinces – harvests, epidemics, new roads, the
opening of a school or a temple etc. … Naturally our curiosity is
drawn to these facts because they form our small horizon and, in a
way, our living environment. This is why this news is received with
the greatest of pleasure.
The newspaper played an important educating role in the mak-
ing of a ‘New Laos’ and a national consciousness:
Among all the things that we lack first, it must be noted that the
most important of them is cohesion and solidarity. The Laotian is
an individualist, even a bit anarchist. His gregarious nature does not
extend beyond the village and often it does not reach even that far.
Why is this so? Because ignorance rules out for him any intellectual
and moral contact with the ensemble of his compatriots. His ignor-
ance isolates him, makes him inward-looking. It is such that he has
almost completely lost the ideas of people and nation. The news-
paper has still a lot to do to awaken these ideas lying dormant in the
souls. I am sure that it will manage to do so, because, I notice, the
159

Creating Laos
effect is already there. Lao Nhay opens up a new horizon by linking

the Laotians to their history and to their compatriots in the north
and south, and it comes as a real discovery for some. This awaken-
ing of the national conscience and the religious idea should serve
as the foundation for all the altruistic and social feelings that the
modern Laotian needs to acquire. Mutual aid, charity, professional
consciousness or devotion to the general interest should rest on this
basis. Our old morality only insufficiently meets the requirements
of a modern people. A new morality must be born, one which, with-
out conflicting with the old one, completes it and adapts it. We are
going to need qualities and activities that our fathers did not need
or, alas, lacked. We needed above all an ideal. This ideal we have
today: it is the resurrection of the Lao patrie.44
In the same manner the idea of Laos and the sense of a unified
Lao space was nourished in the novel Khamson and Sisamud serial-
ised in Lao Nhay.45 The novel was written by Blanchard de la Brosse,
who was one of the authors behind the Lao schoolbook A Lao
History/Chronicle discussed in the previous chapter. Throughout
the novel we follow two orphans on a journey through large parts of
Laos. Setting out from a village in Champassack, they travel through
Pakse, Savannakhet, Thakhek, Vientiane, Borikhan, Xiengkhuang,
and Luang Phrabang. On this tour of Laos the boys are constantly
eager to learn about the areas they pass through. Obtaining informa-
tion from other people or from books they carry with them, the boys
acquire knowledge about towns, natural phenomena, and agricul-
tural products produced in the regions of Laos they visit. Through
the boys’ eyes the readers see and experience the country in which
they live – Laos is brought into being.
At the same time a variety of national symbols linked with the
new space of Laos were designed and propagated. A national an-
them was composed and recorded on a gramophone record. The
text was written by Maha Phoumi and the music by the medical
doctor Thong Dy, and it was hailed as the winner of the first music
context launched by Lao Nhay in the middle of 1941. It was distrib-
uted throughout Laos to all local associations, schools, and writers
160

who regularly contributed to Lao Nhay. In this manner, the record

became an important symbolic expression of the new space in the
making. Not only Laos was taking shape before the eyes of the read-
ers of Lao Nhay. Laos could also be heard – the record was the voice
of Laos:
For the first time a revived Laos sings on a gramophone, and when
we think that tomorrow – from the banks of Khong to the lost
mountains of Phongsaly – the same notes will ring out and will talk
to the hearts, we believe we hear the very voice of our patrie.46
A national flag was also designed. In Lao Nhay, however, it was
never presented as an important national symbol. In comparison, it is
striking that Lao Chaleun – the newspaper published as a successor to
Lao Nhay following the Japanese occupation in March 1945 – carried
Laos’s flag together with the Japanese flag as a heading on the front
page.47 Likewise, the second issue of the newspaper La Patrie Lao
published by the Lao Issara Government after the Japanese surrender
in August 1945 carried the new flag of Laos on the front page and an
article explaining the symbolism of the new tricolour flag supersed-
ing the three-headed elephant flag of the past.48 Instead, That Luang
and from issue number 72 also Wat Phra Kaeo figured as national
symbols on the front page of Lao Nhay. The symbol of the letter L
produced on a pentagonal shield was also promoted as an important
national symbol. According to a notice in Lao Nhay it represented
the unity of the population.49 It also figured as the emblem of the Lao
Youth Movement in Laos and judging from drawings appearing in
articles about the new theatre in Vientiane or in printed versions of
the plays performed there this emblem towered over the scene.50 The
reason for this preference for other national symbols to the flag may
be that two flags were actually in existence in Laos – that of the king,
used in the Kingdom of Luang Phrabang, and that of Laos.51 In India
the British colonial authorities also resisted the propagation of the
Indian flag as a national symbol for fear that it could nourish antico-
lonial resistance and this may also have been the reason for French
preference for other national symbols over the flag.52
161

Creating Laos
Lao Nhay means ‘Great(er) Laos’ and the title of the newspaper
could imply that the new national space in the making was linked
with an enlarged national territory, a territory associated with
pan-Lao irredentist claims infringing on the territorial integrity of
contemporary Thailand. But this was not the case. A reading of Lao
Nhay reveals how the national territory in the making was linked
with the current extension of Laos – not with an enlarged territory
defined with reference to history or race including the Khorat Plateau
in Thailand. Still, in Lao Nhay we do encounter references to the ex-
istence of a pan-Lao space including both banks of the Mekong. Not
only is reference made repeatedly to ‘our Lao siblings’ on the other
side of the Mekong River, but in the novel Khamson and Sisamud
a Lao-space running counter to the national boundaries is vividly
depicted. Reference to this Lao-space can, for example, be found in
the part of the novel dealing with the boys’ trip through the eastern
part of the Khorat Plateau in Thailand. In search of information
about this territory and the people inhabiting it, the boys are told
that it is a Lao territory in terms of both history and culture. Before
crossing the Mekong and entering Thailand, the boys are briefed by
an actor belonging to theatre company they are travelling with:
Earlier both banks of the Mekong used to be one Lao territory (pen
mueang lao hao an diao kan) and was under the King of Lan Xang
Hom Khao who had established his palace in Vientiane. Today our
brothers and sisters [west of the Mekong] are not under the Lan
Xang flag as they used to be. But soon you will have the opportunity
to go and visit the right-bank. Then you will discover that people in
the villages follow the same traditions as we do.53
Nonetheless, upon arrival in Thailand Sisamud is at first wor-
ried about having to perform before an audience of foreigners (khon
tang pathet). Fortunately, he is comforted by Khamson:
[…] the people you will see when you perform are all Lao to the
very bone. They speak Lao and uphold the traditions we Lao have
respected since our forefathers. Even though you will see that some
people have changed their dress and speech, these people are few in
number. […] Therefore, younger brother, you have to know they are
162

like our race-fellows/fellow-nationals (phuean huam sat) in Thahae,

Pakse, Savannakhet and Thakhek.54
Subsequently, Sisamud takes great pleasure in observing how the
people living on the Khorat Plateau belong to the same race (sat) as
himself.55
Although the vision of an extensive pan-Lao space including
both banks of the Mekong runs counter to the pan-Thai national-
ist discourse, we find no overt call for a territorial enlargement of
Laos in Lao Nhay. We only encounter a few articles in Lao Nhay
addressing directly the pan-Thai nationalist discourse in Thailand,
and the few cartoons ridiculing pan-Thaiism, which appeared in the
first issue, were not followed up in later issues. (See Figures 5, 6, 7.)
Figure 5: Bangkok monkey drills imitating soldier. Anti-Thai

cartoon in Laos’s first newspaper.
Source: Lao Nhay, sabab ton ( January 1941).
163

Creating Laos
Figure 6: ‘In ancient times they burned our temples with wooden torches.
Today they use bombs. The Bangkok people have not changed their ways at
all’. Anti-Thai cartoon in Laos’s first newspaper.
164

Figure 7: ‘The Bangkok Government tries to catch the moon [Greater Thailand].
Will they succeed?’ Anti-Thai cartoon in Laos’s first newspaper.
165

Creating Laos
In the journal Indochine a series of articles written by a Kambuputra

appeared at the height of the Thai–French border war at the end of
1940 and early 1941. These articles took a direct stance against the
pan-Thai irredentist discourse and used the inner logic of this dis-
course to deconstruct Thailand from a historical perspective. Such an
overt critique of the pan-Thai nationalist discourse cannot be found
in later issues of the journal.56 Nowhere do we encounter the kind
of potent pan-Lao discourse later expressed by, for example, Prince
Phetsarath in 1945 in support of a Lao state encompassing the east-
bank territories and the Khorat Plateau.57 In August 1945, a strong
anti-Thai note was also struck by the official representative of the
Royal Government in Luang Phrabang to the representative of the
French colonial authorities in Calcutta. He demanded a recovery of
the Emerald Buddha and of the territories on the Khorat Plateau.58
Finally, in 1945 when the French guerrillas and the royal family of
Luang Phrabang started recruiting volunteers, Crown Prince Savang
reportedly insisted that the oath to be sworn by the new recruits
should focus on the issue of invading Thailand.59
That a strong pan-Lao and anti-Thai discourse was absent from
the columns of Lao Nhay does not, however, imply that such no-
tions were non-existent in Laos in the preceding period. At a great
gathering in Vientiane in late 1940, for example, banners appeared
with the text: ‘Today Xieng-mai, Oubone and Korat are under the
Siamese yoke – in the past they were Lao.’60 Rather, the absence of
a strong irredentist rhetoric in the Lao Nhay newspaper and other
contemporary publications indicates how these were framed in con-
formity with the official French guidelines set for the propaganda
launched in Laos and in other parts of Indochina. From an official
French perspective a rather defensive stance was taken: allusions to
Thailand were to be avoided. The propaganda was not intended to
run counter to the ‘re-establishment of a good neighbourhood’, as the
Résident-Supérieur of Laos reprimanded Rochet after he had made
polemic allusions to Thailand on Radio Vientiane.61 This orientation
of the French propaganda is also reflected in the treatment of a selec-
tion of songs intended to be diffused in Cambodia by the French
166

for propaganda purposes. These songs received approbation from

the Governor-General with the reservation that certain sections of
the text – in which reference to Thailand was made – were deleted.
All the propaganda intended for use in French Indochina should
only inform the Indochinese about their history and the role France
had played in their development.62 For Laos it was specified that the
counter-propaganda should include the following themes. First, the
decadence of the later Lan Xang Kingdom, the rivalry between the
Lao principalities, and the anarchy that was caused by and furthered
by the rise of the Siamese. Second, the nature of the relationship be-
tween the Lao and the Siamese including, on the one hand, the sack
of Vientiane, and, on the other hand, how the Siamese were unable
to provide any protection when the Hos ravaged the Lao territories.
Third, the French encounter personified by Pavie and his so-called
‘mission pacifique’ that gave security to the Lao.63 These themes are in
accordance with the overall narrative structure of the perception of
Laos’s history that came into being in the 1930s and was discussed
in the last chapter. In the following section we shall see how central
elements of this narrative were propagated by the campaign for a
national renovation in Laos.
A NATIONAL REAWAKENING: THE IMPORTANCE OF

HISTORY AND FRANCO–LAO COOPERATION
Apparently, no new books dealing with the history of Laos in broad
terms were published in the period 1941–45. Likewise, in the
columns of Lao Nhay and other contemporary publications like
Indochine and Pathet Lao, we are not presented with detailed ac-
counts of Laos’s history. Still, publications from this period supply us
with valuable historical insights, which, when put together, serve to
delineate the framework of a Lao historical narrative. It can come as
no surprise that the Lan Xang Kingdom occupies a central position
in this narrative structure. Throughout Lao Nhay we encounter ref-
erences to Lan Xang. In the pages of the newspaper it never seemed
important to fix the proportions of this kingdom, neither in terms
of time nor space. Lan Xang becomes a kind of timeless entity of
167

Creating Laos
the past, synonymous with a distant golden age associated with, for
example, military bravery, a flourishing Buddhism, and the apogee
of Lao craftsmanship.64 With reference to a timeless Lan Xang, Laos
is given a historical identity and is removed from the historical orbit
of Thailand. As it is expressed in one of the few articles in Lao Nhay
dealing explicitly with the history of Laos:
The Lao are different from the Siamese. Lan Sang [Xang] has never
been part of Siam. It [Lan Xang] possessed its own personality. As
we go back to the most distant periods of our history, we can see
that our ancient state has never been a vassal of another. Such an
assertion is a historical fact. The Lao people are entirely distinct
from their neighbours. It is only in vain that a deceitful propaganda
tries to distort the truth which the entire history proves: in heart,
language, customs, as much as by their ancestors the Lao are Thai
[Tai] but they are first and above all Lao. […] Laotians, wake-up!
… Let us unite our efforts to defend our country! Let us gather
around our guardian nation to save the land of our ancestors. The
day will come when we restore the Lao country [pays lao] and we
will recover again our national prestige.65
In the historical narrative propagated as part of the campaign for
a national renovation in Laos great emphasis is placed on explaining
the reasons for the disintegration of the Lan Xang Kingdom and the
loss of unity. The period of decline is linked with a changing state
of mind. First, unity was lost as political conflicts emerged because
rulers were guided more by ‘egoism’ and ‘personal interests’ than by
national interests. Second, continued warfare and conflict led to the
emergence of the so-called su-su nature of the Lao during the period
of decline. That is, a Lao stereotype characterised by keywords such
as ‘lazy’, ‘indifferent’, ‘ignorant’, ‘uneducated’, and ‘light-hearted’. The
perception of such a causality, which links the fate of Laos over time
with changes in the mental dispositions of the Lao, is, for example,
forcefully expressed in a series of articles appearing in the first issue
of Pathet Lao. Take, for example, the article with the revealing head-
ing ‘The Errors of Our Ancestors’. It is written by Bouasy, a Lao civil
servant. Bouasy states that decadence emerged because the Lao an-
168

cestors sacrificed the overall interests of the country to their personal

interests. When dealing with the ‘dark age’ of Lao history –the period
when Lan Xang had been split into rival kingdoms – Bouasy refers
to the existence of a kind of solidarity among the Lao. This solidarity,
however, did not equate to a sense of belonging to a country:
[it] did not include the whole of the country, it was only limited to
the village or neighbouring villages. Clannishness took the place of
what we term love of the nation or patriotism, as the Lao of one
mueang seemed to be unaware that the Lao of another mueang
were their brothers. The horizon of our ancestors was very nar-
row-minded. In general the outlook was confined by the mountains
forming the limits of the rice fields. This was their universe.
This divided geopolitical landscape also implied the existence of
many lords each guided by egoist concerns. In the words of Bouasy
a ‘feudalism’ existed that formed the ‘gangrene that destroyed our
country’. At the same time Bouasy characterises the Lao of past gen-
erations as being much too caught up with amusing themselves while
neglecting work and education. In doing so these Lao neglected the
duty of ‘preparing the future for their descendants’. Alluding to an old
saying – ‘a father who takes his food too salty also makes his children
thirsty’ – Bouasy laments further how this su-su nature for much too
long has characterised the Lao and how the Lao have inherited the
‘sickness of merrymaking’ from their forefathers. But now the time
had come to remedy this situation:
Thank you, Lao Nhay, for inviting us to correct the mistakes of the
past. Thank you for waking us and turning us towards a new hori-
zon, towards a future more viable, more secure and more glorious.
The mistakes of our ancestors will not be futile if they serve us as a
lesson today.66
In the same vein Thao Phoui alluded to the changing states of
mind when he sets out to discover ‘Who are We?’ in an article in
the same issue of Pathet Lao. Phoui provides a twofold answer. On
the one hand, referring to the recent past he characterises the Lao
as ‘lazy’ and ‘carefree’ in accordance with the su-su stereotype. But
169

Creating Laos
on the other hand, Phoui locates the remnants of a more glorious

identity under the veneer of the decadent nature. The Lao not only
have a genealogy stretching far back in time, but he characterises
them also as a people ‘who sleep in the shadow of a great past’. Now,
according to Phoui, the Lao are ready to take advantage of what the
French have to offer them:
A new spirit has been born that calls for solidarity, sacrifice, and the
revival of a Patrie – mutilated and gasping for breath. Our answer
is: here we are. Here we are with all our strength and energies not
yet destroyed. And we say to France: do to us what you will. Our
ancestors gave their hearts to Pavie; following their example and, in
full confidence, we give you ours.67
Following the guidelines mentioned earlier, French propaganda
in Laos was to de-link Laos from Thai pretensions, stressing how
the Thai in the past were unable to protect the Lao against the ravag-
ing Ho. Referring to the same logic, the military confrontation and
the loss of Laos’s territories west of the Mekong could have been
interpreted as evidence for the inability of the French to defend
Laos. This is not the case. In the narrative, the attacks represent a
necessary evil that violently shook the Lao out of their lethargy and
made them conscious of their country and the unity that they had
lost in a distant past. In this manner, the attacks become a decisive
turning point that woke the Lao from a slumber and made them
desirous to carve out a new path towards the future. That is, the
attacks are linked with the formation of a new state of mind among
the population in Laos. The problem or frustration associated with
the loss of territory is played down in comparison with the gains
achieved: a spiritual awakening. In an editorial in Lao Nhay entitled
‘The Lao have Regained Consciousness’ the positive implications of
the Thai attacks are summarised in the following manner:
The deeds of the Thai have also made us understand that we do
not suffer as individuals. All the Lao living along the Mekong have
endured sufferings. This has been the occasion for all to awaken and
think about their Lao race/nation (sat lao). From North to South,
170

Housai to Pakse, from the Lan Xang Mountains to the Saravan

Mountains, […] all the Lao now feel that a line unites them: the
line of the old Lao race/lineage. When feeling this, [the Lao] desire
to preserve the Lao name for ever.
Cessation of territory is not a pleasant experience, the editorial
continues, but what is important is that a people can face the future
when they have faith in themselves, and:
[a] faith like this has been lit in the mind of the Lao (sao lao).
Together we will preserve this flame to be bright forever. Soon it
will shine brightly over all of the Mekong Valley and be a sign that
the Lao race/nation has awakened.68
The same positive linkage between the attacks and a fundamen-
tal turning point in the history of Laos and the Lao is stressed in
another editorial of Lao Nhay, extolling what has happened in Laos
since 1941. Besides the construction of new roads, reforms of the
administration and educational sector something more important
has been achieved:
[…] the Lao have regained consciousness and have re-found their
love for the race/nation passed on from a distant past. From North
to South no matter what districts, [the people] call out for their
compatriots (phuean huam sat lao) to unite.69
That is, a unified Laos has become the ideal and it is deemed
necessary to work for the unification of Laos. A unified Laos, how-
ever, is not perceived as a new and strange creation. In the previous
chapter we saw how a proto-national history of Laos was in the
making in the 1930s. In this history the modern state of Laos is
conceived as being part of a linear history stretching back to the early
beginnings of the Lan Xang Kingdom. The perception of history
propagated by the campaign for a national renovation in Laos places
great emphasis on associating the emergence of a unified Laos with
the re-awakening of an identity and sentiments that have always
been in existence. With reference to the glorious past of Lan Xang,
the ‘New Laos’ or ‘Young Laos’ embodis the ‘re-construction’ or ‘re-
unification’ of a space and its population which lost its unity under
171

Creating Laos
specific historical circumstances. Laos is transformed from ‘Old

Laos’ to ‘New Laos’ implying continuity with the past. ‘New Laos’
is to be formed in conformity with an ancient Lao cultural heritage.
Or, as Nhouy Abhay puts it in his speech on the occasion of the
opening of the Lao Theatre in Vientiane (Théâtre Lao de Vientiane)
in late 1941: the new Laos is to be constructed with ‘old Lao stones’.70
Bringing a ‘New Laos’ into being indicates a process of change within
an overall continuity. This idea of embedding Laos with continuity
within an overall process of change is nicely captured by Rochet in a
small article published in Indochine:
Of course, I knew that this old Laos – nice and resigned – was still
intact, but at its side, a young Laos was in the process of being born
and was looking towards life. On thinking about it, I found it logi-
cal, natural, inevitable. And yet, I remained surprised as if I had had
a revelation. ‘Moral unity, national spirit, revival of the Lao patrie ...’.
These words that I heard proclaimed with so much faith vibrated
in my ears. Oh! They were not exactly new for me. During chats,
I had often heard the old Laotians pronounce them as well. But
they talked about these things with their gaze on the past and with
a voice loaded with regret. They talked about them as memories
lost long ago in the mists of the centuries ... And I came to gaze
upon a room of young men – confident and enthusiastic – who
had decided to make this dream of their ancestors a living reality.
My stroll had taken me to Wat Phra Kaeo. Before the temple, in
the night, stood the statue of Pavie against the star-studded sky, as
if he was on the guard. Pavie! … The saint, the creator of French
Laos! ... What does he think, I asked myself, if, high on his pedestal,
the man with his big hat could contemplate this birth of a Laotian
patriotism? ... Without a doubt he would be thrilled. Yes, it would
be sweet for him to see his work accomplished, crowned. It would
be sweet for him to see resurrected the country he had loved and,
because of him, France had saved. 71
Just as in the historical narrative propagated in the previous pe-
riod, we also see here how Auguste Pavie in the 1941–45 period is
presented as the epitome of the positive aspect of French colonialism:
had it not been for Pavie ‘Laos and the Lao name would probably
172

have disappeared’ as readers could read in Lao Nhay.72 In general

this is reflected in numerous references throughout Lao Nhay and
specifically in an article where the deeds of Pavie are praised under
the heading ‘Great Men and their Everlasting Work’.73 In the novel
Khamson and Sisamud Pavie is hailed as ‘the one who restored the
Lao race/nation (sat lao) so that it did not disappear’.74 In that con-
nection an interesting parallel between, on the one hand, Pavie and
Oun Kham, and, on the other hand, Decoux and Sisavang Vong
is often invoked to communicate this theme of French protection.
Pavie was instrumental in the survival of Laos. But initially the patrie
was not resurrected because the Lao were not ready for this due to
their decadent nature. But now a new spirit has been born after the
Thai attacks and the Lao once more turn to Decoux to be saved.75
Furthermore, this theme of the necessity of French colonialism to
safeguard and develop Laos is conveyed with reference to the sym-
bolism of Laos as a ‘spiritual child’ and France as an ‘adopted mother’.
Or as it is phrased in an article in Pathet Lao: ‘In reality Laos is still
at the stage of an infant. If not supported, it will fall; if not defended
it will be beaten.’76 Laos is moving forward by resurrecting qualities
of the past under French tutelage.
In the previous chapter I dealt with the significance of the restora-
tion of Vientiane and of various religious monuments as national
symbols expressing the essence of the historical narrative. In 1942
Wat Phra Kaeo in Vientiane was inaugurated after it had undergone
a thorough restoration. This was hailed as a very auspicious sign for
the future of Laos, and the fate of the temple was so closely related
to the sorrows and happiness of the country that it was characterised
as the ‘national temple of Laos’.77 In fact, the history of Wat Phra
Kaeo can be read as the essence of the above-mentioned historical
narrative. Its creation dates back to the Lan Xang Kingdom and it is
a unique symbol of that period. When it was raided by the Siamese
invaders in 1828, the most auspicious Buddha image of the kingdom
kept in the temple was carried off to Bangkok and the temple was
left in ruins. Following 150 years of devastation Wat Phra Kaeo
was finally restored to its former glory with French help in 1942,
173

Creating Laos
‘giving back to Laos its glory and prosperity of the past’.78 Emerging
from the ruins it appeared more smart and ‘svelte’ than ever – resur-
rected under French tutelage, but under the supervision of Souvanna
Phouma and employing Lao workers indicating that the Lao are just
as capable as any other people.79 In the same way the historical nar-
rative portrayed a ‘New Laos’ in the making under French guidance,
but with the Lao taking an active part. Although new and modern
in its appearance Laos was formed according to a specific historical
heritage. Like a phoenix, Laos – and Wat Phra Kaeo – rose from the
ashes in a slightly different but still familiar shape.80 (See Figure 8.)
The process of creating a sense of an unprecedented unified Lao
space is also reflected in a change in the Lao term used to signify
‘Laos’. Here I have in mind how the term sat took on a new mean-
ing in the public discourse under the auspices of the campaign for a
national renovation. This shift parallels the same conceptual devel-
opment that took place in Thailand in the early part of the twentieth
century with regard to the term chat – the Thai equivalent to Lao
sat. Etymologically, the term chat means ‘origins, birth, race’. By the
early twentieth century it was also used to mean ‘nation’ – often oc-
curring in prathet chat.81 Dictionaries of the Lao language published
in the early twentieth century reflect the same polyvalence in the
meaning of the term sat. In Cuaz’s French–Lao dictionary of 1904
the meanings of sat are given as: ‘race’ (sat) and ‘nation’ (satpathet).82
Likewise, in Guignard’s Lao–French dictionary published around a
decade later the meanings of the word sat are listed as: ‘race’, ‘gender’,
‘sex’ (sat) and ‘nation’, ‘people’ (sat pathet – listed as synonymous with
pathet).83 Therefore, according to these dictionaries, in the early part
of the twentieth century in Lao sat could be associated with the term
for ‘nation’. Still, judging from a reading of Lao schoolbooks from
the 1930s the term sat was not used officially in connection with
Laos. Rather the term pathet lao – ‘Laos’ or ‘Lao-land’ – is used.
Invoking notions of independence from western dominance it is only
natural that chat in the meaning ‘nation’ flourished in non-colonised
Thailand, while its Lao equivalent was evaded in texts published
with the approval of the colonial authorities in Laos.
174

[Wat Phra Kaeo 5–6 years ago.]
[Wat Phra Kaeo today.]

Figure 8: Wat Phra Kaeo and the resurrection of Laos.
Source: Lao Nhay, 26 (March 1942).
175

Creating Laos
Petain’s ideology was closely linked with the idea of the nation,
so it must have been almost unavoidable not to begin thinking about
Laos in national terms too. If we turn our attention to the World
War II period a reading of Lao Nhay indicates how pathet lao was
still the term used primarily when referring to Laos. At the same
time we can also see how sat and pathet-sat appear now with the
meaning ‘nation’.84 In this manner, pathet sat lao and sat lao were used
to conceptualise Laos as a nation-state. However, if we look solely at
the term sat lao, it can be difficult, if not impossible, to know whether
it is employed in the meaning ‘Lao race’ or ‘Lao nation’. Judging from
the context it can mean both. Take, for example, Hymne Lao, which
had an official version in both Lao and French. In the French version
we come across the following lines:
Long ago our Lao race [sat lao] benefited from great renown in
Asia.
Then the Lao [sao lao] were united and loved each other.
Today once again they love their race [sat lao] and their pays [pathet],
and are uniting around their leaders.
[…]
They will not allow some nation [sat] to come and create trouble or
take possession of their land.85 [My emphasis]
In parenthesis I have given the word used in the Lao version of
the text. We can see how sat is employed both with the meaning
of ‘race’ and ‘nation’: ‘race’ when referring to Lao(s) and ‘nation’ when
referring to a foreign nation. In the Lao version it is impossible to see
with what meaning the term sat is employed. In line one and three
we could just as well have translated sat lao as ‘Lao nation’. It is the
French version that fixes the meaning. This play with words may
mirror a French reluctance to apply the term ‘nation’ to Laos as this
potentially could be linked with the notion of an independent Laos
released from French colonialism. Nevertheless, ideologically the
campaign for a national renovation in Laos is linked with the ‘resur-
rection’ or ‘reconstruction’ of a Lao nation conceptualised as sat lao or
sat pathet lao. This emerging Lao nation is harnessed to the French
176

colonial project. That is, the process of bringing Laos into existence
as a Lao nation is not linked with a political revolution releasing
Laos from French colonial rule. Instead, as discussed above, the
creation of the Lao nation is linked with a human revolution under
French guidance. This idea is summarised nicely in a note published
together with the first novel in Lao in 1943. Here, in a very Pétain-
like manner, it is specified that the Lao national renovation is linked
with forming a new work ethic, exercise of the body, cleanliness, and
discipline. These entail the qualities of the human revolution that
will bring Laos forward. If we do not know ‘respect for seniors, to tell
the truth, […] our Laos cannot become “Great Laos”’, as it is stated in
the note.86 In the same vein, a young Lao ‘patriot’ or ‘nationalist’ (phu
hak sat) is defined as a ‘docile and well-mannered person’ (pen khon
hu phu di).87
LES ANNAMITES ET NOUS:

AN AMBIVALENT RELATIONSHIP
In the last chapter we saw how the Vietnamese population in Laos
increased in the 1920–30s and how debates on the future of Laos
had centred on whether Laos should be a ‘Lao Laos’ or a ‘Laos
Annamite’. The administrative, economic and politico-cultural
programme launched by the French colonial administration in Laos
during World War II intended to bury designs for a ‘Laos Annamite’.
Still, for many Lao the Vietnamese population living in Laos and
their dominance in the urban centres was still perceived as a threat.
In a report written in 1945 summarising the accomplishments of the
campaign for a national renovation in Laos, Rochet notes how the
theme of an Indochinese federation was received ‘coldly’ in Laos due
to fear that this would imply an increased Vietnamese influence in
Laos.88 In this connection it is interesting to note how the first issue
of Lao Nhay contains a small textbox informing the readers that this
new Lao newspaper is intended to be the journal of the Lao, French
and Vietnamese, with the aim of establishing a ‘line between’ these
people.89 Letters from Vietnamese in Laos published in the early is-
sues of Lao Nhay were, however, soon to disappear. Later, in 1943,
177

Creating Laos
Lao Nhay was supplemented with Le Nouveau Laos in French and

Tin Lao in Vietnamese. Although it is not stated explicitly such a
split up of the readership along ‘racial’ or ‘national’ lines may have
been connected with Lao discontent with the Vietnamese being
present in their ‘national’ newspaper.
Still, in Lao Nhay we also encounter articles that stress how the
‘New Laos’ is to be constructed by Lao and Vietnamese in co-opera-
tion and hail the harmonious co-existence between these two groups
of people.90 There are also articles dealing with the Lao-Vietnamese
relationship from a historical perspective. Take, for example, the
article entitled ‘The relationship between Lao and the Vietnamese
according to the chronicles’ which was published over two issues in
May 1943.91 In this article the relationship between these two people
over the longue durée is characterised as:
[…] a friendly relationship only scarred by minor instances of con-
flict in a distant past that we have all but forgotten today. For five
centuries the Lao have been on good terms and have been getting
along well with the Vietnamese but not with other people.92
This ‘harmonious’ relationship, however, is not one between two
equal partners. While the Thai appear as the ‘oppressors’ in the Lao
historical narrative, the Vietnamese are assigned the role of ‘protec-
tors’. They fulfil this role especially after the destruction of Vientiane
in 1828, an event that expresses the quintessence of the oppressive
Thai. However, after this the Vietnamese Ming Mang stationed
troops in Xiengkhuang in order to ‘protect it against Thai troops’,
and many of the Lao principalities sought Vietnamese protection
as a bulwark against harassment by the Thai.93 From this historical
projection emerges, first of all, an ‘us-them’ dichotomy, with the Lao
juxtaposed to the Thai. But the ‘us’ category is enlarged to include
the Vietnamese. In this way the modern creation of an Indochinese
unity is projected back in time. From this historical perspective
the Thai are perceived as a ‘danger from the outside’ (antalai phai
nok).94 According to this article the closeness between the Lao and
the Vietnamese is further nourished by common descent or racial
178

closeness (pen suea phi sai nong kan). Originally, the two peoples
were settled in a region north of Indochina. In search for land to
farm they moved southward to live on each side of the Annamese
Cordillera and were subjected to different cultural influences. But
when it comes to ‘mind and spirit’ they are still closely related.95
Through this projection Laos is sealed off from Thailand as part of
this historically constituted ‘Lao-Vietnamese federation’.
However, in Pathet Lao, Lao Nhay and Indochine we encounter
articles presenting the Lao-Vietnamese in more ambivalent terms.
This ambivalence is, for example, expressed clearly in the article ‘Les
Annamites et nous’ by Ourot Souvannavong.96 On the one hand,
Ourot praises the Vietnamese for contributing positively to the de-
velopment of Laos: not only have the coolies on roadwork and the
civil servants in the offices assisted the development of Laos, but
recently they have also defended Laos when it was threatened by the
Thai. Furthermore, Ourot notes that many of the Vietnamese liv-
ing in Vientiane as teachers, traders and civil servants have married
Lao women, and have, in fact, become ‘just as much Laotians as us’.
On the other hand, Ourot likens the influx of Vietnamese farmers
to an ‘invading flood’ and emphasises that they can be a danger for
Laos. If these farmers – characterised as ‘disagreeable’ and ‘arrogant’
– arrive in great numbers in Laos, a situation will be created where
the Vietnamese will not only be masters of the cities, but also own-
ers of the rice fields. Echoing Prince Phetsarath and French colonial
administrators in Laos in the 1930s, Ourot calls for a controlled
immigration of Vietnamese into Laos:
Just as it is impossible to keep the waters of the Mekong from flooding
the plains it is also impossible to keep the Annamese [Vietnamese]
from entering Laos. But in the same way as it is possible to guide the
water through channels to allow it into this locality and keep it out
of another, in the same manner it is possible to control the stream of
immigrants that threatens to drown us.97
According to Ourot, however, it is not only the responsibility of
the French administration to control Vietnamese immigration into
179

Creating Laos
Laos. In line with the discourse on Lao decadence and regeneration,

he notes that it is also up to the Lao to work. In other words, the
Lao have to take responsibility themselves by leaving their su-su
nature behind. The change of mind imbedded in the campaign for a
national renovation is the best barrier to the danger to the Lao and
Laos arising from the immigrant Vietnamese.
In another article praising the material progress achieved in
southern Laos, the author laments the tendency of the Lao to leave
the major cities in Laos to settle in the countryside because of the
stiff competition they encounter from foreigners (tang dao). People
who do this
[. . .] do not think of the future of our nation [pathet sat] at all.
The time now is the time for fight. Anyone who does not fight and
defend their rights must die and disappear. The Lao race/nation
[sat lao] used to be well known and in history they were not weak
and lazy like the ones referred to [i.e. those moving away from the
cities]. We are clever and can live like all other races/nations [sat].
We must show that we have strength, intelligence and ideas equal
with other races/nations [sat].98
Eric Pietrantoni’s study of the population in Laos in 1943 at-
tests how the Vietnamese made up the major component of the
population in the cities in southern Laos.99 So although there is no
explicit reference in the above-mentioned article to the Vietnamese
there can be no doubt that they are the ones the Laotians have to
fight. This theme of ‘racial’ exclusion is also a recurring theme in
articles stressing the need for the Lao to attend schools and become
educated. In one article focusing on the need to educate more Lao
teachers, for example, the author takes issue with a problem he has
heard people addressing very often: that they only encounter other
races/nationalities in the government offices in Laos. Instead of just
complaining, the author urges these to send their children to the
schools to counter this menace.100 Again, there is made no explicit
reference to the Vietnamese. But taking into consideration the great
abundance of Vietnamese in the administrative sector in Laos there
can be no doubt that this argument is framed with them in mind.101
180

CULTURAL REVIVAL: LITERATURE AND SONGS

We saw earlier how an attempt was made to build up a Lao religious
textual heritage at the Buddhist Institute in Vientiane in the 1930s.
Contemporary Lao literature was, however, virtually non-existent
when the Vichy-sponsored campaign for a national renovation was
launched in Laos. Instead, the reading public in Laos had to turn to
publications in foreign languages, such as French and Thai. If Laos
were to be revived as a full-fledged patrie this lack of contemporary
Lao literature constituted a problem, not only because the reading
public in Laos was potentially confronted with Thai anti-French
propaganda when reading Thai literature, but also because the lack
of an indigenous Lao literature kept Laos within the cultural sphere
of Thailand. This problem was acknowledged by the chief for the
Service for Information, Propaganda and Press (IPP), who called
for a speeding up of the publication of books and pamphlets in
Lao to counter the diffusion of books and other material in Thai in
Laos.102
In connection with building up a separate specific modern and
popular Lao literary tradition Lao Nhay – both as printed medium
and as an institution – played an important role. As Laos’s first
newspaper written in the Lao language, Lao Nhay was not only a
symbol of the new national space in the making and a symbol of
the modernity of ‘New Laos’. The newspaper was also instrumental
in the attempt to bring a new Lao literary tradition into existence
by printing and diffusing the new literature. In a regularly-featuring
column entitled Liberal Arts (aksonsat) classical and modern Lao
poems were printed and made known throughout Laos. The clas-
sical Lao literary heritage was especially connected with the poem
Sin Sai and sections of it were a recurring feature in the newspaper.
In co-operation with a Lao Literary Committee formed in 1941,
Lao Nhay also arranged literary contests to stimulate the writing of
modern Lao literature and selected texts were published either in
Lao Nhay or under separate cover. The first poetry contest was ar-
ranged in early 1941 on the theme ‘our homeland’ (thinthan bankoet
khong sat lao). This contest was followed by other literary contests
181

Creating Laos
covering tales, cartoons, and translations of French literary pieces

into Lao. Among the books published by Lao Nhay we find the win-
ning poem from the first poetry contest written by Thao Nouthak.
This was followed by the publication of The Sacred Buddha Image
by Lao Cindamani (Pierre Nginn), the first short story in Lao. It
was published in 1943.103 Later a book Lao Poetry (kap kon lao) con-
taining the poems found most popular by Lao Nhay was published.
The idea was that this book should serve as a guidebook for other
potential poets. A collection of Lao translations of French literary
pieces was likewise published. Finally, all the songs and theatre plays
written as part of the campaign for a national renovation in Laos
were published by Lao Nhay throughout the period 1941–45.
Linked with this drive to publish Lao literature was an attempt
to standardise the rules for Lao poetry. People who wanted to con-
tribute poems to Lao Nhay were urged to follow the strict rules for
Lao poetry. This served two purposes. First, to secure and improve
the quality of modern Lao poetry. Secondly, to link the modern lit-
erature with that of the past by reproducing rules that supposedly
were found in Lao classical poetry. In that connection it is interesting
to note how a Lao literary history was in fact framed with refer-
ence to the golden age-decadence-resurrection narrative structure
mentioned earlier. In an editorial in Lao Nhay, for example, Thao
Nouthak is hailed as the winner of the first literary contest in the
following manner:
For three centuries Lao poetry has been in a disastrous state. The
scribes copied the poetry passed on from antiquity wrongly and
changed it from the original form as the scribes or the singers were
neither diligent nor interested. The conventions of poetry were not
respected. Thao Nouthak has solved this problem entirely and has
resurrected our classical verses of seven or nine syllables in con-
formity with the classical conventions and has made them just as
renowned as in the past.104
As Laos got its new generation of poets, the new poetry ex-
pressed continuity with the classical traditions with regard to form,
but was characterised by change with regard to content. The new
182

literature was to fulfil a new function in a ‘New Laos’. In Lao Nhay it

was noted:
These days the poets do not only write about adultery and young
girls. Rather, the poets have attempted to compose poetry dealing
with other subjects in order to advise the elder and younger Lao
siblings [. . .]. 105
Child: ‘How can I get the coconut?’

Father: ‘If you want it, you have to climb up the school.’
Child: ‘I do not want to follow that path.’
Father: ‘Then you will have nothing to eat.’
(The tree trunk reads ‘school; the top reads ‘doctor’, ‘teacher’ and ‘district administrator’)
Figure 9: Building a future through education.
Source: Lao Nhay, 19 (November 1941).
183

Creating Laos
In this way literature fulfilled a double function in the campaign

for a national renovation. It was not only a symbol of the renovation
but was also used as a medium for carrying the message of what the
Lao in a ‘New Laos’ should and should not do. That is, the poems
were used to express the characteristics of ‘Lao-ness’, and the ethics
and human ideals embodied in the human revolution that should
bring Laos forward from a degenerate past. An exaltation of the hu-
man qualities that should characterise the modern Lao was therefore
a recurrent theme in many of the poems published in Lao Nhay.
[Left sign: ‘dissipation’; right sign: ‘modernisation’; top: ‘physical fitness’]
Figure 10: Disciplining the body and modernising the nation/race.

Source: Lao Nhay, 33 ( June 1942).
184

Not surprisingly, a central theme in many poems was the need for
education.106 Another recurring theme was the need for the people
to work and produce instead of idling the time away. The lazy ways
of the past were to be left behind and instead the Lao were to work
for a common future.107 These two characteristics of the new-born
Lao – education and diligence – were linked also with a ‘pure’ way of
living and in poems gambling and the misuse of alcohol and opium
were likewise discouraged.108 The need to abandon ways and beliefs
of former times was also a recurring theme. In an untitled poem, for
example, the habit of chewing betel was discouraged. The causes of
various common diseases were explained with reference to modern
medicine while the ‘traditional’ way of explaining illness with refer-
ence to spirits was rejected.109 (See Figures 9, 10, 11.)
‘To put on your father’s glasses will not help you read if you do not attend school.’
Figure 11: The need for education.

Source: Lao Nhay, 21 (November 1941).
185

Creating Laos
Besides serving as a kind of checklist to the ideal characteristics

of ‘Lao-ness’ in the ‘New Laos’, the quintessence of the historical
narrative of degeneration and resurrection was a recurring theme in
the poems published in Lao Nhay. This theme added both histori-
cal depth to ‘New Laos’ and emphasised the positive – and indeed
necessary – influence of French colonialism on Laos and Lao society.
This narrative was, for example, embodied in the poems that were
awarded prizes in the first literary contest launched by Lao Nhay.
Take, for example, the poem by Thao Set – a teacher from Mueang
Nong who received the second prize. The poem traces the history
of the Lao back to a mythical homeland in southern China. Due to
hardship the Lao left this place and moved further south and settled
on the east-bank territories of the Mekong. According to the poem,
at first the Lao people were politically divided and King Fa Ngum is
hailed as the king who brought unity to the Lao. This distant past
is evoked as Laos’s golden age. Only part of the poem was published
in Lao Nhay. In this extract the golden age is followed abruptly by a
period of disorder and chaos that only the French were able to stop.
Thao Set finally encourages the readers to contemplate how Laos
today is more prosperous and civilised than ever due to France. The
term ‘Laos’ (pathet lao) is used throughout the poem, embedding
modern Laos with a permanent and everlasting quality. In another
poem by Thao Khammuy – a clerk from Paksong who also received
a second prize – it is the protective and positive aspect of French
colonialism that features as the recurrent theme. As a tiny country
it has only been possible for Laos to survive in the protective shade
of French grandeur. Finally, there is the poem by Thao Thong Sing
– an assistant in Luang Phrabang – which received fourth prize in
the contest. In the poem Thao Thong locates Laos’s golden age in a
distant past in southern China. Threatened by enemy forces the Lao
were forced to leave this wonderland and started moving southwards
to settle in the Mekong region. During this migration the Lao were
split into various groups fighting each other. As they were divided,
the Lao were weak and came under the rule of other people. Thao
Thong wants the Lao to remember this historical lesson: in times of
186

danger it is only when the Lao are united that they are strong enough
to fight the enemy. The poem ends with Thao Thong asking the Lao
to unite and love their homeland that has been passed on to them
from their ancestors.110
Parallel to this endeavour to resurrect and renovate Lao literature
a similar project was launched with respect to another facet of the
Lao cultural heritage: Lao songs. A first step was taken in May 1941
when a Committee for Music was formed with the aim to ‘revive’
and ‘modernise the classical songs of Laos’.111 A few months later, an
editorial in Lao Nhay spelled out what the work of this commit-
tee entailed. According to the editorial Laos was in the middle of a
modernisation process and things ‘backward’ and out of fashion had
to be changed in order to fit the modern era. The readers, however,
were assured that this modernisation process did not imply that
‘old songs that are pleasant to our ears will be thrown away’. These
songs represent a ‘heritage that has been passed on to us from the
time when the Lao race/nation was born’.112 These traditional songs
were to be preserved. At the same time new songs were to be writ-
ten that were more suited to the demands of contemporary Laos.
This implied the composition of songs elucidating the themes of a
degenerate past, the positive aspect of French colonialism, and the
need for a unification of the people. These are all themes that figures
prominently in many of the songs written as part of the campaign
for a national renovation in Laos. In ‘The Lao peasant’ (pho na lao
or Chant du paysan lao), for example, the farmers are asked to work
hard for their country:
Come, come, come, farmers, my friends,
Let us get up, as usual, at the first crow of the cock.
Come, come, come, the horizon is already glowing in the East.
The sun soaks us in its rays; hurry up, dear friends.
Prepare our ploughs, our buffaloes, our harrows and leave.
Working in the fields is not a humiliating task;
On the contrary, it makes us money:
We shall undertake this with ardour.
Farmers, my dear companions,
187

Creating Laos
We must love working in the fields.

It is hard but we will persevere:
We harvest from it excellent fruits.
Working in the fields is just as useful and necessary
As trade and better than the bureaucracy [mandarinate];
It provides pleasure for both body and spirit.113
In ‘A call to the Lao’ (tuean chai lao or Appel aux Lao) the deca-
dent Lao stereotype is identified as the cause that has brought the
Lao race/nation to the edge of extinction. This deplorable situation
can only be reversed if all the Lao who have been living in ‘indiffer-
ence’ and ‘idleness’ break with the past and become united:
Listen, Lao, my brothers,
You who take pleasure in indifference and laziness:
This attitude is contrary to our interests
For the danger stalks us.
Our Lao race [suea lao] was on the brink of perishing, its name was
going to disappear.
Must we, my brothers, accept such a situation?
When you think about it, what sadness;
The one who has understood this is awakened with a jolt and stops
his daydreaming.
Let us keep each other on guard all the time
And let us search for ways to defend our country [pathet] and make
it long-lasting.
The best way to reach this result
Is to love each other, my brothers;
To help each other all our lives,
To share on all occasions and with a kind heart
Our sorrows and happiness.114
‘Union of the Lao’ (lao huam samphan or L’union Lao) reflects on
the unity of the people in Laos from north to south with regard to
race and common ancestry:
188

The [geographical] limits of Laos are very vast. Its name ‘Lan Xang’
was once famous.
Whether they be from the North or the South, its people do not
belong to different races. They are all Lao.
Oh, compatriots, protect yourselves mutually.
Do not say that there are people from the north and people from
the south.
Those who have good fortune and wealth must help those who find
themselves in unhappiness, poverty and misfortune.
We are of the same blood and we are descendants from the same
ancestors,
We must love each other to the end of our lives.
Friends, gather quickly and let us unite our physical and spiritual
strengths.
Quick, quick, rush to defend the Lao race [lueat nuea suea lao] to-
gether.
Quick, quick, wake up and help us protect ourselves against misfor-
tune, so that the Lao will continue to exist.
Sacrifice yourself body and soul. We are virile men and we must
accept dying for our pays [sat].
And we will be ready to spill our blood for the greatness and the
glory of our patrie [sat].115
Finally, the close relationship between Laos and France is a cen-
tral theme in Hymne Lao:
In olden times our Lao race [sat lao] was well known in Asia.
Then the Lao [sao lao] were united and loved each other.
Today they still know how to love their race [sat lao] and their pays
[pathet], and unite around their leaders.
They have preserved the religion of their fathers and have known
how to watch over their ancestral soil.
They will not allow any nation [sat] to come and create trouble or
take possession of their land.
Whoever will invade their land will find them firmly determined to
fight until death.
Together they will restore the antique glory of the Lao blood and
help each other in times of hardship.
189

Creating Laos
France is here; she assists us in hard times, she awakens us and

shows us the way.
Hurry, get in line and march towards our destiny.
Laotian brothers, wake up! It is only through the rebirth of our
country that we will find happiness.
France is our teacher, she seeks to teach us and lift us up.
Hurry! Let us march resolutely towards progress like other nations
[sat].
Let us come together! Unite our hearts and our forces and work
with zeal.
We are united in life, we will be united in death, we will know to
share as brothers the times of hardship and days of happiness.116
The first Lao gramophone record with Hymne Lao embodied

the close relationship between Laos and France as the Lao national
anthem appeared on this record together with the French national
anthem. This close relationship between the Lao and the French is
depicted nicely in a cartoon included in the published version of the
play La Folie des Grandeurs.117 The cartoon depicts a group of Lao
children belonging to the Lao Youth Movement – all wearing on
their shirt the emblem with the L mentioned earlier – singing the
Lao national anthem. Two of the children in the centre of the group
carry a picture of Petain whereby Laos is linked symbolically to the
overall French Empire.
‘SIAM-IFICATION’ OR ‘LAO-IFICATION’:
THE ISSUE OF LANGUAGE STANDARDISATION
The Lao Literary Committee was not only concerned with the
renovation of Lao literature, but was also concerned with language
matters. One of its explicit aims was to defend the Lao language.118
For the committee this endeavour was linked with a unification of
Lao vocabulary and orthography, and in Lao Nhay they found the
medium through which this was to be achieved. As it is evident from
my discussion of the language issue in the last chapter, at the turn of
World War II a standardisation key for the spelling of Lao had yet to
be produced. An analysis of the spelling employed in the columns of
190

Lao Nhay displays how it was still difficult to establish a fundamen-

tal principle according to which Lao should be spelled.
In accordance with the results of the discussions concerning the
standardisation of the Lao alphabet in 1938–39, the first line of ap-
proach was to use an orthography in accordance with the so-called
phonetic principle. In the early issues of Lao Nhay published in
1941, the words were spelled as they are pronounced and the karan
figures only in very few words. A systematic presentation of the rules
for spelling was, however, not laid out and in the early issues we can
find certain variations in the spelling, especially with regard to the
final consonants.
This phonetic spelling was praised as a system that was easy to
read and therefore suited to the educational level of the masses.119
But this spelling was never given time to mature. Instead, from
the beginning of 1942, a new spelling principle was adopted in
Lao Nhay. This change was motivated by an ambition to enrich
the Lao language through neologisms. Following long discussions
in the Lao Literary Committee it was decided to borrow words of
Pali–Sanskrit origin from Thai and write them in a Lao manner.
Or, as Charles Rochet put it, to ‘Lao-ify’ them.120 This change was
based on a principle devised by Pierre Nginn. In practice this meant
the overall implementation of what was called ‘simple etymological
spelling’ (tam khaomun nyang ngaj), which gradually superseded the
original phonetic spelling. The new spelling implied widespread use
of what Maha Sila Viravong had earlier termed irregular Pali final-
consonants and of the karan. At the same time various measures were
taken to codify this new way of spelling. First, extracts from a new
‘mini dictionary’ were published in the Lao Nhay. In this diction-
ary new words were explained and their spelling was fixed. Among
the phrases introduced in this way we find what could be termed
‘high language’ (sap sung) forms of ordinary words and words used
explicitly in connection with royalty (lasa sap).121 A problem with the
simple etymological spelling was the uncertainties it often created
with regard to the pronunciation of certain words, and in the word-
list a specification of how these new words were to be pronounced
191

Creating Laos
was included. Second, a table entitled ‘A Revision of the Spelling of

Lao’ was printed where some basic spelling rules were laid out.122
The simple etymological spelling principle presented and used
in Lao Nhay had one serious problem: it moved the spelling of Lao
dangerously close to that of Thai. Just as George Cœdès two dec-
ades earlier had stressed the close relationship that exists between
language engineering and politics he also pointed his finger to this
pertinent problem in this case. Although he approved of the spelling
employed in the newspaper, Cœdès raised the following issue in a
letter to Pierre Nginn, the mastermind behind the reform and later
editor of Lao Nhay:
It is clear that Siamese orthography is much more conservative and ac-
cordingly more ‘etymological’ than the Lao [orthography], and that all
attempts to write Lao in conformity with its etymology will be inspired
by the Siamese orthography. The only inconvenience (but I do not
know how to avoid this unless the etymological principle is dropped
for the phonetic principle) is that you certainly will be accused of Siam-
ificating the Lao language at a moment where, in the political sphere,
attempts are being made to achieve the just opposite. I only indicate the
danger to you without being able to indicate a cure.123
Clearly, the initiators of the spelling reform were aware of this
problem and on several occasions they were accused of using Thai
words and Thai spelling, which entailed widespread use of what was
called the ‘Thai karan’.124 Faced with such a critique, the proponents
of the semi-etymological principle argued vigorously that in no way
did the new style entail the use of Thai words. In the minutes of a
meeting of the Lao Literary Committee published in Lao Nhay, the
readers are assured that the new words for terms related to political,
economic and social issues are exclusively of Pali or Sanskrit origin;
and words for scientific terms of French origin.125 So although the
language engineers looked for inspiration to Thailand, and many
new words used in Thailand were introduced in Laos, they sought
refuge in a distant origin of the words to argue that the reform of
the language by no means implicated Thai- or Siam-ification. ‘Take
the word kila. It is a Pali word that both the Thais and we have bor-
192

rowed’, it was argued.126 Even if the simple etymological spelling at

first sight moved written Lao closer to Siamese than the phonetic
spelling used previously, yet the new system was designed so that
written Lao in some fundamental ways was different from Thai.
In the early 1940s, however, the distinction that had existed be-
tween written Lao and written Thai was getting blurred. This was
the result of a reform of the Thai alphabet and spelling that was pro-
posed in the middle of 1942 by the Committee for Promoting Thai
Language Culture in Thailand. This committee was headed by Prime
Minster Phibun himself and counted among its members many of
the leading cultural personalities of that age, like Anuman Rajadhon
and Wichit Wathakan.127 The reform entailed a simplification of the
orthographic principle used previously in Thailand. The number of
letters in the Thai alphabet was to be reduced and a spelling closely
related to the pronunciation of the word was to be adopted. With
the exception of three letters, the Lao and Thai alphabets would
now be identical and the spelling employed in Thailand would be
closely related to the ‘simple etymological spelling’ used in Laos. The
overall cultural reform programme initiated under the premiership
of Phibun in the 1940s aimed at defining a distinct ‘Thai-ness’. In
the same manner, the language reform was also an effort to ‘Thai-ify’
the writing system. At a meeting of the committee for compiling a
new dictionary of the Thai language it was argued that the former
spelling had blurred the distinction between words of foreign origin
and ‘authentic Thai words’ (kham thai doem) – the latter were said to
constitute around seventy per cent of the language.128 By spelling the
‘authentic’ Thai words in accordance with a phonetic principle and
adopting a reformed system of etymological spelling for the words
of foreign origin, the Thai roots of the language would be clarified.
Officially the purpose was to simplify the Thai writing system to
make it more easy to read and write. However, always keen on the
nexus between cultural reform and political ideology and practice,
George Cœdès connected this reform of Thai orthography with the
irredentist policies of the Phibun government. As Cœdès noted in a
letter to Pierre Nginn:
193

Creating Laos
Moreover, it is probable that this simplification, which as a result

will have a kind of unification of the alphabets used by the Siamese,
the Laotians, and the Shans of Burma, is inspired by political mo-
tives and is part of the pan-Thai policies of the Government in
Bangkok.129
From a Lao perspective this reform of Thai orthography was
hailed as a ‘Lao-ification’ of Thai.130 What had been perceived as the
traditional relationship between Lao and Thai was reversed. In a
very polemical booklet on the Lao alphabet written by Katay Don
Sasorith this point was taken even further. Katay wrote the text in
support of the simple etymological principle which had been used
and propagated in Lao Nhay. According to him this was a sound
principle that placed Laos on a middle road, avoiding the extremist
positions represented by either the purely phonetic principle or the
‘Thai etymological’ principle designed by Maha Sila Viravong. What
makes Katay’s exposition especially interesting is his rehabilitation
of the Lao language from a historical perspective and his counter-
attack on the standard perception of ‘Thai-ness’ associated with the
Sukhothai Kingdom. In a very Wichit-like manner Katay juggles
with former ‘ethnic’ categories in order to read new meanings into the
past and thereby read new meanings into the present. According to
Katay, King Ramkhamhaeng was a Lao king. Katay presents this as a
historical fact and in passing he substantiates his claim with reference
to the language used in the famous Ramkhamhaeng Inscription.131
In this manner, the Sukhothai Kingdom becomes synonymous with
a golden age of Lao – not Thai – culture. The ‘Thai-ness’ that this
kingdom represents in, for example, Wichit Wathakan’s contempo-
rary historical narrative of the Thai nation becomes ‘Lao-ness’. The
implication is that the cultural roots of modern Thailand normally
associated with the Sukhothai Kingdom are in fact ‘Lao roots’. In
Katay’s words:
Have we ever seen the vestiges of a specifically Thai past? No. It
is well known that the Thais themselves, when speaking about old
traditions and their secular literature, always refer uniquely to old
Lao traditions – to the classical Lao literature.132
194

According to the logic of Katay’s historical projection the origins

of modern Thai writing can be traced to a Lao system of writing
– the ‘Lao’ alphabet of King Ramkhamhaeng. Katay discusses the
different reforms the Thai writing system has undergone over time
and he welcomes the latest reform as it implies an approximation of
Thai written language to that of the writing system currently used
in Laos. Having the critics of the latter system in mind, Katay in-
terprets this development as an indication that the writing system
employed by Lao Nhay in fact represents the most ‘rational’ and best
‘organised’ indigenous writing system of the Far East.133 Likewise,
in Lao Nhay advocates of a spelling in conformity with a purely
etymological principle and the introduction of additional letters in
agreement with the principle devised earlier by Maha Sila Viravong
were criticised openly. Lao Nhay was intended be a newspaper of the
masses. Therefore to adopt the etymological principle, it was argued
in Lao Nhay, would be a mistake as it would turn the newspaper into
a newspaper for an intellectual elite comprising scholars of Pali and
Sanskrit while it was intended be a newspaper of the masses.134
Despite all the arguments and despite the fact that the propo-
nents of the simple etymological spelling seemed always to have the
upper-hand in the articles published in Lao Nhay, this new spelling
was stopped without further notice in the end of 1943. At the same
time, the publication of Pierre Nginn’s dictionary in Lao Nhay was
terminated. The readers were just informed that a return to a spell-
ing without the karan would take place.135 A reading of Lao Nhay
in the period following this announcement shows how the spelling
returned to an almost pure phonetic spelling. Whereas the simple
etymological spelling had been associated with an attempt to enrich
the Lao language through resort to foreign traditions, the new trend
was associated with a ‘rediscovery’ of local Lao traditions. Local
manuscripts were to be consulted in order to locate words no longer
in use and incorporate them in the modern Lao language. This new
strategy to reform the current Lao language was outlined in an
article that suggestively had the headline: ‘The Original Lao Texts
are the Most Precious Objects’.136 In the same vein the new spelling
195

Creating Laos
employed was characterised as a return to the ‘old pronunciation’

(samniang buhan).137 So in order to move forward it was deemed
necessary to go back and in this way Lao writing was established as
distinct from Thai writing and the enrichment of the Lao language
was removed from the Thai orbit of influence.
Parallel to these endeavours to standardise the spelling of Lao
another issue related to the future of written Lao surfaced, namely,
the question about using Roman letters to write Lao. In the middle
of 1942, an editorial in Lao Nhay informed the readers that plans
to Romanise Lao existed and that a Committee for Writing Lao
with Roman Letters were taking care of this project. The editorial
claimed that immense technical progress could be gained through
Romanisation, which, it was argued, would make it easier to print
Lao texts, would make it possible to use typewriters, and would be
more economical by reducing the amount of paper used in printing.
According to Lao Nhay, Romanisation did not imply a replacement
of Lao letters proper. Roman letters would be used along with Lao
letters. Therefore, Lao Nhay had decided to give the Romanisation-
project its full support as it would not lead to a marginalisation of
the Lao alphabet which is ‘an intellectual heritage of the Lao race/
nation’. 138 The same issue of Lao Nhay included a preliminary list
showing how to write Lao with Roman letters, and in line with the
practice adopted so often before Lao Nhay soon launched a contest
for writing short texts with Roman letters.139
The question of how the use of two distinct ways of writing Lao
was to be realised in practice was not dealt with. Concurrently, a
similar scheme was launched in Cambodia. A Romanisation of Lao
and Khmer might be linked with a plan to de-link these parts of
French Indochina from Thailand by adopting an alphabet of non-
Indian origins. However, in the contemporary literature dealing
with this issue, Romanisation is linked in general with a desirable,
indeed necessary, modernisation of the Laotian and Cambodian
societies.140 This view is, for example, advocated by Katay Sasorith
– an ardent supporter of the Romanisation project – in his booklet
on the Lao alphabet. Basically, Katay proposed that two alphabets
196

and two spelling principles should be used in Laos. The first was
a phonetic spelling written with Roman letters. The second was
an etymological spelling written with the Lao alphabet. While the
first was intended for the ‘ignorant mass’, the second was intended
to be used by a small group of ‘highly learned compatriots’, and he
calls this scheme the ‘writing of culture’.141 Therefore, in principle the
Romanisation scheme is not linked with the extinction of the ‘na-
tional’ Lao alphabet. Katay, however, notes that had Romanisation
been linked with the displacement of Lao characters, this should not
necessarily be seen as an ‘un-nationalistic’ move:
One should not exaggerate inordinately the importance of the
‘national character’ of our traditional alphabet. That which deter-
mines, which assigns the nationality [national character] of human
achievements down here is usage and time. Since the day when
King Ramkhamhaeng adapted the Indian alphabet in order to
make the Lao alphabet – because, in reality, one should not think
that he invented it out of nothing, this Lao alphabet – six or seven
centuries have gone by. What will our descendants think of this
‘Romanised Laotian’ when they will have received it as [their] herit-
age? I wouldn’t even say in six or seven centuries – man’s memory
is becoming ever shorter – but in two or three centuries later? Will
they deny it all national character?142
For Katay, the nation and its culture is a living organism. It is
constantly changing to adapt itself to new conditions. If this does not
happen, the future of the Lao nation and its population is at stake:
We find ourselves at a historical turning point, where the slightest
mistake in calibration [literally: switching railway tracks] could be
fatal for us, and when it is no longer allowed to hesitate or pro-
crastinate on such vital matters, without running the risk of being
overrun by more developed races. We must not use [the need to]
respect traditions as an excuse for refusing all reforms out of hand,
whatever they might be. Just as there are good traditions there
are also bad ones. We must no longer take cover behind ‘national
prestige’ in order to renounce in advance all innovation. Everything
evolves: people, things, the language and the writing system like eve-
rything else. One must know how to adapt oneself to the times, to
197

Creating Laos
one’s milieu and walk courageously towards the future with others,
like the others. The world is in constant movement; no nation that
desires to live can remain at a standstill. All people must progress
or perish.143
Therefore, the use of Roman letters is not a move which threat-
ens to de-nationalise the Lao written language and thereby imperil
an important national characteristic. Rather, according to Katay, it is
an adaptation to modernity that will enable Laos to live in a new and
ever-changing world. Other countries have shown the way:
All the countries in Europe and America have adopted Roman
letters. For a long time, Turkey, China and Japan have romanised
their writing systems. Even the Thai have begun to adopt Arabic
numerals. Sooner or later, they, too, will end up romanising their al-
phabet. In this century of the aeroplane and wireless telegraphy, the
diffusion of education is a question of life and death for all peoples.
Why would we not follow the example of the Turks, Chinese and
Japanese? Are they less nationalist than us? No. They are as much
as we can be. But their nationalism, instead of clinging blindly to the
past, is adapted to the present and faces the future. We should, we
must do like them. To love one’s country is, first and foremost, the
desire for your country to live.144
In Cambodia a decree institutionalising the use of Roman letters
in the administration had been passed in 1943. In Laos, the project
met resistance from prominent people such as Prince Phetsarath,
Crown Prince Savang and the King.145 Accordingly, the effort to
propagandise the Romanisation project was slowed down. But in
September 1944 it was made public that Roman letters should be
used to write Lao in the administration in Laos. Later, the system
was supposed to be taught in schools throughout Laos.146 The use
of Roman letters to write Lao, however, was never carried out as
Laos was occupied by Japanese troops in the beginning of March
1945. With the Japanese occupation the French colonial administra-
tion was overthrown and a new period in the formation of a Lao
nationalism opened up. It is a period when a Lao cultural national-
ism orchestrated by French colonialism was transformed into a Lao
political and anticolonial nationalism.
198

NOTES
1. See Eric Jennings, Vichy in the Tropics. Pétain’s National Revolution in Mada-
gascar, Guadeloupe, and Indochina, 1940–1944 (Stanford, California: Stanford
University Press, 2001); Anne Raffin, ‘Easternization Meets Westernization.
Patriotic Youth Organizations in French Indochina during World War II’,
French Politics, Culture and Society, 20:2, 2002, pp. 121–140; Anne Raffin,
‘Domestic Militarization in a Transnational Perspective. Patriotic and
Militaristic Youth Mobilization in France and Indochina, 1940–1945’, in
Diane E. Davis and Anthony W. Pereira (eds), Irregular Armed Forces and
Their Role in Politics and State Formation (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2003), pp. 303–321; Anne Raffin, Youth Mobilization in Vichy Indochina
and Its Legacies, 1940 to 1970 (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2005).
2. In the contemporary literature dealing with the campaign in Laos, the cam-
paign was known as a campaign for a ‘national renovation’ and I will use this
term throughout this chapter.
3. This included guerrilla activity in northern Tonkin and in the Mekong
Delta region. The latter was violently suppressed by the French with several
thousands killed and 6,000 arrested. See Raffin, ‘Domestic Militarization’, pp.
308–309.
4. Jennings, Vichy in the Tropics, p. 174.
5. Christopher E. Goscha, Vietnam or Indochina? Contesting Concepts of Space
in Vietnamese Nationalism, 1887-1954 (NIAS Report, No. 28, Copenhagen:
Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 1995), pp. 80–86.
6. Quoted in Goscha, Vietnam or Indochina?, pp. 82–83.
7. Nguyen Phan Long, ‘Un des fruits du fédéralisme indochinois: La citoyen-
neté indochinoise’, Indochine, 175 ( January 1944), pp. 1–3.
8. Jean Decoux, ‘S’il nous a été possible de mettre sur le chantier une œuvre
durable, c’est à la Révolution Nationale que nous le devons’, Indochine, 127
(February 1943), p. i.
9. Jean Decoux, À la barre de l’Indochine. Histoire de mon Gouvernement Général
(1940–1945) (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1949), pp. 388–389.
10. ‘Fédéralisme Indochinois’, Indochine, 119 (December 1942), pp. 1–2.
11. A summary of this critique is given by Eric Pietrantoni, ‘Le problème politique
du Laos’ (Unpublished report: Vientiane, 1943), pp. 108–111.
12. Maha Sila Viravong, Chao maha upalat phetsalat [His Highness Viceroy
Phetsarath] (Vientiane: Social Science Committee, 1996), p. 61.
13. Nina Adams, ‘Patrons, Clients, and Revolutionaries: The Lao Search for
Independence, 1945–1954’, in Nina S. Admas and Alfred McCoy (eds), War
and Revolution (New York: Harper & Row, 1970), p. 102.
199

Creating Laos
14. Among others this group included Maha Sila Viravong and Oun Sananikone.
15. A general outline of the program can be found in Eric Pietrantoni, ‘Le
problème politique du Laos’, pp. 101–105. See also ‘Gouverneur Général de
l’Indochine à le Résident Supérieur au Laos, Hanoi, le 8 août 1941, no 3094/
API’, B221/203, Série B, GGI, CAOM.
16. Paul Lévy, Histoire du Laos (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1974), p. 90.
17. Quoted in Pietrantoni, ‘Le problème politique du Laos’, p. 104.
18. Quoted in ibid., p. 101.
19. Ibid., p. 22.
20. The names Man and Khong put together means ‘stability’, Chuchat means
‘upholding the nation’ and Rakthai means ‘love the Thai’.
21. ‘Servir’, Pathet Lao, 2 (February 1944), p. 1.
22. Raffin, ‘Domestic Militarization’, p. 317.
23. Alfred McCoy, ‘French Colonialism in Laos, 1893–1945’, in Nina S. Admas
and Alfred McCoy (eds), War and Revolution (New York: Harper & Row,
1970), p. 94.
24. Charles Rochet, Pays Lao. Le Laos dans la tourmente 1939–1945 (Paris: Jean
Vigneau, 1946).
25. Lists of people contributing regularly to the Lao Nhay newspaper can be
found in Lao Nhay, 6 (May 1941), p. 4 & 11 ( July 1941), p. 5.
26. Pietrantoni, ‘Le problème politique du Laos’, p. 96.
27. Ibid., pp. 96–97.
28. Hugh Toye, Laos. Bufferstate or Battleground? (London and New York: Oxford
University Press, 1968), p. 58.
29. ‘Notes sur le Laos par Parisot, Calcutta, 20.6 1945’, d. 245, CP, CAOM.
30. ‘Note sur le Laos par Rochet, Septembre 1945’, c. 157, EA, AMAE.
31. E.g.: ‘Than phu samlet lasakan indochin pai yiam pathet lao’ [The Governor-
General visits Laos], Lao Nhay, 4 (April 1941), pp. 11-12; ‘Kao na ha lao mai’
[Towards a new Laos], Lao Nhay, 6 (May 1941), p. 1; ‘Sadet phan wiangchan’
[Passing through Vientiane], Lao Nhay, 18 (October 1941), p. 1; ‘Pha lasa
damnoen’ [Royal trip], Lao Nhay, 19 (November 1941), p. 1.
32. ‘Pha lasa damnoen’, Lao Nhay, 19 (November 1941), p. 1.
33. ‘Antiquité de la Famille royale de Luang-Prabang’, Indochine, 35 (May 1941),
pp. 1–3 (in this issue also pictures from Sisavang Vong’s visit to Hanoi); ‘La
rénovation laotienne’, Indochine, 71 ( January 1942); ‘La nouvelle organisation
du Royaume de Luang-Prabang’, Indochine, 90 (May 1942), pp. 1–3; ‘Une
famille royale en Indochine – La dynastie de Khoun-Borom’, Indochine, 91
200

(May 1942), pp. 3–5; ‘Les fêtes du grand serment à Luang-Prabang’, Indochine,
121 (December 1942), pp. 1–6.
34. Evans, A Short History of Laos, pp. 77–78.
35. This stamp is depicted in Indochine, 117 (November 1942), p. 8.
36. Hymnes et Pavillions d’Indochine (Hanoi: Imprimerie d’Extrême-Orient,
1941). For other songs, see the discussion on cultural revival later in this chap-
ter. The king and kingship appear in Cambodia’s first national anthem coined
likewise in 1941, see Hymnes et Pavillions.
37. E.g. ‘Prix littéraire Lao 1943’, Indochine, 188 (March 1944), p. 31.
38. A point stressed by Rochet in a 1945-report, ‘Note sur le Laos par Rochet,
Septembre, 1945’, c. 157, EA, AMAE.
39. ‘Rochet à Amiral Decoux, Vientiane, 23 février 1943’, d. 14PA 8, c. 1, Papiers
Decoux, CAOM.
40. ‘Societe des études laotiennes, status du 31 octobre 1943’, c. D7, RSL, CAOM.
41. ‘La Route Coloniale No 13’, Indochine, 140 (1943), p. 7.
42. ‘Laos – rapport politique du mois mars 1940’, d. 2336, c. 267, NF, CAOM.
43. ‘La Route Coloniale No 13 entre Paksé et la Route Coloniale No 9’, Indochine,
55 (September 1941), pp. 5–7.
44. X [Anonymous], ‘Au Lao Nhay’, Pathet Lao, 1 ( June 1941), pp. 27–28.
45. First part was published in Lao Nhay, 3 (March 1941).
46. Lao Nhay, 26 (March 1942), p. 9.
47. Lao Chaleun, 1 (March 1945), p. 1. I am grateful to M. Jean Deuve for kindly
providing me with a photocopy of this issue of the newspaper otherwise dif-
ficult to obtain.
48. La Patrie Lao, 2 (March 1946), p. 1. Again I thank M. Jean Deuve for provid-
ing me with a copy.
49. Lao Nhay, 17 (October 1941), p. 1.
50. E.g. Lao Nhay, 15 (September 1941), p. 1; J.R., ‘Théatre Lao’, Indochine,
129 (February 1943), p. i; Lao Nhay, 25 (February 1942), p. 1; La folie des
grandeurs, Comédie en deux actes, Vientiane: Imprimerie du Gouvernement
Vientiane, 1942, p. 39.
51. Both flags are depicted in Hymnes et Pavillions.
52. Arundhati Virmani, ‘National Symbols under Colonial Domination: The
Nationalization of the Indian Flag, March-August 1923’, Past and Present, 164
(August 1999), pp. 169–197.
53. ‘Khamson kap sisamut’ [Khamson and Sisamud], Lao Nhay, 16 (September
1941), p. 7.
201

Creating Laos
54. ‘Khamson kap sisamut’, Lao Nhay, 19 (November 1941), p. 10.

55. E.g. ‘Khamson kap sisamut’, Lao Nhay, 24 (February 1942) p. 7, using the
phrase ‘pen khon sat diao phasa diao kan kap sisamud’ when referring to the
people living between Sakhon Nakhon and Nongkhai.
56. See a series of articles by Kambuputra, ‘Le Cambodge héritier de l’empire
khmer’, Indochine, 9 (November 1940), pp. 7–8; ‘La prétendue identité raciale
des Khmers et des Thais’, Indochine, 12 (November 1940), p. 5; ‘Les vestiges
de la domination khmère en territoire thailandais’, Indochine, 14 (December
1940), pp. 8–9; ‘Ingratitude’, Indochine, 19 ( January 1941), pp. 1–3; and
Kambuputra, ‘Comment les Siamois comprennent l’indépendance’, Indochine,
20 ( January 1941), pp. 1–2.
57. ‘Prince Phetsarth au Prince Kindavong, Vientiane, 6 septembre 1945’, c. 157,
Indochine, EA, AMAE.
58. ‘Kindavong à Raymond, inspecteur des colonies, chef de la mission colonial
française en Extrême-Orient, Calcutta, le 15 Août 1945’, d. 245, CP, CAOM.
59. ‘Rapport du Sous-Lieutenant Thormann au Commandant Norois, le 1er Mai
1945’, c. 10H84, SHAT.
60. Georges-Marie Kerneis, ‘La vérité sur le differend franco-siamois’, Indochine,
18 ( January 1941), p. 7. See also the pictures published under the heading ‘Le
Laos manifeste son loyalisme’, Indochine, 12 (November 1940), pp. i–iii.
61. ‘Telegramme Officiel, no 3609/s, RESUPER à GOUGAL, Vientiane, 5 juin
1941’, d. 563, CM, CAOM.
62. ‘Monsieur le Gouverneur Général à le général de corps d’armee, commandant
superieur des troupes du groupe de l’Indochine, Dalat, le 2 juillet 1943’, d. 604,
CM, CAOM.
63. ‘Note de section des affaires politiques pour Monsieur le chef du service de
l’IPP, sd [around October 1942], no 2258/AIS, Objet: Propagande thailand-
aise’, d. 604, CM, CAOM.
64. See, for example, Lao Nhay, 34 ( July 1942), p. 1; Lao Nhay, 2 (March 1941),
p. 1; Lao Nhay, 35 ( July 1942), p. 1
65. Lao Nhay, 2 (March 1941), p. 4.
66. Bouasy, ‘Les fautes de nos pères’, Pathet Lao, 1 ( June 1941), pp. 7–10.
67. Phoui, ‘Qui sommes-nous?’, Pathet Lao, 1 ( June 1941), pp. 3–6.
68. ‘Lao hu muea khing’ [The Lao have regained consciousness], Lao Nhay, 2
(May 1941), pp. 1, 7.
69. ‘Nai pi nueng’ [In one year], Lao Nhay, 27 (March 1942), p. 1.
70. ‘Allocution prononcée par M. Thao Nhouy à l’inauguration du théâtre Lao,
le Vendredi 28 Novembre 1941’, Bulletin général de l’instruction publique, 21:6,
1942, pp. 14–15.
202

71. J. Rochet, ‘Vers un Laos nouveau. Une soirée imprévue’, Indochine, 42 ( June
1941), p. 10.
72. ‘Kao na ha lao mai’ [Towards a New Laos], Lao Nhay, 6 (May 1941), p. 1.
73. ‘Maha bulut lae kan ngan thawon’, Lao Nhay, 49 (February 1943), p. 5. This
article seemed to mark the introduction of a new series, but it was not followed
up by others published under the same heading.
74. ‘Khamson kap sisamut’, Lao Nhay, 29 (April 1942), p. 7.
75. ‘Ou allons-nous?’, Pathet Lao, 1 ( June 1942), pp. 6. See also Lao Nhay, 6 (May
1941), p. 4.
76. ‘Les annamites et nous’, Indochine, 57 (October 1941), p. 4.
77. ‘Wat pha kaeo’ [Wat Phra Kaeo], Lao Nhay, 26 (March 1942), p. 10.
78. ‘Le voyage du Gouverneur Général au Laos’, Indochine, 82 (March 1942), p. 17.
79. ‘La restauration du Vat Phra Keo de Vientiane’, Indochine, 82 (March 1942),
p. 12.
80. ‘Le Phra-Kèo est restauré’, Lao Nhay 15 (March 1942), supplément.
81. See, for example, Scot Barmé, Wichit Wathakan and the Creation of a Thai
Identity (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1993), chapter two;
Thongchai Winichakul, Siam Mapped. A History of the Geo-Body of a Nation
(Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1994), pp. 134–135.
82. J. Cuaz, Lexique Français-Laocien (Hong Kong: Imprimerie de la Société des
Missions étrangères, 1904).
83. Théodore Guignard, Dictionnaire Laotien-Français (Hong Kong: Imprimerie
de Nazareth, 1912).
84. Sat appears, for example, in kan patiwat haeng sat (‘national revolution’), see
Lao Nhay 50 (March 1943), p. 1 and 53 (April 1943), p. 1. Pathet sat lao ap-
pears, for example, in kan fuenfu pathet sat lao (‘Lao national renovation’), see
Lao Nhay, 22 (December 1941), 1; 25 (February 1942), p. 1; and 26 (March
1942), p. 10. For the use of pathet sat with reference to Laos, see Lao Nhay, 15
(September 1941), 1; 58 ( July 1943), p. 2; 86 (September 1944), p. 7.
85. Hymnes et Pavillions.
86. Somchin Nginn, ‘Kham tak tuean bang kho khong phuean lao phu nueng’
[Some warnings from a Lao friend], in Lao Cindamani, Phaphuthahub saksit
[La statuette merveilleuse, nouvelle laotienne] (Vientiane: Éditions Lao Nhay,
1943), p. 37.
87. Ibid., p. 40.
88. ‘Note sur le Laos par Rochet, Septembre 1945’, c. 157, MAE, EA.
89. Lao Nhay, sabab ton ( January 1941), p. 5.
203

Creating Laos
90. See for example ‘Sao falangset lao lae kaeo thi dong bolawen’ [The French,
Vietnamese and Lao at Bolowen], Lao Nhay, 56 ( June 1943), p. 1; ‘Nathi lao
nai sahalat induchin’ [The duty of the Lao in the Indochinese Union], Lao
Nhay, 81 ( June 1944), p. 1; J.M., ‘Au Laos avec sa Majesté le roi du Cambodge’,
Indochine, 128 (February 1943).
91. ‘Khwam samphan lawang lao kap kaeo tam pawatkan’ [The relationship
between the Lao and Vietnamese according to the chronicles], Lao Nhay, 54
(Mai 1943), p. 9 & 55 (Mai 1943), p. 8.
92. ‘Khwam samphan lawang lao kap kaeo’, Lao Nhay, 55 (May 1943), p. 8.
95. Ibid.
96. Ourot Souvannavong, ‘Les Annamites et nous’, Pathet Lao, 1 ( June 1941), pp.
29–32. Later this article appeared also in Indochine, 57 (October 1941), pp.
3–5.
97. Ibid., p. 31.
98. ‘Khwam chaloen khong lao tai’ [Progress in southern Laos], Lao Nhay, 61
(August 1943), p. 10.
99. Eric Pietrantoni, ‘La population du Laos en 1943 dans son milieu géographi-
que’, Bulletin de la Société des Études Indochinoises, 32:3, 1957, p. 230.
100. ‘Khu son lao’ [Lao teachers], Lao Nhay, 30 (May 1942), p. 10.
101. See also the article ‘Phak hong hian’ [Holiday], Lao Nhay, 14 (August 1941),
pp. 1–2.
102. ‘Note de le chef du service de l’IPP pour M. le directeur des affaires politi-
ques, Hanoi, le 22 octobre 1942, no. 2347-IPP’, d. 604, CM, CAOM.
103. Lao Cindamani, Phaphuthahub.
104. ‘Thin than ban koet khong sat lao’ [Our Homeland], Lao Nhay, 23 ( January
1942), p. 1. See also Nhouy Abhay’s exposition of elements of a Lao literary
history in ‘Une belle conference’, Lao Nhay, 9 ( June 1941), p. 4; or Thao Nhoy,
‘Poésie lao’, Indochine, 50 (August 1941), pp. 6–9.
105. Lao Nhay, 81 ( June 1944), p. 7.
106. This theme is for example treated in ‘Wisa’ [Knowledge], Lao Nhay, 40
(October 1942), p. 3; ‘Khu son’ [The Teacher], Lao Nhay, 45 (December
1942), p. 3; ‘Tak tuean’ [Advice], Lao Nhay, 86 (September 1944), p. 3.
107. See for example ‘Wiak kan’ [Work], Lao Nhay, 49 (February 1943), p. 3;
‘Tuean phuean sao na’ [An advice to our friends the farmers], Lao Nhay,
57 ( June 1943), p. 3; ‘Wiak hai kan na’ [Farming the land], Lao Nhay, 59
( July 1943), p. 3; ‘Soen sao lao hed-wiak kan’ [Lao, please work], Lao Nhay,
204

61 (August 1943), p. 3; ‘Kan puk fang’ [Cultivation], Lao Nhay, 74 (March

1944), p. 3.
108. ‘Thot khong ya fin lae sula’ [The danger of opium and alcohol], Lao Nhay,
69–70 (December 1943–January 1944), p. 3; ‘Phu sai lin phai’ [The gambling
man], Lao Nhay, 73 (February 1944), p. 3; ‘Nying lin phai’ [The gambling
woman], Lao Nhay, 75 (March 1944), p. 3.
109. Part of the first poem is found under the heading ‘Nak taeng kap kon lao
hao’ [Our Lao poets], Lao Nhay, 81 (September 1944), p. 3; the other poem
is ‘Sena matchulat’ [The ministers of death], Lao Nhay, 44 & 45 (December
1942), p. 3.
110. Extracts of the poems can be found in ‘Phon khong kan seng kap-kon’ [Result
of the poetry competition], Lao Nhay, 16 (September 1941) & 17 (October
1941), supplement, without pagination. I have not been able to obtain a copy
of the winning poem by Thao Nouthak which was published separately. A
short résumé, however, can be found in Lao Nhay, 23 ( January 1942), p. 1. It
confirms that it also reproduced this overall narrative structure
111. Lao Nhay, 7 (Mai 1941), p. 11.
112. Lao Nhay, 12–13 (August 1941), p. 1.
113. Pho na lao [Chant du paysan lao] (Vientiane: Éditions du Lao Nhay, with-
out year).
114. Tuean chai lao [Appel aux Lao] (Vientiane: Éditions du Lao Nhay, without
year).
115. Lao huam samphan [L’union Lao] (Vientiane: Éditions du Lao Nhay, with-
out year).
116. Lao hak sat [Hymne Lao], in Hymnes et Pavillions d’Indochine.
117. La folie des grandeurs, p. 8.
118. Lao Nhay, 11 ( July 1941), p. 5.
119. ‘Vers la réforme de l’orthographie laotienne par Pierre Nginn, sd’, d. F4, c.
33, AEFEO.
120. ‘Le Chef de la Section Laotienne d’Information à M Pierre Nginn, Vientiane,
le 9 Octobre 1941, No 311/Inf ’, d. F4, c. 33, AEFEO.
121. Extracts of this ‘mini-dictionary’ (athibai sap – explanation of words) can
be found in the following issues of Lao Nhay, 43 (November 1942), p. 10; 44
(December 1942), p. 10; 50 (March 1943), p. 10. This list of words was sup-
plemented by a list of French words translated into Lao, see ‘Sap’, Lao Nhay,
49 (February 1943), p. 10.
122. ‘Kae khai withi sakot kham-lao’ [A solution to the spelling of Lao], Lao
Nhay, 44 (November 1942), p. 9.
205

Creating Laos
123. ‘Le Directeur de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient à M Pierre Nginn, le 23

Mai 1942, No 1074’, d. F4, c. 33, AEFEO.
124. See, for example, Lao Nhay, 44 (December 1942), p. 5; and Lao Nhay, 45
(December 1942), p. 9.
125. ‘Pasum khana kamakan aksonsat lao’ [Meeting in the Lao Literary
Committee], Lao Nhay, 44 (December 1942), p. 5.
126. ‘Pasum lueang sakot kham lao’ [Meeting concerning the spelling of Lao], Lao
Nhay, 45 (December 1942), p. 9.
127. A list of members is given in the journal Khao Khotsanakan, 5 (May 1942),
p. 765.
128. Khao Khotsanakan, 7 ( July 1942), p. 1054.
129. ‘Le Directeur de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient à Monsieur Pierre
Nginn, Hanoi, le 4 Juin 1942, No. 1113’, d. F4, c. 33, AEFEO.
130. ‘Pierre Nginn à M le Directeur de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient,
Saigon, le 29 Mai 1942’, d. F4, c. 33, AEFEO.
131. Katay Sasorith, Alphabet et ecriture lao (Vientiane: Éditions du ‘Pathet Lao’,
1943), pp. 8–10. Katay, for example, refers to the use of the Lao negative
particle bo, used instead of the Thai particle mai. The term thai – normally
interpreted as an ethnic label associated with the Siamese – in the inscription
is ‘neutralised’, as Katay reads it not as an ethnic denominator but in accord-
ance with contemporary use of this term in Laos as a word meaning ‘people’
or ‘inhabitant’.
132. Ibid., p. 8.
133. Ibid., p. 13.
134. Lao Nhay, 49 (December 1943, p. 9.
135. ‘Thoeng nak an thang lai’ [To all our readers], Lao Nhay, 69–70 (December
1943), p. 5.
136. ‘Mun doem haeng nangsue lao pen khong pasoet thisut’ [The original Lao
texts are the most precious objects ], Lao Nhay, 87 (September 1944), p. 1.
137. ‘Aksonsat lao’ [Lao literature], Lao Nhay, 74 (March 1944), p. 6.
138. ‘Nangsue lao’ [The Lao alphabet/Lao letters], Lao Nhay, 36 (August 1942),
p. 1.
139. ‘Tableau d’equivalences adoptées pour la transcription de l’alphabet laotien
en caractères romains’, Lao Nhay, 36 (August 1942), p. 9 and ‘Set’ [Contest],
Lao Nhay, 40 (September 1942), p. 1.
140. See, for example, W., ‘Une importante réforme au Cambodge. La romanisa-
tion du cambodgien’, Indochine, 160 (1943), p. 9–10; Thao Kham, ‘La roma-
206

nisation au Laos’, Indochine, 169 (November 1943), p. 14; George Cœdès, ‘La
romanisation des langues indochinoises’, Indochine, 212 (1944), pp. 21–22.
141. Katay, Alphabet, p. 17.
142. Ibid., p. 16, note 1.
143. Ibid., p. 20.
144. Ibid., p. 17.
145. ‘Résident Superieur au Laos à Decoux, Vientiane, le 21 octobre 1943’,
14PA8, CAOM.
146. ‘Kan khian phasa lao duai akson romaeng – dai pakat ok hai sai thang la-
sakan laeo’ [Writing Lao with Roman letters. A decree has been passed], Lao
Nhay, 88–89 (October 1944), supplement. See also ‘Kan khian phasa lao duai
akson romaeng’ [To write Lao with Roman letters], Lao Nhay, 90 (November
1944), p. 2.
207

CHAPTER FIVE
Setting Laos Free from the French
In March 1945 the uneasy alliance between the Japanese troops

and the French administration in Indochina ended when Japanese
troops occupied Indochina and deposed the French colonial admin-
istration. For the Lao this meant the end of half a century of French
rule. The Japanese occupation of Laos lasted only six months. By
April 1946 French–Lao military forces had reoccupied Laos and the
French colonial administration was reinstalled. Nonetheless, this
brief interlude in French colonial rule had a radical impact on Lao
nationalism. It was in this period that the idea of Laos nourished
by French colonialism was let loose from its French connotations
and Lao nationalists made the first feeble attempts to establish an
indigenous political structure for a unified and independent Laos.
It was in this period that the idea of Laos became associated with a
political and anticolonial Lao nationalism.
TURNING THE IDEA OF LAOS AGAINST THE FRENCH

Following the Japanese occupation of Laos in March 1945, the Japanese
Supreme Counsellor Ishibashi replaced the French Résident-
Supérieur in Vientiane and Laos was basically transferred from the
rule of one colonial master to that of another. While the French were
ousted the Lao part of the administration remained in place. Likewise,
the Japanese confirmed the position of the Royal Government in
Luang Phrabang. In a direct continuation of French policies the
Japanese sponsored the publication of a newspaper in Lao entitled
208

Lao Chaleun (Prosperous Laos). This newspaper replaced Lao Nhay.

The first issue of Lao Chaleun heralded how Japanese troops had
been victorious all over Indochina. Just as the Japanese had granted
independence to Vietnam and Cambodia it was believed that Laos
soon would be following.1 The move towards a Japanese-sponsored
independence for Laos was taken in early April 1945 after Japanese
troops had moved into Luang Phrabang. On April 8 the King of
Luang Phrabang declared:
[…] that from this day forward, our Kingdom of Laos, formerly colony
of France, is now an independent nation. Henceforth, the Kingdom
of Luang Prabang will attempt to preserve its own independence
like other countries of East Asia, and will join with neighbouring
countries to build prosperity and progress following the principles
of the Greater East-Asia Co-prosperity Sphere. Consequently, in
order to work with the Japanese Empire as a trusted ally, I hereby
declare that our Kingdom has agreed to co-operate in all things
with Japan.2 (My emphasis)
It is unclear whether the independence included the whole of
Laos or just the Kingdom of Luang Phrabang. We have earlier seen
how the unification of Laos had been a distant goal for the campaign
for a national renovation in Laos. However, the unification was some-
thing yet to be achieved when the declaration of independence was
proclaimed. As emphasised in the quotation above, both ‘Kingdom
of Laos’ and ‘Kingdom of Luang Prabang’ appeared in the King’s
declaration. The same uncertainty is conveyed in Iron Man of Laos,
the supposed autobiography of Prince Phetsarath. According to this
account, Prince Phetsarath had advised the Japanese to sanction the
unification of Laos. The Japanese turned this suggestion down as
‘the French had administrated the provinces separately and had re-
fused a Lao request to unite them; the Japanese would do the same’.3
Accordingly, in the book the declaration of independence is intro-
duced under the headline ‘Royal Proclamation of the Independence
of the Kingdom of Luang Prabang under King Sisavangvong of
Luang Prabang’. A few lines later, however, the declaration of inde-
pendence is linked with Laos as a whole.4 Jean Deuve gives another
209

Creating Laos
angle. Despite the lack of a formal declaration of unification, in the

wake of the Japanese occupation Prince Phetsarath declared that the
Royal Government in Luang Phrabang covered the whole of Laos.
According to Deuve, the Japanese Supreme Counsellor approved of
this move and intended the declaration of independence to encom-
pass the whole of Laos.5
In August 1945 the Japanese troops in Indochina surrendered.
Therefore, there had not been much time available to prepare for
Lao independence under Japanese tutelage or implement changes
in the political system. For Lao nationalists, however, the Japanese
occupation and the King’s public declaration of independence repre-
sented a radical turning point: they symbolised how French colonial
dominance in Laos had become obsolete and how Laos had been
set free from its colonial form. Repeatedly, Prince Phetsarath propa-
gated this message after the Japanese troops’ official surrender. In a
proclamation to French prisoners in Laos about to be released from
Japanese custody, Prince Phetsarath made it clear that although
peace had been re-established in the Pacific it did not interfere with
the kingdom’s newly acquired national independence. Because the
French had been overthrown by the Japanese, Prince Phetsarath
regarded the treaties between Laos and France as void.6 The French
were no longer to be involved in the internal affairs of the kingdom.
When the former Résident-Supérieur of Laos was freed from cus-
tody and called on Prince Phetsarath to inform him that he would
take up his old position, he was rejected by Prince Phetsarath.7
On 15 September 1945, Prince Phetsarath unified Laos when he
proclaimed the attachment of the four southern provinces to the
Kingdom of Luang Phrabang.
That the Japanese interlude in Laos represented an important
break with French colonialism is also reflected in Prince Phetsarath’s
call for the reconstitution of a Laos rather different than the one
brought into existence and cultivated by French colonialism. In a re-
port written by him in early September and sent to a British mission
in Thailand, he envisioned a post-war Laos that would encompass:
210

[…] besides the territories on the left-bank of the Mekong up to the

Annamese Cordillera to the East, the territories on the right-bank
of this river limited roughly by: in the North, Burma; in the West,
Chiang Mai Province and the dividing line between the waters of
the Mekong and the Menam [Chao Phraya]; in the South, by the
Dangrek Mountains and the Khone Falls.
Prince Phetsarath was calling for a wider national Lao-space includ-
ing the Khorat Plateau. He unleashed a powerful nationalist rhetoric
to defend the historical legitimacy of this new and greater Laos situ-
ated in the heart of mainland Southeast Asia. He rejected the idea of
the Mekong River as a ‘natural’ boundary. ‘The Mekong’, he argued,
‘has never been a barrier but rather a bridge.’ He insisted that the
Lao people are all united by their ‘common origins; they speak the
same language; and they have shared the same joys and have been
subjected to the same national sufferings’. Although the Lao on the
Khorat Plateau in Thailand have been subjected to half a century
of ‘thai-ification’, they still belong to this larger Lao-space, as they
have not ‘lost their memories of their origins and their national sen-
timent’. ‘The so-called Thai of Ubon and Khorat’, he continued, ‘still
continue to use the Lao language and sing Laotian poems, practicing
on all occasions the mores and customs of Laos.’ On this basis Prince
Phetsarath calls for the constitution of a new Laos:
Laos as it exists with the Mekong as [western] boundary and its
million inhabitants is a mistake with regard to both geography
and politics. This country has been amputated from three-fifths
of its territory – the richest and most populated; it is not viable
and cannot exist as a state. It has only been able to survive due to
the support received from the other countries of the Indochinese
Federation more favoured than it [Laos]. But its [Laos’s] progress
has been slow due to limited human resources. It is in view of the
reconstitution of a geographic and ethnic reality in conformity with
its history and in view of forming a State that is viable from a politi-
cal and economic point of view, capable to figure on the map of the
world, that this report has been written. It expresses the profound
and intimate sentiment of all Lao – both those of the right [west]
bank and the left [east] bank.8
211

Creating Laos
During World War II, the French colonial administration had

called for a ‘New Laos’ linked with a human and moral re-making of
the ‘decadent Lao’, and contained within the territorial straight-jacket
of the colonial Laos. In comparison, Prince Phetsarath propagated
a ‘New Laos’ set loose from French colonialism and nourished by a
potent nationalist imagining with an expansionist dimension. In the
wake of the World War II, Prince Phetsarath must have believed
that a situation existed when geopolitical boundaries on mainland
Southeast Asia could be broken up and replaced by new ones. But
such a major redefinition of the geo-body of Laos never materialised.
In pursuing this vision, however, Prince Phetsarath shows how the
idea of Laos was set free effectively from French connotations.
At the same time an initiative to prepare for a Laotian govern-
ment was taken by the Lao Issara or the ‘promoters’ (khana ko kan),
which consisted of a mix of civil servants who had worked in the
French colonial administration and people who had been in Thailand
during World War II as exiles or in the service of the Thai govern-
ment.9 On 12 October 1945, this new government held a ceremony
in Vientiane and proclaimed the unity and independence of Laos
under its authority. The new government also promulgated Laos’s
first constitution and on 15 October the government presented its
programme to the provisional national assembly.10 We can follow the
attempts to set the idea of Laos free from the ideology of French
colonial protection and the French civilising mission in a memoran-
dum delivered by the new Lao government in Vientiane to the Allied
Powers in October 1945. The note was signed by Prince Phetsarath
but it is supposedly written by Katay Sasorith and Nhouy Abhay, re-
spectively ministers of finance and education in the new government.
In the memorandum French colonial policies in Laos are castigated.
In fact, the message conveyed is that Laos has survived as a separate
state not due to but rather despite the impact of French colonialism.
According to the memorandum, French colonial policies in Laos had
the following shortcomings. First, they created a ‘demi-pays’ by divid-
ing the Lao population in Laos from the Lao living on the Khorat
Plateau. Second, they failed to turn Laos into a viable state since
212

they did not establish a territorial, political, moral and national unity
for Laos. Third, the influx of Vietnamese into Laos of the colonial
period is criticised. It is a development that has turned the Lao into
a poor and backward minority in their own land. Thus it is French
colonial policies that are adduced to explain shortcomings in the
social and economic development of Laos – and not the idea of the
decadent Lao that loomed large in French colonial ideology. Set free
from French colonial control the Lao government has set a new path
for Laos.11
In this way the idea of Laos was re-situated and liberated from
French colonial ideology. But it proved impossible to establish Laos
as an independent state in the real world of international politics
in the wake of World War II. By April 1946 French–Lao military
forces had reoccupied the whole of Laos and a new French colonial
administration was reinstalled. However, this brief period in Laos’s
history shows how the very idea of Laos nourished by French colo-
nialism was turned against the French and how a French-sponsored
Lao cultural nationalism was transformed into a political and anti-
colonial nationalism.
CONCLUDING REMARKS: BRINGING LAOS INTO EXISTENCE

At a meeting at the L’Academie des Sciences Coloniales in 1953
George Cœdès – the doyen of the epigraphic and historical stud-
ies of the Indochinese countries – mounted a strong attack on the
views presented in an article that had recently appeared in the jour-
nal L’Observateur Politique, Économique et Littéraire. In this article
Claude Bourdet criticised the French policy of presenting the views
and complaints of the Royal Lao Government before the United
Nations. What provoked Cœdès was not this denouncement of
French policy, but rather Bourdet’s representation of the history of
Laos. Cœdès rejected Bourdet’s claim that Laos had been created
artificially by the French in 1945. In a man like Cœdès, who had
studied and published widely about the historical kingdoms that
dotted the Indochinese peninsula in the premodern period, this
perception of a modern and history-less Laos was bound to provoke
213

Creating Laos
a strong reaction. Bourdet was in for a lesson about the history of

Laos, which, according to Cœdès was to ‘prove the existence in antiq-
uity and the historical importance of a state the creation of which M.
Claude Bourdet attributes to Admiral Thierry d’Argenlieu!’12 With
reference to the writings of Auguste Pavie on the historical Lao states
in the Mekong region, to the military accomplishments of legendary
Lao kings of the Lan Xang Kingdom, to the travelogue of the Dutch
trader Gerrit van Wuysthoff, and finally to historical maps where
the term ‘Laos’ occurs, Cœdès sets out on an intellectual mission to
unearth ‘Laos’ from the past and link it to its new post-World War II
future. In this perspective, Laos is not without a history; on the con-
trary, Coedès gives it a past in which the Lao Kingdom of Lan Xang
is identical to Laos of the past. As Cœdès later argued in a short
article entitled Introduction to the History of Laos, it is indeed the
existence of a glorious past that gives an independent Laos the right
to be treated as an equal partner by other countries in the world. No
modern Lao nationalist could have put it better. To have a history
equals civilisation and in this connection Cœdès differentiates Laos
– and the other Indochinese countries – from the tribal societies in
Africa:
It might indeed seem presumptuous if some African tribe whose
stage of human development had remained very backward were to
claim equality with the most civilised nations of Europe, and this
notion has been carried over and applied to Indochina, forgetful of
the fact that with a very few exceptions the tribes of Africa have no
past, whereas, in Indochina, the history of Viêt-Nam dates back to
before the Christian era, of Cambodia from the 6th century, and of
Laos from the 14th century.13
Yet Cœdès’ comments highlight a fundamental problem in the
writing of the ‘modern’ or ‘nationalist’ history of Laos: when the
French extended their authority over that part of Indochina which
would become Laos, this colonial state did not correspond to any
political entity already in existence. The Lan Xang Kingdom that
long had formed the centre of gravity for Lao political power in the
Mekong region was in the early eighteenth century split into separate
214

kingdoms centred in Luang Phrabang, Vientiane, and Champassack.

Subsequently, since the late eighteenth century, Siam gradually ex-
panded its suzerainty over these kingdoms. In this process Vientiane
was destroyed by Siamese forces in the early nineteenth century.
When the French intervened at the turn of the twentieth century,
Champassack had become a province of Siam, and Luang Phrabang,
while formally retaining the status of a tributary kingdom of Siam,
was close to becoming the same. While the Lao past undoubtedly
contains glorious episodes, it is by no means certain that the Laos on
the map since World War II was necessarily synonymous geopoliti-
cally with the one that had existed before the French arrived. Cœdès
was far too good an historian of peninsular geography not to know
this. But he was also keen to give Laos a past in the manner of the
Lao nationalists whom he knew so well after the war.
This exchange between Cœdès and Bourdet illustrates a funda-
mental issue in the writing of the history of Laos specifically and
of nation-states more generally. Nation-states are landmarks of a
quite recent date in the geopolitical landscape and Bourdet is fun-
damentally right in stating that Laos is a modern colonial construct.
However, that the date of its creation is 1945 is debatable. Cœdès
is on firm ground when documenting the existence of a Lao or Lao
state or states in the Mekong region prior to Laos’s formative period.
The problem arises when these histories are linked together and pre-
sented as part of a continuous history of ‘Laos’. By doing this, nations
become historically rooted entities embedded with a primordial and
almost timeless quality that spans the historical divide. This ap-
proach brushes aside the novelty of nation-states and neglects the
various complex historical processes that led first to the formation
of the territorial entities and later turned these into viable nation-
states.
In general, the writing of Laos’s history has been linked with a
historical narrative where the roots of the modern state are located in
a distant past in conformity with the approach adopted by Cœdès.14
This book has taken another path in its search for an understanding of
how French colonialism was instrumental in giving the unprecedented
215

Creating Laos
colonial space of Laos a past and a culture and thereby also a future as
a distinct nation-state. In doing so, this book is placed in the modern-
ist camp and it has been inspired by Benedict Anderson’s thinking on
the close link between Western colonialism and colonial nationalism.
In his approach to nations and nationalism, Anderson has primarily
focused on how the fundamental grammar that enabled thinking in
nationalist terms came into being in different contexts. He has not
been dwelling on the concrete forms of the nationalist imagination
– except in his very general considerations about the role of history. In
this book, I have focused on the early roots of the nationalist imagina-
tion in Laos. I have approached the link between French colonialism
and Lao nationalism from a cultural perspective and have discussed
how a specific idea about Laos and its culture was formed under
French colonial rule in the period up until the end of World War II.
Adopting this chronological framework I have traced the beginnings
of a Lao cultural nationalism that was closely linked to the French
colonial project, and I have followed it to the juncture where it was
transformed into a political and anticolonial nationalism.
Grant Evans has pointed out that one of the paradoxes of study-
ing Laos is ‘that even those people most engaged in its affairs have
questioned whether Laos exists as a “real” national entity’.15 Such a
questioning of whether Laos’s current form is ‘real’ is often linked
with the idea that the border running between Laos and Thailand
is ‘unnatural’, since the people recognised as ‘Lao’ in the precolonial
period were split into two groups which were later incorporated
into two different national forms. The largest group of Lao, living
in the Khorat Plateau, has been turned into ‘Thais’, while a smaller
Lao population lives across the Mekong in ‘Laos’, the nation-state
whose name is associated with the Lao. Laos in this common view is
somehow not quite natural in its emergence from half a century of
French colonial intervention. Accordingly, it should have included all
of the ethnic Lao extending across the Khorat Plateau, but instead
struggles to integrate its ethnic minorities. By illuminating the inter-
relationship between French colonialism and Lao nationalism my
point is neither to deny the existence of a Lao national identity in
216

Laos nor to treat Laos in its current national form as an ‘anomaly’.

Rather, my point is that by studying the cultural aspects of the nexus
between French colonialism and Lao nationalism Laos is treated as
‘normal’. This, however, does not imply ‘normal’ in the sense of being
a primordial nation embodying a national identity with a lineage
stretching back into a distant past. Instead, it implies ‘normal’ in the
sense of being a historical nation which came into being in the mod-
ern period under influence of French colonialism, and was shaped in
a dialogue between external and internal forces.
NOTES
1. Lao Chaleun, 1 (March 1945), p. 1.
2. Quoted in 3349, Iron Man of Laos: Prince Phetsarath Ratanavongsa (translated
by J.B. Murdoch, Data Paper No. 110, Southeast Asia Program. Ithaca, N.Y.:
Cornell University Press, 1978), p. 36.
3. Ibid., pp. 25–26.
4. Ibid., p. 36.
5. Jean Deuve [Caply], Guérilla au Laos (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1997 [1966]), p.
176.
6. ‘Proclamation de S.A. le Premier Ministre du Gouvernement Royal de Luang
Prabang à la population française’, (1.9 1945) in Deuve, Le Laos 1945–1949.
Contribution à l’histoire du mouvement Lao Issala (Montpellier: Université
Paul-Valéry, 2000 [1992]), pp. 292–293
7. 3349, Iron Man of Laos, p. 26.
8. ‘Renseignement – Objet: Indochine, Activités laotiennes, a/s Phetsarath,
juillet 1947’, c. 163, HC, CAOM. Sent first to Kindavong in Calcutta and later
presented to the British mission in Thailand in September 1945.
9. An overview of events in Laos in 1945 can be found in Sila Viravong, Pawatsat
wan thi 12 tula 1945 [History of 12 October 1945] (Vientiane: Pakpasak
Kanphim, 1975). For a discussion of events in Laos in 1945 and subsequent
Lao interpretations of these, see Bruce M. Lockhart, ‘Narrating 1945 in Lao
Historiography’, in Christopher E. Goscha and Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting
Visions of the Lao Past: Lao Historiography at the Crossroads (NIAS Studies in
Asian Topics, No. 32, Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2003), pp. 129–163.
10. ‘Nayobai khong rathaban thalaeng to sapha phu thaen ratsadon 20.10 1945’
[The policy of the Government announced to the House of Representatives,
20.10 1945], (3) SR.0201.9/4, TNA.
217

Creating Laos
11. ‘Mémorandum. Note présentée par le gouvernement laotien sur le protecto-

rat français et sur les menées françaises après la défaite du Japon et contenant
quelques vœux du dit gouvernement exprimés conformément aux aspirations
du peuple lao, Vientiane, le 4 Octobre 1945’, in Deuve, Le Laos 1945–1949,
pp. 298–310.
12. George Cœdès, ‘Présentation d’ouvrages’, in Comptes Rendus Mensuels des
Séances de l’Académie des Sciences Coloniales, 13 (séance du 22 Mai 1953)
(Paris: Académie des sciences coloniales, 1957), p. 246.
13. George Cœdès, ‘Introduction to the History of Laos’, in René de Berval (ed.),
Kingdom of Laos (Saigon: France-Asie, 1959), p. 20.
14. Texts such as the first and for long only general history of Laos produced
by the French colonial administrator Paul Le Boulanger, Historie du Laos
Français (Paris: Plon, 1931); the Thai nationalist approach to Laos’s history
by Manich Jumsai, History of Laos (Bangkok: Chalermnit, 1971); the first
part of Hugh Toye’s study that forms an insightful historical backdrop to
his analysis of Laos’s role in the Second Indochina War: Laos. Bufferstate or
Battleground? (London and New York: Oxford University Press, 1968); the
short but perceptive account written by Paul Lévy, Histoire du Laos (Paris:
Presses Universitaires de France, 1974); the accounts published recently by
Michael Schultze, Die Geschichte von Laos. Von den Anfängen bis zum Beginn
der neunziger Jahre (Hamburg: Mitteilungen des Instituts für Asienkunde,
1996); Peter and Sanda Simms, The Kingdoms of Laos. Six Hundred Years
of History (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon, 1999); and Saveng Phinith, Phou
Nheun Souk-Aloun and Vannida Thongchanh, Histoire du Pays Lao, de la
préhistoire à la république (Paris: Éditions L’Harmattan, 1998).
15. Grant Evans, ‘Introduction: What is Lao Culture and Society?’, in Grant
Evans (ed.), Laos: Culture and Society (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 1999),
p. 1.
218

Bibliography
JOURNALS AND NEWSPAPERS

France-Indochine Le Monde Colonial Illustré
Indochine Pathet Lao
Lao Chaleun Prachachat
Lao Nhay Yuthakot
La Patrie Lao Withayacharn
BOOKS AND ARTICLES

3349. Iron Man of Laos: Prince Phetsarath Ratanavongsa (translated by J.B.
Murdoch, Data Paper No. 110, Southeast Asia Program. Ithaca, N.Y.:
Cornell University Press, 1978).
Adams, Nina S. ‘Patrons, Clients, and Revolutionaries: The Lao Search
for Independence, 1945–1954’, in Nina S. Adams and Alfred McCoy
(eds), Laos: War and Revolution, pp. 100–120.
Adams, Nina S. and Alfred W. McCoy (eds). Laos: War and Revolution
(New York, Evanston, and London: Harper Colophon Book, 1970).
‘Allocution prononcée par M. Thao Nhouy à l’inauguration du théâtre
Lao, le Vendredi 28 Novembre 1941’, Bulletin général de l’instruction
publique, 21:6, 1942, pp. 14–15.
Amédee Gréhan. Le Royaume de Siam (Paris: Challamelaîné, 1878).
Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origin and
Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 1991 [revised version]).
Archaimbault, Charles. ‘L’histoire de Champassak’, Journal Asiatique, 4,
1961, pp. 519–595.
——‘Les annales de l’ancien Royaume de S’ieng Khwang’, Bulletin de l’École
Française d’Extrême-Orient, 53:2, 1967, pp. 557–673.
219

Creating Laos
Athi phommacharyakasikkha: petit manuel de discipline bouddhique (Vientiane:

1931).
Atlas-Geography of Siam (28 Lessons and Readings) (Orne: Imprimerie de
Montligeon, 1925).
Bacon, George B. Siam. The Land of the White Elephant – As It Was and
Is (Illustrated Library of Travel, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons,
1892 [1881]).
Baep son an [A Lao reader – cours préparatoire] (Hanoi: Imprimerie d’Ex-
trême-Orient, 1934).
Baep son an san triamsueksa phasa lao [A Lao reader – cours enfantin]
(Hanoi: Imprimerie d’Extrême-Orient, 1934).
Barmé, Scot. Luang Wichit Wathakan and the Creation of a Thai Identity
(Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1993).
Berval, René de (ed.), Kingdom of Laos (Saigon: France-Asie, 1959).
Bock, Carl. Temples and Elephants. The Narrative of a Journey of Exploration
through Upper Siam and Lao (Bangkok: White Orchid Press, 1985
[1884]).
Boulanger, Paul Le. Historie du Laos Français (Paris: Plon, 1931).
Boulé, Etienne. La rénovation des écoles de pagodes au Laos (Saigon:
Direction de l’instruction publique, 1933).
Bounthavy Sisouphanthong and Christian Taillard. Atlas of Laos. Spatial
Dimensions of the Economic and Social Development of the Lao People’s
Democratic Republic, (Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2000).
Bowring, John. The Kingdom and the People of Siam (Oxford in Asia Historical
Reprints, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1969 [1857]).
Bradley, B. Dictionary of the Siamese Language (Bangkok: 1873).
Breazeale, Kennon. ‘The Integration of the Lao States into the Thai
Kingdom’ (PhD thesis, Oxford: University of Oxford, 1975).
—— ‘Laos Mapped by Treaty and Decree, 1895–1907’, in Mayoury
Ngaosyvathna and Kennon Breazeale (eds), Breaking New Ground in
Lao History, pp. 297–336.
Brocheux, Pierre (ed.). Histoire de l’Asie du Sud-Est: Révoltes, Réformes,
Révolutions (Lille: Presses Universitaires de Lille, 1981).
Brosse, Blanchard de la and Lê-Duy-Luong. Phongsawadan lao [A Lao his-
tory/chronicle] (Vientiane: Imprimerie Gouvernmentale, 1934).
Brown, MacAlister and Joseph J. Zasloff. Apprentice Revolutionaries:
The Communist Movement in Laos, 1930–1985 (Stanford: Hoover
Institution Press, 1986).
220

Bibliography
Campos, Joaquim De. ‘Early Portuguese Accounts of Thailand’, Journal of

the Siam Society, 32:1, 1940, pp. 1–27.
Carné, Louis de. Travels on the Mekong, Cambodia, Laos and Yunnan.
The Political and Trade Report of the Mekong Exploration Commission
(Bangkok: White Lotus Press, 1995 [1872]).
Chakrabarty, Dipesh. Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and
Historical Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000).
Chalong Soontravanich.‘Sila Viravong’s Phongsawadan Lao: A Reappraisal’,
in Christopher E. Goscha and Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting Visions
of the Lao Past, pp. 111–128.
Chanida Phromphayak Phueaksom. Kan mueang nai prawatisat thong chat
thai [Politics in the history of the Thai national colours] (Bangkok:
Matichon, 2003).
Chatterjee, Partha. The Nation and Its Fragments. Colonial and Postcolonial
Histories (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993).
—— Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World. A Derivative Discourse
(London: Zed Books, 1993).
Chotmai het rueang prap kabot wiangchan [Accounts of the suppression of
the Vientiane rebellion] (Cremation volume for Major Thaem Chuto,
Bangkok: 1958 [1923]).
Christie, Clive J. ‘Marxism and the History of the Nationalist Movements
in Laos’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 10:1, 1979, pp. 146–158.
—— Ideology and Revolution in Southeast Asia, 1900–1980. Political Ideas
of the Anti-Colonial Era (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon, 2001).
‘Circulaire relative aux écoles de pagodes au Laos’, Bulletin général de l’ins-
truction publique, 12:3, 1932, pp. 60–64.
Cœdès, George. ‘Documents sur l’histoire du Laos occidental’, Bulletin
d’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 25, 1925, pp.1–202.
—— Tamnan akson thai [A history of the Thai script] (Bangkok: Khrongkan
Phathana Kan Sueksa, 1961 [1925]).
—— ‘Présentation d’ouvrages’, in Comptes Rendus Mensuels des Séances de
l’Académie des Sciences Coloniales, 13 (séance du 22 Mai 1953) (Paris:
Académie des sciences coloniales, 1957), pp. 245–247.
——‘Introduction to the History of Laos’, in René de Berval (ed.), Kingdom
of Laos, pp. 19–23.
Conklin, Alice L. A Mission to Civilize: The Republican Idea of Empire in
France and West Africa 1895–1930 (Stanford: Stanford University
Press, 1998).
221

Creating Laos
Cooper, Nicola. France in Indochina: Colonial Encounters (New York and

Oxford: Berg, 2001).
Copeland, Matthew. ‘Contested Nationalism and the 1932 Overthrow of
the Absolute Monarchy in Siam’ (PhD thesis, Canberra: Australian
National University, 1993).
Crawfurd, John. Journal of an Embassy from the Governor-General of India
to the Courts of Siam and Cochin China (Oxford in Asia Historical
Reprints, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1967 [1828]).
Cuaz, J. Essai de Dictionnaire Français-Siamois (Bangkok: Imprimerie de la
Mission Catholique, 1903).
—— Lexique Français-Laocien (Hong Kong: Imprimerie de la Société des
Missions étrangères, 1904).
Davis, Diane E. and Anthony W. Pereira (eds). Irregular Armed Forces
and Their Role in Politics and State Formation (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2003).
Decoux, Jean. À la barre de l’Indochine. Histoire de mon Gouvernement
Général (1940–1945) (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1949).
Deuve, Jean [Caply]. Guérilla au Laos (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1997 [1966]).
—— Le Laos, 1945–1949. Contribution à l’histoire du mouvement Lao
Issara (Monpellier: Université Paul Valery, 2000 [1992]).
Diller, Anthony. ‘Thai Syntax and “National Grammar”’, Language Sciences,
10:2, 1988, pp. 273–312.
——‘What Makes Central Thai a National Language?’, in Craig J. Reynolds
(ed.), National Identity and its Defenders, pp. 87–132.
Dodd, William Clifton. The Tai Race. Elder Brother of the Chinese (Cedar
Rapids, Iowa: The Torch Press, 1923).
Dommen, Arthur J. The Indochinese Experience of the French and the
Americans: Nationalism and Communism in Cambodia, Laos, and
Vietnam (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001).
Duara, Prasenjit. Rescuing History from the Nation. Questioning Narratives
of Modern China (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago
Press, 1995).
Edwards, Penny. ‘Making a Religion of the Nation, and its Language:
The French Protectorate (1863–1954) and the Dhammakay’, in John
Marston and Elisabeth Guthrie (eds), History, Buddhism and New
Religious Movements in Cambodia, pp. 63–85.
—— Cambodge: The Cultivation of a Nation, 1860–1945 (Honolulu:
University of Hawai‘i Press, 2007).
222

Bibliography
Estrade. Dictionnaire et Guide Franco-Laotiens (Toulouse: Imprimerie G.

Berthoumien, 1895).
Evans, Grant. The Politics of Ritual and Remembrance. Laos Since 1975
(Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 1998).
—— ‘Introduction: What is Lao Culture and Society?’, in Grant Evans
(ed.), Laos: Culture and Society, pp. 1–34.
—— Laos: Culture and Society (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 1999).
—— A Short History of Laos: The Land In-Between (Crows Nest NSW:
Allen & Unwin, 2002).
—— ‘Different Paths: Lao Historiography in Historical Perspective’, in
Christopher E. Goscha and Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting Visions of
the Lao Past, pp. 97–110.
Finot, Louis. ‘Recherches sur la littératur laotienne’, Bulletin d’École
Française d’Extrême-Orient, 17:5, 1917, pp. 1–218.
Folliot. ‘Examen des anciennes frontières entre le Siam et l’Annam, d’après
la carte de Monseigneur Taberd, et des empiétements des Siamois sur
le territorie Annamite’, Bulletin de la Société des Études Indochinoises, 2,
1889, pp. 21–24.
Fournereau, Lucien. ‘Le Siam Ancien’, Annales du Musée Guimet, 27, 1895,
pp. 1–43.
Garnier, Francis. Voyage d’exploration en Indo-Chine (Paris: Librairie
Hachette et Cie, 1873).
Gay, Bernard. ‘Millenarian Movements in Laos, 1895–1936: Depictions
by Modern Lao Historians’, in Mayoury Ngaosrivathana and Kennon
Breazeale (eds), Breaking New Ground in Lao History, pp. 281–295.
Goscha, Christopher E. Vietnam and Indochina? Contesting Concepts of
Space in Vietnamese Nationalism, 1887–1954 (NIAS Report, No. 28,
Copenhagen: Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 1995).
—— ‘L’Indochine repensée par les “Indochinois”: Pham Quynh et les
deux débats de 1931 sur l’immigration, le fédéralisme et la réalité de
l’Indochine’, Revue française d’histoire d’outre-mer, 82:309, 1995, pp.
421–453.
——‘Annam and Vietnam in the New Indochinese Space, 1887–1945’, in
Stein Tønnesson and Hans Antlöv (eds), Asian Forms of the Nation,
pp. 93–130.
——‘Revolutionizing the Indochinese Past: Communist Vietnam’s “Special”
Historiography on Laos’, in Christopher E. Goscha and Søren Ivarsson
(eds), Contesting Visions of the Lao Past, pp. 265–299.
223

Creating Laos
Goscha, Christopher E. and Søren Ivarsson (eds). Contesting Visions of the

Lao Past: Lao Historiography at the Crossroads (NIAS Studies in Asian
Topics, No. 32, Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2003).
Gosselin. Le Laos et le protectorat français (Paris: Librairie académique
Didier, 1900).
Grabowsky, Volker. An Early Thai Census: Translation and Analysis (Institute
of Population Studies, Chulalongkorn University, Publication no.
211/93, 1993).
—— ‘The Isan up to its Integration into the Siamese State’, in Volker
Grabowsky (ed.), Regions and National Integration in Thailand 1892–
1992, pp. 107–129.
—— (ed.). Regions and National Integration in Thailand 1892–1992
(Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 1995).
Guignard, Théodore. Dictionnaire Laotien-Français (Hong Kong: Imprimerie
de Nazareth, 1912).
Gunn, Geoffrey C. Political Struggles in Laos (1930–1954). Vietnamese
Communist Power and the Lao Struggle for National Independence
(Bangkok: Editions Duang Kamol, 1988).
—— ‘Approaches to Tai-Lao Studies: From Orientalism to Marxism’,
Review, 12:4, 1989, pp. 503–533.
—— Rebellion in Laos. Peasant and Politics in a Colonial Backwater (Boulder:
Westview Press, 1990).
Harmand, Jules. ‘Les races Indo-Chinoises’, Mémoires de la Société d’Anthro-
pologie de Paris, 2:2, 1875, pp. 314–368.
—— L’Homme du Mékong. Un voyageur solitaire à travers l’Indochine in-
connue (Paris: Phébus, 1994 [Published originally in Tour du Monde
1879–80]).
Henley, David E.F.‘Ethnographic Integration and Exclusion in Anticolonial
Nationalism: Indonesia and Indochina’, Comparative Studies in Society
and History, 37:2, 1995, pp. 286–324.
‘Histoire du Annam’, Bulletin général de l’instruction publique, 3:8, 1924, pp.
437–441.
Hroch, Miroslav. ‘From National Movement to the Fully-formed Nation.
The Nation-building Process in Europe’, New Left Review, 198
(March–April 1993), pp. 3–20.
Hutchinson, John. The Dynamics of Cultural Nationalism. The Gaelic Revival
and the Creation of the Irish Nation State (London: Allen & Unwin,
1987).
224

Bibliography
—— ‘Re-Interpreting Cultural Nationalism’, Australian Journal of Politics

and History, 45:3, 1999, pp. 392–407.
Hymnes et Pavillions d’Indochine (Hanoi: Imprimerie d’Extrême-Orient,
1941).
Iché, François. Le statut politique et international du Laos Français. Sa
condition juridique dans la Communauté du Droit des Gens (Toulouse:
Imprimerie moderne, 1935).
Inthara Prasat. Baep rian phumisat lem nueng wa duai thawip asia [Textbook
in geography, book one: about the Asian Continent] (Bangkok:
Rongphim Akson Nit, 1908).
Ivarsson, Søren and Christopher E. Goscha. ‘Prince Phetsarath (1890–
1959): Nationalism and Royalty in the Making of Modern Laos’,
Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 38:1, 2007, pp. 55–81.
Jennings, Eric. Vichy in the Tropics: Pétain’s National Revolution in Madagascar,
Guadeloupe, and Indochina, 1940–1944 (Stanford, California: Stanford
—— ‘Conservative Confluences, “Nativist” Synergy: Reinscribing Vichy’s
National Revolution in Indochina, 1940–1945’, French Historical
Studies, 27:3, 2004, pp. 601–635.
Jiraporn Witayasakpan. ‘Nationalism and the Transformation of Aesthetic
Concepts: Theatre in Thailand during the Phibun Period’ (PhD the-
sis, Ithaca: Cornell University, 1992).
Jit Pumisak. Khwam pen ma khong kham sayam, thai, lao lae khom lae lak-
sana thang sangkhom khong chue chon chat [Origins of the words Siam,
Thai, Lao and Khom and social characteristics of nationality names]
(Bangkok: Editions Duang Kamol, 1981).
Kalamasutta (Vientiane: Imprimerie du Gouvernement, 1931).
Katay Sasorith. Alphabet et ecriture lao (Vientiane: Éditions du ‘Pathet
Lao’, 1943).
Keyes, Charles F. ‘A Princess in a People’s Republic: A New Phase in the
Construction of the Lao Nation’, in Andrew Turton (ed.), Civility and
Savagery, pp. 206–226.
Khana Yuwasan. Sayam ro so 112 [Siam in Ratanakosin Era year 112]
(Bangkok: Samnak-ngan Khana Yuwasan, 1935).
Khanakamakan Withayasat Sangkhom [Social Science Committee]. Maha
sila wirawong – siwit lae phon ngan [Maha Sila Viravong – life and work]
(Vientiane: Rongphim Haeng Lat, 1990).
Kitirat Sihaban. ‘Phrasong isan khao krung thep samai raek’ [When north-
225

Creating Laos
eastern monks first came to Bangkok], Sinlapa-Wathanatham, 12:9,

1991, pp. 112–119.
Kitiyakorn Woralag. Phumisat khong prathet sayam – samrap rongrian thai
[Geography of Siam for Thai schools] (Bangkok: no publisher, 1900).
Koret, Peter. ‘Books of Search: The Invention of Traditional Lao Literature
as a Subject of Study’, in Grant Evans (ed.), Laos. Culture and Society,
pp. 226–257.
Krasuang Kalahom [Ministry of Defence]. Naeo son prawatisat sayam
[Guideline for the teaching of the history of Siam] (Bangkok: Rong
Phim Krom Yuthasueksa Thahanbok, 1935).
Krasuang Mahatthai [Ministry of Interior]. Chodmai to top bang chabap
rueang prathet thai sia din daen [Some correspondence related to
Thailand’s loss of territories] (Bangkok: Rong Phim Rotfai, 1940).
—— Kan pokhrong khwaen lao lae khamen [The administration of the dis-
trict Laos and Cambodia] (Bangkok: Railway Department, 1940).
Krasung Sueksa lae Kila [Ministry of Education and Sport]. Pawatsat lao
lem 3 (1893 thoeng pachuban) [History of Laos – volume 3 (1893 to
today)] (Vientiane: Social Research Institute, 1989).
Krom Kosanakan [Department of Information]. Thai riak rong khwam
yutitham [The Thai demand justice] (Cremation volume for Mr That
Vibuncan, Ayutthaya: no publisher, 1941).
Krom Rachabandit [Department of the Royal Academy]. Thetsana phra
rachaprawat phongsawadan krungthep [A sermon on the history of the
kings and of Bangkok] (Bangkok: Nangsuephim Thai, 1913).
Krom Sueksathikan [Department of Education]. Baep khon tua sakot chuai
nai baep rian reo [A textbook of final consonants to be used with the
rian-reo system] (Bangkok: Rongphim Bamrung Nukunkit, 1899).
Krom Tamra [Department of Textbooks]. Baep rian phumisat – phumisat
prathet sayam [Geography textbook: the geography of Siam] (Bangkok:
Krom Tamra Krasuang Sueksathikan, 1925).
La folie des grandeurs, Comédie en deux actes (Vientiane: Imprimerie du
Gouvernement Vientiane, 1942).
Lafont, P.B. (ed.). Les Frontières du Vietnam, Histoire des frontières de la
Péninsule Indochinoise (Paris: Éditions l’Harmattan, 1989).
Lao Cindamani. Phaphuthahub saksit [La statuette merveilleuse, nouvelle
laotienne] (Vientiane: Éditions Lao Nhay, 1943).
Lao huam samphan [L’union Lao] (Vientiane: Éditions du Lao Nhay, with-
out year).
226

Bibliography
Larcher-Goscha, Agathe. ‘On the Trail of an Itinerant Explorer: French

Colonial Historiography on Auguste Pavie’s Work in Laos’, in Christopher
E. Goscha and Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting Visions of the Lao Past,
pp. 209–238.
le May, Reginald. An Asian Arcady. The Land and Peoples of Northern Siam
(Cambridge: Heffer & Sons, 1926).
Lejosne, Jean-Claude (translation and comments). Le journal de voyage de
G. van Wuysthoff et de ses assistants au Laos, 1641–1642 (Metz: Centre
de Documentation et d’Information sur le Laos, 1993).
Lemire, Charles. Le Laos Annamite. Affaires Franco–Siamoises (Paris:
Augustin Challamel, 1894).
‘Les langues tai’, in A. Meillet and Marcel Cohen (eds), Les langues du
monde, pp. 379–384.
Lévy, Paul. Histoire du Laos (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France,
1974).
Lockhart, Bruce M.‘Narrating 1945 in Lao Historiography’, in Christopher
E. Goscha and Søren Ivarsson (eds), Contesting Visions of the Lao Past,
pp. 129–163.
—— ‘Pavatsat Lao: Constructing a National History’, Southeast Asia
Research, 14:3, 2006, pp. 361-386.
Lorrillard, Michel. ‘Les Chroniques Royales du Laos. Contribution à la
connaissance historique des royaumes lao (1316–1887)’ (PhD thesis,
Paris: École des Hautes Études, 1995).
——‘Lao History Revisited: Paradoxes and Problems in Current Research’,
Southeast Asia Research, 14:3, 2007, pp. 387–401.
Luean Asanan. Nangsue an phumisat lem song (wa duai prathet sayam – tam
pramuan mai) samrap chan mathayom thi song kap prathom thi hok [A
reader in geography, book two (about Siam –according to the new
syllabus) for secondary school year two and primary school year six]
(Bangkok: Bamrung Nukunit, 1934).
McCarthy, James. ‘Siam’, Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and
Monthly Record of Geography, 10:3, 1888, pp. 117–134.
—— Surveying and Exploring in Siam with Descriptions of Lao Dependencies
and of Battles against the Chinese Haws (Bangkok: White Lotus, 1994
[1900]).
McCoy, Alfred W. ‘French Colonialism in Laos, 1893–1945’, in Nina S.
Adams and Alfred W. McCoy (eds), Laos: War and Revolution, pp.
67–99.
227

Creating Laos
Mager, H. Atlas colonial (Paris: Charles Bayle, 1885).

Manich Jumsai. History of Laos (Bangkok: Chalermnit, 1971).
Marini, Giovanni Filippo de. A New and Interesting Description of the Lao
Kingdom, 1642–1648 (Bangkok: White Lotus Press, 1998 [1666]).
Marr, David G. Vietnamese Tradition on Trial, 1920–1945 (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1981).
Marston, John and Elisabeth Guthrie (eds). History, Buddhism and New
Religious Movements in Cambodia (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i
Press, 2004).
Maspero, Henri. ‘Contribution à l’Étude du Systéme Phonétique des
Langues Thai’, Bulletin de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 11:1–2,
1911.
Massie. ‘Le “laotien”’, Bulletin de la Societe de Geographie de Marseille, 4:3,
1890, p. 276.
Mayoury Ngaosrivathan and Pheuiphanh Ngaosyvathn. ‘Lao Historio-
graphy and Historians: Case Study of the War Between Bangkok and
the Lao in 1827’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 20:1, 1989, pp.
55–69.
—— Paths to Conflagration. Fifty Years of Diplomacy and Warfare in Laos,
Thailand, and Vietnam, 1778–1828 (Ithaca: Southeast Asia Program
Publications, 1998).
Mayoury Ngaosrivathana and Kennon Breazeale (eds). Breaking New Ground
in Lao History. Essays on the Seventh to Twentieth Centuries (Chiang
Mai: Silkworm Books, 2002).
Mayoury Ngaosrivathana and Pheuiphanh Ngaosyvathna.‘Early European
Impressions of the Lao’, in Mayoury Ngaosrivathana and Kennon
Breazeale (eds), Breaking New Ground in Lao History, pp. 95–149.
Meillet, A. and Marcel Cohen (eds). Les langues du monde (Paris: Librairie
ancienne Édouard Champion, 1924).
Meyer, Roland. Le Laos (Hanoi: Imprimerie d’Extrême-Orient, 1930).
Ministry of Commerce and Communications. Siam. Nature and Industry
(Bangkok: Ministry of Commerce and Communications, 1930).
Monteil, Roger. ‘La pénétration scolaire au Laos’, Bulletin général de l’ins-
truction publique, 10:1, 1930, pp. 1–6.
Moppert, François. ‘La Révolte des Bolovens (1901–1936)’, in Pierre
Brocheux (ed.), Histoire de l’Asie du Sud-Est, pp. 47–62.
Mouhot, Henri. Voyages dans les Royaumes de Siam de Cambodge et de Laos
(Genève: Éditions Olizane, 1989 [1868]).
228

Bibliography
Murdoch, John B. ‘The 1901–1902 “Holy Man’s” Rebellion’, Journal of the

Siam Society, 62:1, 1974, pp. 47–66.
Neale, Frederick Arthur. Narrative of a Residence at the Capital of the
Kingdom of Siam with a Description of the Manners, Customs, and Laws
of the Modern Siamese (Reprint, Bangkok: White Lotus Co, without
year [1852]).
Norman, Henry. The Peoples and Politics of the Far East (London: T. Fischer
Unwin, 1895).
Pallegoix, Jean Baptiste. Grammatica Linguae Thai (Bangkok: Assumption
College, 1850).
—— Dictionarium Lingua Thai (Paris: Jussu Imperatoris Impressum,
1854).
Panivong Norindr. Phantasmatic Indochina. French Colonial Ideology
in Architecture, Film and Literature (Durham and London: Duke
Pavie, Auguste. Mission Pavie Indo-Chine 1879-1895. Études diverses II.
Recherches sur l’histoire du Cambodge, du Laos et du Siam (Paris: Ernest
Leroux, 1898).
—— Travel Reports of the Pavie Mission. The Pavie Mission Indochina
Papers 1879–1895, Volume 3 (Bangkok: White Lotus Press, 1999
[1911/1919]).
Pavie, Auguste and Pierre Lèfevre-Pontalis (eds). Mission Pavie. Exploration
de l’Indo-Chine. Mémoires et documents. Archéologie et histoire (Paris:
Ernest Leroux, 1894).
Peleggi, Maurizio. Lords of Things. The Fashioning of the Siamese Monarchy’s
Modern Image (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Pres, 2002).
Pelley, Patricia M. Postcolonial Vietnam. New Histories of the National Past
(Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2002).
Pheuiphanh Ngaosyvathn. ‘Maha Sila Viravong et la litérature clas-
sique lao’, in Khanakamakan Withayasat Sangkhom [Social Science
Committee], maha sila wirawong, pp. 245–253.
Pho na lao [Chant du paysan lao] (Vientiane: Éditions du Lao Nhay, with-
out year).
Phochananukrom pen kham plae sap phasa thai samrap khian kham chai hai
thuk tong tua sakot [A dictionary giving a translation of Thai words to
be used to write final consonants correctly] (Bangkok: 1901).
Phoumi Vongvichit. Laos and the Victorious Struggle of the Lao People against
U.S. Neo-Colonialism (No place: Neo Lao Haksat Publications, 1969).
229

Creating Laos
Phumisat bueang ton: wa duai prathet sayam yang sangkhep [An introductory
geography: On Siam in brief ] (Bangkok: Rong Phim Akson Nit, 1932).
Pietrantoni, Eric. ‘Le problème politique du Laos’ (Unpublished report:
Vientiane, 1943).
—— ‘La population du Laos de 1912 à 1945’, Bulletin de la Société des
Études Indochinoises, 28:1, 1953, pp. 25–38.
——‘La population du Laos en 1943 dans son milieu géographique’, Bulletin
de la Société des Études Indochinoises, 32:3, 1957, pp. 223–243.
Pra-onrat Buranamat. Luang wichit wathakan kap bot lakhon prawatisat [Luang
Wichit Wathakan and the historical plays] (Bangkok: Thammasat
Prachum pathakatha khong luang wichit wathakan kiao kap rueang riak rong
din daen khuen [Collected lectures of Luang Wichit Wathakan related
to the call for a return of the Thai territories] (Bangkok: Rong Phim
Phra Chan 1941).
Quach-Langlet, Tam. ‘La perception des frontières dans l’Ancien Viêtnam
à travers quelques cartes vietnamiennes et occidentales’, in P.B. Lafont
(ed.), Les Frontières du Vietnam.
Raffin, Anne. ‘Easternization Meets Westernization. Patriotic Youth Organ-
izations in French Indochina during World War II’, French Politics,
Culture & Society, 20:2, 2002, pp. 121–1140.
——‘Domestic Militarization in a Transnational Perspective. Patriotic and
Militaristic Youth Mobilization in France and Indochina, 1940–1945’,
in Diane E. Davis and Anthony W. Pereira (eds), Irregular Armed
Forces and Their Role in Politics and State Formation, pp. 303–321.
—— Youth Mobilization in Vichy Indochina and Its Legacies, 1940 to 1970
(Lanham: Lexington Books, 2005).
Raquez, A. ‘Les rois de Luang Prabang’, Revue Indochinoise, ns. 1:7, 1904,
pp. 426–438.
Reinach, Lucien de. Le Laos (Édition posthume, revue et miss a jour par P.
Chemin Dupontès) (Paris: Librairie Orientale & Américaine, without
year).
Reynolds, Craig J. (ed.). National Identity and its Defenders (Chiang Mai:
Silkworm Books, 1991).
Robson, Kathryn and Jenifer Yee (eds). France and ‘Indochina’: Cultural
Representations (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2005).
Rochet, Charles. Pays Lao. Le Laos dans la tourmente 1939–1945 (Paris:
Jean Vigneau, 1946).
230

Bibliography
Sarrault, Albert. La mise en valeur des colonies francaises (Paris: Payot,

1923).
Saveng Phinith. Contribution à l’histoire du Royaume de Luang Prabang
(Paris: Publications de l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 1987).
Saveng Phinith, Phou Nheun Souk-Aloun and Vannida Thongchanh.
Histoire du Pays Lao, de la préhistoire à la république (Paris: Éditions
L’Harmattan, 1998).
Schultze, Michael. Die Geschichte von Laos. Von den Anfängen bis zum
Beginn der neunziger Jahre (Hamburg: Mitteilungen des Instituts für
Asienkunde, 1996).
Sears, Laurie J. (ed.). Autonomous Histories, Particular Truths: Essays in
Honour of John R. W. Smail (Center for Southeast Asian Studies,
Monograph No. 11, Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1993).
Sila Viravong (Maha). Wainyakon lao [Lao grammar] (Bangkok: Kramol
Tiranasaw, 1957 [1935]).
—— Pawatsat wan thi 12 tula 1945 [History of 12 October 1945]
(Vientiane: Pakpasak Kanphim, 1975).
—— Chao maha upalat phetsalat [His Highness Viceroy Phetsarath]
(Vientiane: Social Science Committee, 1996).
Simms, Peter and Sanda. The Kingdoms of Laos. Six Hundred Years of
History (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon, 1999).
Smith, Anthony D. The Ethnic Origins of Nations (Oxford: Blackwell,
1986).
Snit Smuckarn and Kennon Breazeale. A Culture in Search of Survival: The
Phuan of Thailand and Laos (Monograph Series, No. 31, New Haven:
Yale University of Southeast Asian Studies, 1988).
Somkiat Wanthana. ‘The Politics of Modern Thai Historiography’ (PhD
thesis, Melbourne: Monash University, 1986).
Souneth Phothisane and Nousai Phoummachan. Pawatsat lao (duekdamban
– pachuban) [History of Laos (from ancient times to the contemporary
period)] (Vientiane: Ministry of Information and Culture, 2000).
Souvenir of the Siamese Kingdom Exhibition at Lumbini Park (Bangkok: no
publisher, 1925).
Sternstein, Larry. ‘“Low” Maps of Siam’, Journal of the Siam Society, 73:1–2,
1985, pp. 132–157.
——‘Low’s Description of the Siamese Empire in 1824’, Journal of the Siam
Society, 78:1, 1990, pp. 8–34.
Streckfuss, David. ‘The Mixed Colonial Legacy in Siam: Origins of Thai
231

Creating Laos
Racialist Thought, 1890–1910’, in Laurie J. Sears (ed.), Autonomous

Histories, Particular Truths, pp. 123–153.
Stuart-Fox, Martin. ‘On the Writing of Lao History: Continuities and
Discontinuities’, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 24:1, 1993, pp.
106–121.
—— ‘The French in Laos, 1887–1945’, in Martin Stuart-Fox, Buddhist
Kingdom. The Making of Modern Laos, pp. 17–36.
—— Buddhist Kingdom. The Making of Modern Laos (Bangkok: White
Lotus Press, 1996).
—— A History of Laos (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).
—— The Lao Kingdom of Lān Xāng: Rise and Decline (Bangkok: White
Lotus Press, 1998).
Sunait Chutintaranond. ‘“Mandala”, “Segmentary State” and Politics of
Centralization in Medieval Ayudhaya’, Journal of the Siam Society, 78:1,
1990, pp. 89–100.
Taboulet, Georges. ‘Les origines du chemin du fer de Saigon à Mytho.
Projet Blancsubé d’un chemin de fer de pénétration au Laos et au
Yunnan (1880)’, Bulletin général de l’Instruction publique, 20:10, 1941.
Tambiah, Stanley J. World Conqueror and World Renouncer: A Study
of Buddhism and Polity in Thailand against a Historical Backdrop
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976).
Taupin, J.‘Rapport à Monsieur le Gouverneur Général’, Bulletin de la Société
des Études Indochinoises, 2:3, 1889, pp. 43–102.
—— Vocabulaire Franco-Laotien (Hanoi: Schneider, 1893 [deuxieme édi-
tion]).
Taylor-Jones, J. Brief Grammatical Notices of the Siamese Language (Bangkok:
The Mission Press, 1842).
Thamrongsak Phertlert-anan. ‘Kan riak rong din daen pho so 2483’ [The
demand for territories in 1940], Samut Sangkhomsat, 12:3–4, 1990,
pp. 23–81.
Thaveesilp Subwattana. ‘“Lao” nai thatsana khong thai samai ratanakosin’
[‘Lao’ in the view of Thai rulers in the early Ratanakosin period],
Codmai Khao Sangkhomsat, 11:1, 1988, pp. 104–121.
Thipakorawong. Phraracha phongsawadan krung ratanakosin rachakan thi
sam [The royal chronicles of the third reign] (Bangkok: Department
of Fine Arts, 1995 [1934]).
Thiraphan Thongkham. Kan tham phochananukrom thai-thai: adit-pachu-
ban (pho so 2389–2533) [The production of Thai-Thai dictionaries:
232

Bibliography
past and present, 1846–1993] (Bangkok: Khrongkan Phoeiphrae

Nganwichai, 1995).
Thomas, Nicholas. Colonialism’s Culture. Anthropology, Travel and
Government (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994).
Thongchai Winichakul. Siam Mapped: A History of the Geo-Body of a
Nation (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1994).
Thorel, Clovis. ‘Notes anthropologiques sur l’Indo-Chine’, in Francis
Garnier, Voyage d’exploration en Indo-Chine, Vol. II, pp. 285–334.
Toye, Hugh. Laos. Buffer State or Battleground (London: Oxford University
Press, 1968).
Traypranam (Vientiane: Imprimerie du Gouvernement, 1931).
Tuck, Patrick. The French Wolf and the Siamese Lamb. The French Threat
to Siamese Independence, 1858–1907 (Bangkok: White Lotus Press,
1995).
Tuean chai lao [Appel aux Lao] (Vientiane: Éditions du Lao Nhay, without
year).
Turton, Andrew (ed.). Civility and Savagery. Social Identity in Tai States
(Richmond, Surrey: Curzon, 2000).
Tønnesson, Stein and Hans Antlöv (eds). Asian Forms of the Nation (NIAS
Studies in Asian Topics, No. 23, Richmond: Nordic Institute of Asian
Studies, 1996).
Uphakit Sinlapasan. Lak phasa thai: akharawithi, wachiiwiphak, waka-
yasamphan, chanthalaksana [Fundamentals of the Thai langauge:
Akaravithi, Vaciviphak, Vakayasamphan, Chantalaksana] (Bangkok:
Thai Wathana Phanit, 1995 [reprint]).
Virmani, Arundhati. ‘National Symbols under Colonial Domination: The
Nationalization of the Indian Flag, March-August 1923’, Past and
Present, 164 (August 1999), pp. 169–197.
Weber, Eugen. Peasants Into Frenchmen. The Modernization of Rural France,
1870–1914 (London: Chatto & Windus, 1977).
Wichit wannakhadi [The literary works of Luang Wichit Wathakan]
(Cremation volume for Lady Praphaphan Wichitwathakan, Bangkok:
1993).
Wichit Wathakan. Sayam kap suwanaphum phak nueng: adit [Siam and
Suwannaphum, part one: the past] (Bangkok: without publisher,
1933).
—— Pathakatha rueang sia din daen thai hai kae farangset [Lecture about
the loss of Thai territories to France] (Bangkok: no publisher, 1940).
233

Creating Laos
—— ‘Khwam samphan thang chuea chat rawang thai kap khamen’ [The
racial relationship between Thai and Khmer], in Prachum pathakatha
khong luang wichit wathakan.
—— Prawatisat sakon [A universal history] (Bangkok: Rong Phim Rung
Watthana, 1971).
Wolters, O.W. ‘Ayudhaya and the Rearward Part of the World’, Journal of
the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, 3 & 4, 1968, pp.
166–178.
—— History, Culture, and Region in Southeast Asian Perspectives (Singapore:
Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1982).
234

Index
Administration 93–95 Civilisational hierarchy 42–46, 52

Alphabet Codmaihet (Bulletin Officiel du
Lao 133–135, 191, 194–198 Laos) 131–132
Thai 128, 193–194 Cœdès, Georges 126–127, 133,
Anderson, Benedict 2–5, 7, 9, 11, 192–193, 213–215
111, 216 Crawfurd, John 41–44
Anou, Chao 15, 27–28, 47, 67, Cuaz, J. 129, 174
114–116, 118
Cultural nationalism 8, 9–11,
Ayutthaya, Kingdom 24–25, 27, 16–19, 198, 213, 216
49, 63, 78
Damrong Rajanuphab 61–62
Barros, João de 24
Dauplay, J. 107–108
Beau, Paul 104–105
Decoux, Jean 145, 147–148, 150,
Bock, Carl 24 155–156, 173
Bourdet, Claude 213–215 Deuve, Jean 209–210
Bowring, John 31 Dictionaries 128–131, 174, 191,
Buddhist Institute 14, 120, 193, 195
123–127, 133–135, 181 Dodd, William Clifton 73–75
Doumer, Poul 94
Carné, Louis de 34, 46, 51
Chakrabarty, Dipesh 112 Edwards, Penny 112
Champassack, Kingdom 27–28, Estrade 129
95, 114, 154, 215–216
Evans, Grant 18–19, 24, 216
Chasseloup-Laubat 30
Chat 71–72, 79–80, 84, 174
Fa Ngum, King 15, 49, 113,
Chatterjee, Partha 9–11 116–117, 186
Chulalongkorn, King 37, 63, 65, 67 Federalism 6, 110, 146–148
235
Ivarsson_index.indd 235 2/11/07 15:44:04

Creating Laos
Finot, Louis 81, 132 Indochine (journal) 147–148, 155,

Flag 166–167, 172, 179
India 161
Laos 161–162 Jennings, Eric 147
Siam 37
Folliot, Professor 38–39 Karpelès, Suzanne 125–127
French colonialism Katay Don Sasorith 153,
expansion into Indochina 29–33 194–198, 212
ideas about Chinese influence Khana Yuwasan 66
48; ~ Siamese oppression Khorat Plateau 27–28, 36, 38, 40,
46, 51–52 66–67, 95, 120, 162–163, 166,
in LPDR historiography 11–15, 211–212, 216
21, 37
perceptions of Siamese suzerainty Laem Thong (Golden
33–35, 49–50; Peninsular) 70, 76–81
Lagrée, Doudart de 31
Garnier, Francis 31, 51
Lan Xang Kingdom 24, 27–28,
Gauthier, George 148 49, 68, 76, 113–117, 119, 162,
Goscha, Christopher E. 6–7, 101, 167–169, 171, 173, 189, 214
147 Lanessan, Jean M. de 34–35
Grabowsky, Volker 27 Language (Lao) 12, 14, 36, 41
Guignard, Théodore 130–131, 174 Lao as a dialect of Siamese 43,
129–130
Harmand, Jules 33, 52, 104 Lao on a par with Siamese
Henley, David E. F. 5–7 130–131
History written Lao 127–136, 190–198
Chronicles 49–50 Romanisation of Lao 196–198
Cœdès-Bourdet exchange Lao/Laos
213–215 as a Siamese space 35–37, 38
French narrative 112–113, 117 as khwaen 68, 84–85
lack of history 43, 47 as lost territory 60–71, 86–87
Lao schoolbooks 113–117 as ‘non–country’ 67–70
LPDR 12–16 as subordinate to Vietnamese
Thai national narrative 63–65 51–52
Ho (Chinese troops) 48, 170 as Vietnamese space 38–40, 49,
53, 70
Hroch, Miroslav 8 early accounts 24, 31
Hutchinson, John 8 in 1904 census 71–72
Hymne Lao 155–156, 176, 189–190 Lao decadence 104–110
236

Index
‘neglected colonial backwater’ 93 Maps

origins of terms 24–26 Lan Xang 116–117
‘secondary nation’ 43 Low 44
Siamese oppression 46, 51–52 McCarthy 38
su-su nature 168–169 Siam 31, 65–67
Vietnamese tributary rights Siamese suzerainty depicted in
38–40 French maps 34–35
Lao Chaleun (newspaper) 161, 209 Taberd 38;
Lao Cindamani, see Pierre Nginn Marquet, Jean 105–108, 118, 148
Lao Issara 17, 161, 212 Massie 50
Lao Nhay (newspaper) 16, McCarthy, James 35–36, 43
151–152, 155, 158, 160–165, map 38
167–171, 173, 175, 176–179, McCoy, Alfred 16
181, 183–186, 190–192, Meillier 132–133
194–196
Mekong Expedition 31–34,
Laos Annamite 39, 94, 104–106, 44–49, 51–52
109, 111, 118, 120, 177
Meyer, Roland 96–97, 109–110,
Le Boulanger, Paul 112–113, 117 117–118, 136
Lek, Chao 102 Mongkut, King 127–128
Leria, G. M. 31 Mouhot, Henri 31
Lefévre-Pontalis 50
Lê-Ky-Huong, Pierre 131–133 New Laos 149, 171–172, 181,
Literature 50, 79, 114, 132–133 183–184, 186, 212
Lao Literary Committee 190–192 Nhouy Abhay 153, 172, 212
religious textural tradition Nousai Phoummachan 13–16
124–127
revival of literature 181–187 Pak Nam incident (1893) 40, 61
Low, James 44 Pathet Lao (journal) 152, 159,
Luang Phrabang, Kingdom 167–169, 173, 179
pre-1893 27–29, 31, 33, 36–37, Pavie, Auguste 38, 48–50, 115,
46, 48–50, 67–68, 115, 215 167, 170, 172, 173, 214
post-1893 94–95, 97–101, 106, and Lao chronicles 49–50
114, 119–123, 125, 132, Pavie Expedition 38, 48–50
135, 150, 155, 157, 161, 166,
208–210 Pelleggi, Maurizio 37
Luce 38 Phetsarath, Prince 106–107, 110,
122, 124, 132–134, 149–150,
155–156, 166, 179, 198,
Mandala state model 26–27
209–212
237

Creating Laos
Phoumi Vongvichit 12–13, 16, 153 Stuart-Fox, Martin 17, 37

Pierre Nginn 182, 191–193, 195 Sukhothai, Kingdom 49, 63, 80,
Pietrantoni, Eric 180 194
Prachachat (newspaper) 84 Suwannaphum (Golden Land) 70,
75–78, 80–82
Race 25, 40–48, 51–52, 60–61,
70–76, 79–81, 84–86, 104, Taksin, King 27, 63
106, 108, 109, 129, 134, Taupin, J. 36, 47
162–163, 170–176, 180, 184, Thamrongsak Phertlert-anan 61–
187–189, 186 62
Ramkhamhaeng, King 194–195, That Luang 118, 161
197
Thongchai Winichakul 2, 28, 31,
Reinach, Lucien de 102–103 35, 61
Roads 95–100, 105, 110, 149, Thorel, Clovis 45
157–158
Toye, Hugh 154
Rochet, Charles 153–154,
156–157, 166, 172, 177, 191 Vientiane, Kingdom 27–29, 31,
47, 49, 67, 114–120, 167, 215
Samsenthai, King 113
Vietnam/Vietnamese
Sat 14–15, 155, 163, 170–171, in Laos 100–111, 131, 148, 150,
173–174, 176–177, 180–181, 153, 177–180, 213
189–190 post-1893 62
Setthathirat, King 15, 114, pre-1893 25, 28–30, 32, 42, 45,
116–118 64, 67
Schoolbooks Lao 113–117, 135; in Siam 72–73
Thai 62–70, 72; of Thai stock 77–81
‘Vietnam-ification’ 105–106
Sila Viravong, Maha 124, 127,
133–135, 149, 191, 194–195 Vilers, le Myre de 52
Sisavang Vong, King 107, 127,
131, 154–156, 16, 173, 209 Wat Phra Kaeo 118, 161,
172–175
Somkiat Wanthana 65–66
Wat Sisakhet 118–119, 122–123
Songs 187–189
Weber, Eugen 95
Souligna Vongsa, King 114–115,
117 Wichit Wathakan 61, 64–65,
75–83, 85, 193–194
Souneth Phothisane 13–16
Wolters, O.W. 26
Sternstein Larry 44
Wuysthoff, Gerrit van 31, 114,
Streckfuss, David 41, 70, 86 214
238

FULLTEXT01

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

FULLTEXT01

Uploaded by

Document Information

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

FULLTEXT01

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

A fascinating insight into how nations can be created

Ivarsson_reprint-pbk-cover.indd 1 22/07/2010 15:47

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 1 2/11/07 15:19:32

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 2 2/11/07 15:19:32

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 3 2/11/07 15:19:32

First published in 2008

© Søren Ivarsson 2008

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

ISBN: 978-87-7694-022-5 (hardback)

Publication of this monograph was made possible by a grant from the

Typeset by NIAS Press

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 4 2/11/07 15:19:32

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 5 2/11/07 15:19:32

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 6 2/11/07 15:19:32

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 7 2/11/07 15:19:32

My thoughts on French colonialism and Lao nationalism found in

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 9 2/11/07 15:19:33

AEFEO Archives of l’École Française d’Extrême-Orient, Paris

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 10 2/11/07 15:19:33

At the time of writing there exists no single and commonly used

Ivarsson_prelims.indd 11 2/11/07 15:19:33

Today we have grown accustomed to the existence of Laos as a nation-

Ivarsson_book.indd 1 2/11/07 15:20:34

with reference to divergent discourses on Laos and the Lao. It is an

LAOS BETWEEN INDOCHINA AND SIAM

Ivarsson_book.indd 2 2/11/07 15:20:35

not heretical. For Anderson, who perceives the nation as a modern

Ivarsson_book.indd 3 2/11/07 15:20:35

the domain of educational and language policies and the trajectories of

Ivarsson_book.indd 4 2/11/07 15:20:35

Indonesia, however, this process of imagination was countered by

Ivarsson_book.indd 5 2/11/07 15:20:35

in a new direction. Henley recognises the importance of colonial

Ivarsson_book.indd 6 2/11/07 15:20:35

Vietnamese Nationalism, 1887–1954.7 In this study Goscha adds more

Ivarsson_book.indd 7 2/11/07 15:20:36

a Greater Siam, a process that involved the formation of a ‘cultural

Ivarsson_book.indd 8 2/11/07 15:20:36

Likewise, in his highly influential book The Nation and its

Ivarsson_book.indd 9 2/11/07 15:20:37

alism strives to establish a distinct national culture that is not only

Ivarsson_book.indd 10 2/11/07 15:20:37

national project. Chatterjee characterises this process as a ‘selective

COLONIALISM AND NATIONALISM IN LAOS

Ivarsson_book.indd 11 2/11/07 15:20:37

its impact on Lao culture and society is embedded in this percep-

Ivarsson_book.indd 12 2/11/07 15:20:37

Laos after 1975. The recently published History of Laos by Souneth

Ivarsson_book.indd 13 2/11/07 15:20:38

Ivarsson_book.indd 14 2/11/07 15:20:38

Ivarsson_book.indd 15 2/11/07 15:20:38

Lao Renovation Movement which emerged as part of a French

Ivarsson_book.indd 16 2/11/07 15:20:38

these studies it is not an aspect that is discussed at length. What

Ivarsson_book.indd 17 2/11/07 15:20:39

Ivarsson_book.indd 18 2/11/07 15:20:39

Ivarsson_book.indd 19 2/11/07 15:20:39

identities under French colonial rule in other parts of Indochina,

Ivarsson_book.indd 20 2/11/07 15:20:39

11. Miroslav Hroch, ‘From National Movement to the Fully-formed Nation.