Straus investigates the ideology of two genocidal regimes in the developing
world: the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and Hutu Power in Rwanda. Although the
regimes were quite different-one Communist, the other nationalist-he argues
that their ideals converged around a notion of organic purity Both regimes
pursued extraordinary violence to meet the ideal: mass destruction was a m
ethod to achieve organic purity. Straus further contends that anthropologic
al writings provided the necessary ideational building blocks for this idea
l. In promoting a violent return to a mythic past, both murderous regimes e
mbraced the images and concepts of European archaeology and ethnography.