Shawcross, William

New York. 1984. June 1984. Simon & Schuster. 1st American Edition. Very Good in Dustjacket. 0671440225. 464 pages. hardcover. Jacket design by Carin Goldberg. Author photograph by BBC Enterprises Limited. . keywords: Cambodia Asia History . FROM THE PUBLISHER - The sequel SIDESHOW: KISSINGER, NIXON AND THE DESTRUCTION OF CAMBODIA. That earlier book demonstrated the way in which small nations can be destroyed when they are caught in grand and careless strategic designs. THE QUALITY OF MERCY chronicles the way in which the world responds to calamity. The author takes as one of his themes the famine which seemed to sweep Cambodia in 1979 and the extraordinary way in which the Western world reacted to it. Shawcross shows us how a catastrophe in the Third World evokes response in the developed world and examines the modern conscience toward victims of disaster and persecution. He draws upon thousands of internal documents and secret archives from those international organizations on which we rely in times of crisis. He examines UNICEF, the World Food Program, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, the International Committee of the Red Cross, CARE, Catholic Relief Services, OXFAM and the World Council of Churches. THE QUALITY OF MERCY also examines the way in which the Holocaust, the extermination of Europe's Jews, dominates modern memory and helps condition the way in which we perceive and react to catastrophe. THE QUALITY OF MERCY is an indispensable contribution to the history of the aftermath of America's Vietnam War and the murderous Pol Pot regime which devastated Cambodia after its takeover. But it is also a thoughtful and profound contemplation of frailty and of the ironies of our world today, and the practical and philosophical ways in which we try to come to terms with them. inventory #3781 ISBN: 0671440225.