Vietnam and the world

Despite the collapse of the Soviet Union and the socialist world system, Marxism-Leninism in Vietnam's own politico-cultural form remained the country's official political doctrine. Vietnam and the World provides a comprehensive picture of how Vietnamese political doctrine developed and how it responded to the radical changes in international relations from the fall of Saigon in 1975 up to the 1990s.

By joining an established foreign-policy analysis to the studies of political language, the author examines the Communist Party Cadres' theoretical books and articles, as well as Vietnamese documents, in a concrete historical setting. He also points out how formalist Soviet-type rhetoric displaced traditional pragmatic thinking in the 1970s. However, the author reaches the conclusion that the formalist doctrine in diplomatic practice had lost its significance in the mid-1980s. Therefore, when the socialist reform movement began in the Soviet Union, the Vietnamese enthusiastically adopted new elements to add to their doctrine.

The book concludes that the present Vietnamese Marxist-Leninist doctrine includes various compelling politico-cultural elements, owing to Hanoi's endeavour to maintain its old political system and simultaneously join the capitalist world system.