The Politics of Sorrow: A Story of Unity and Allegiance Across Tibetan Exile

The Dalai Lama escaped from Tibet in 1959 after its occupation by China and established a government in exile in India. There, Tibetan leaders aimed to bring together displaced people from varied religious traditions and local loyalties under the banner of unity. To contest Chinese colonization and stand up for self-determination, Tibetan refugees were asked to shed regional allegiances and embrace a vision of a shared national identity.

The Politics of Sorrow tells the story of the Group of Thirteen, a collective of chieftains and lamas from the regions of Kham and Amdo, who sought to preserve Tibet’s cultural diversity in exile. They established settlements in India in the mid-1960s with the goal of protecting their regional and religious traditions, setting them apart from the majority of Tibetan refugees, who saw a common tradition as the basis for unifying the Tibetan people. Tsering Wangmo Dhompa traces these different visions for Tibetan governance and identity, juxtaposing the Tibetan government in exile’s external struggle for international recognition with its lesser-known internal struggle to command loyalty within the diaspora. She argues that although unity was necessary for democracy and independence, it also drew painful boundaries between those who belonged and those who didn’t. Drawing on insightful interviews with Tibetan elders and an exceptional archive of Tibetan exile texts, The Politics of Sorrow is a compelling narrative of a tumultuous time that reveals the complexities of Tibetan identities then and now.

Tsering Wangmo Dhompa is a professor of literature and creative writing at Villanova University. She is the author of the poetry collections My Rice Tastes Like the Lake (2011), In the Absent Everyday (2005), and Rules of the House (2002), as well as the memoir Coming Home to Tibet (2016). Her mother served as a member of parliament in the exile government for three terms.