1. The material basis of the colony – was the colonial economy built on extraction (minerals, rubber, timber, ivory), agriculture (sugar, coffee, fruits, cotton), the slave trade, or something else (such as land annexation and conquest)? Who was the primary source of labor in this economy – slaves, indigenous people, indentured migrants, local residents, etc.)?
Europeans such as the Portuguese arrived in Indonesia from the 16th century seeking to monopolize spices like nutmeg, cloves, and cubeb pepper in Maluku. In 1602, the Dutch established the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and became the dominant European power by 1610. At this time, and through the 17th century, they successfully monopolized the Maluku spice trade. Of course and tragically, spurring brutal genocide of indigenous peoples to accomplish this. By 1800, the Dutch East Indies was a source of many cash crops including coffee, tea, and palm oil. The primary source of labor were Javanese peasants, indigenous people of the Indonesian island of Java. By the late 1800s wealthy Dutch businessmen set up sugar plantations, other crops such as tea and cinchona were introduced as well. There was a large rise in rubber production. There was also a mining sector present that extracted oil, coal, tin and copper. after World War II Indonesia was succeeded by the Indonesian Republic.
2. The political and judicial basis of the colony. How did the colonizing country sustain power and order in the economic system they established? Who were the rulers? How did they enforce their rules and laws?
In the 1600s, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) began colonizing parts of Indonesia. The VOC itself represented a new type of power in the region for many reasons. First of all, it formed a single organization and traded across a vast area. Being the dominating state at the time, it possessed a large and strong military force. Over time, the VOC employed a bureaucracy of servants to patrol and manage its affairs in Indonesia. As a large power at the time, the VOC often forced them to accept its trading conditions. Under the governor-generalship of Jan Pieterszoon Coen and his successors, most notably Anthony van Diemen and Joan Maetsuyker layed the framework for the powerful state that it became. Coen concluded it was necessary to conquer the entire Bandanese archipelago, even if it meant exterminating the native people.Coen ordered troops to raze all the villages and force the surrender of the population. The Bandanese were killed, exiled, or sold as slaves. Coen was even viewed as a national hero in the Netherlands due to his expansion of Dutch empire. After the abolition of the VOC in 1796, the Dutch government gained control over Indonesia.
3. The ideological foundation of the colony. How did they justify their colonial presence? What good did the colonizing force think they were bringing to the people in the colonized region?
The colonization of Indonesia, which was clearly motivated by Dutch economic interests in the Spice trade, was portrayed as a “civilizing mission.” This was supported by the ideology that Indonesians were primitive and backwards and that the Dutch could civilize and modernize them. This is an archetype we can observe across many different occurrences of colonization in the past, some of these ideologies and justifications still carry into the present day. Dutch forces regularly committed atrocities on Indonesian natives. The Bandanese and Javanese people suffered a genocide. Civilians were tortured, raped, and executed. Even in the last years of colonialism, thousands of supporters of independence were jailed.
Sources:
- M.C. Ricklefs: A History of Modern Indonesia since c.1200
- H. Dick, e.a.: The Emergence of a National Economy. An Economic History of Indonesia, 1800-2000
- Wim Ravesteijn, “Between Globalization and Localization: The Case of Dutch Civil Engineering in Indonesia, 1800–1950,” Comparative Technology Transfer and Society, 5#1 (2007) pp. 32–64, quote p 32
- Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopedia. “Javanese”. Encyclopedia Britannica, 14 Jun. 2015, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Javanese-people. Accessed 27 January 2022.