dutch colonial period. september 2021
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Dutch Colonial Period.
A few links mainly relating to some aspects of the colonial history of Indonesia.
A Brief History of the Dutch East Indies - Part 1.
Drawn to this link as gives some introductory insight of the Indonesian archipelago as it was several hundred years ago and was attracted to it as mentions various traditional cultures. As it was the Dutch were to arrive in this apparently very multi-cultural region to establish their mercantile empire from 1600.
From the above link this particular paragraph of the Indonesian archipelago as it was in pre-Dutch times especially gained my interest:
In the archipelago of over 17,000 islands of which only about 900 were inhabited, there was never a unified ‘Indonesian’ culture but rather a series of regional cultural traditions belonging to specific linguistic and ethnic groups, including (but not exclusively) the Achenese, the Minangkabau and the Batak (Sumatra), the Sundanese and the Betawi (West Java), the Cirebonese (West and Central Java), the Javanese (Batavia, Central and East Java), the Makasarese and the Bugis (South Sulawesi and East Kalimantan), the Makassarese and Minahasan (Sulawesi), the Madurese (Madura), the Balinese (Bali), the Ambonese (Ambon in Melaku/Moluccas) and the Bandanese (Banda Islands).
[Acknowledgment: this excerpt is from the above link].
EUROPEAN COLONIALISM IN THE EARLY 20TH CENTURY: COLONIALISM AND NATIONALISM IN THE DUTCH EAST INDIES, 1910-1930.
This following excerpt taken directly from the above also gives some insight to the rise of a growing nationalist sense in the early twentieth century during the Dutch occupation of the then East Indies:
National consciousness emerged gradually in the archipelago during the first decades of the twentieth century, developed rapidly during the contentious 1930s, and flourished, both ideologically and institutionally, during the tumultuous Japanese occupation in the early 1940s, which shattered Dutch colonial authority. As in other parts of colonial Southeast Asia, nationalism was preceded by traditional-style rural resistance. The Java War, joining discontented elites and peasants, was a precursor. Around 1900 the followers of Surantika Samin, a rural messiah who espoused his own religion, the Science of the Prophet Adam, organized passive resistance on Java that included refusal to pay taxes or perform labor service. Militant Islam was another focus of traditional resistance, especially in Sumatra.
Native nationalism reflected trends in other parts of Asia and Europe. Pilgrims and students returning from the Middle East brought modernist Islamic ideas that attempted to adapt the faith to changing times. Other influences included the founding of the Indian National Congress in 1885; the Philippine struggle for independence against both Spain and the United States in 1898-1902; Japan’s victory over Tsarist Russia in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-05), a major challenge to the myth of white European supremacy; and the success of Kemal Ataturk in creating a modern, secularized Turkey after World War I on the ruins of the Ottoman Empire. The Russian Revolution of 1917 also had a profound impact, reflected in the growth of a strong communist movement by the late 1920s. National consciousness was not homogeneous but reflected the diversity of Indonesian society. Dutch repression and the shock of war from 1942 to 1945, however, forged diverse groups into something resembling a unified whole.
[Acknowledgment: this excerpt is from the above link].
Thus if only to speculate as I am not a specialist in Indonesian history from the little that one has already read one may wish to argue that this ‘nationalist sense’ would be ‘Javanised’ even further by Suharto to ‘homogenise’ its diverse elements towards a heterogeneous outlook which radiated out from Jakarta throughout all of new national entity that is Indonesia to submerge as well as suppress if need be – more local sensibilities of cultural identity.
To repeat: transmigration was part of this internal colonial nationalist process to ‘Javanese’ Indonesia which – to also emphasise - is one historical frame through which to view the rise of palm oil...
The Extractive Institutions as Legacy of Dutch Colonialism in Indonesia.
A Historical Case Study. September. 2018.
This Master's Thesis inadvertently discovered online is also worthwhile to peruse and which is posted due to an interest in looking at the 'historical avenue' as being a typical pathway - amongst a myriad of ways which one supposes can range for example along political-economic-cultural discourses - to venture along in trying to comprehend present material and social circumstances.
The dark history of slavery and racism in Indonesia during the Dutch colonial period.
This article relates to another cash crop tobacco in Sumatra but found of interest as cheap labour is so often been a featureof any industry which maximizes profit by way of labour exploitation of which the palm oil industry has regularly been accused of practising to this day.
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