Rule of lawyers: liberalism and colonial judges in nineteenth-century Java

Abstract

This chapter focuses on colonial liberalism in practice in the colonial courtrooms of nineteenth-century Java, studying colonial jurists and officials as ‘intermediate thinkers’ of empire. What exactly changed in the practices of colonial criminal justice when legally trained judges were introduced as landraad presidents in 1869? The chapter discusses the liberal ideals of Dutch lawyers and focuses on the experiences and actions of the landraad judges within their new professional environment, looking at their interactions with the jaksas (Javanese prosecutors) and Javanese court members in the pluralistic courts. Although the Dutch jurists argued they were bringing the rule of law to Java, Ravensbergen shows that they not only continued but also enhanced the unequal practices of the colonial legal system, thereby establishing ‘a rule of lawyers.’