In the shadow of empire: Intra-Asian social networks and economic activities in the Greater Indian Ocean World through a Dutch-Colonial lens (1750-1820)

Bulten, L.J.

In this experimental paper, I will share my hypotheses for the recently commenced study on the economic activities of several Asian business communities in eighteenth-century Melaka. In recent years Asian merchants and entrepreneurs – e.g. Chinese, Malay, Chettiar, Gujarati, Arab, Bugi, Armenian, and Jewish traders – and their relation to the Indian Ocean World have received increasing attention from scholars. These studies show that such social groups had major stakes in both regional and global trade networks, both thanks to and despite of the presence of the colonial trade companies and imperial governments. Moreover, the persistent presence and activities of such communities showcase their capacity to navigate, utilise, or evade European colonial efforts to control and monopolise commerce – offering us an insight into how such communities dealt with and lived under (or regardless of) European colonial rule. In this paper, and my project at large, I want to take a next step by...Show moreIn this experimental paper, I will share my hypotheses for the recently commenced study on the economic activities of several Asian business communities in eighteenth-century Melaka. In recent years Asian merchants and entrepreneurs – e.g. Chinese, Malay, Chettiar, Gujarati, Arab, Bugi, Armenian, and Jewish traders – and their relation to the Indian Ocean World have received increasing attention from scholars. These studies show that such social groups had major stakes in both regional and global trade networks, both thanks to and despite of the presence of the colonial trade companies and imperial governments. Moreover, the persistent presence and activities of such communities showcase their capacity to navigate, utilise, or evade European colonial efforts to control and monopolise commerce – offering us an insight into how such communities dealt with and lived under (or regardless of) European colonial rule. In this paper, and my project at large, I want to take a next step by considering how the activities of such trade communities collectively helped shape and transition institutions, structures, and networks on a global scale that were previously mostly accredited to Western colonialism in an Age of Revolutions – such as capitalism, modern economic, legal and bureaucratic institutions, and forced labour regimes. Through three vignettes centred around the colonial port city of Melaka (1750-1820), I explore to what extent stories extracted from colonial archives can help reconstruct such dynamic historical processes and transitions from a more diversifying perspective – moving beyond binaries like colonial/local, occidental/oriental, and western/non-western.
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In the shadow of empire: Intra-Asian social networks and economic activities in the Greater Indian Ocean World through a Dutch-Colonial lens (1750-1820)