Chinese Indenture in the Interwar Netherlands East Indies and the ‘Coolie Ordinance’: Slavery & Abolition: Vol 45 , No 3 - Get Access

Chinese Indenture in the Interwar Netherlands East Indies and the ‘Coolie Ordinance’: Slavery & Abolition: Vol 45 , No 3 - Get Access

Slavery & Abolition 

A Journal of Slave and Post-Slave Studies

Volume 45, 2024 - Issue 3

16

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Forum: The Abolition of Chinese Indentured Labour Editors: Julia T. Martínez and Claire Lowrie

Chinese Indenture in the Interwar Netherlands East Indies and the ‘Coolie Ordinance’

Gregor Benton

Pages 501-520 | Published online: 17 Aug 2024

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https://doi.org/10.1080/0144039X.2024.2344391

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ABSTRACT

Formal indenture became widespread in the Chinese labour diaspora on Dutch-ruled Sumatra later than in the British Empire and ended later than anywhere else, apart from in some small and isolated settings. 

It also took a different form and was differently named as ‘the penal sanction’. Despite attempts by reformists in the East Indies and the Hague to phase it out, the penal sanction survived into the inter-war years because of resistance from vested conservative interests in both places. It was finally wound up as a result of a combination of international pressures from several sides and socioeconomic changes in the colony itself.

KEYWORDS: Penal sanctionindentureChineseNetherlands East IndiesKongsi