Institutional Memory in the Making of Dutch Colonial Culture in Asia (1700–1870)

Abstract

This chapter argues for a new approach to the history of ideas in Dutch colonialism, asking how Dutch colonial officials and church ministers justified their work. Drawing on the vast locally produced archives and collections in Indonesia and the Netherlands, the chapter breaks away from the historiographical traditions that view the VOC and nineteenth-century colonialism in Asia as different. Fragments from the VOC and colonial archives—produced locally in Asia in the process of performing colonialism—illustrate the historical embeddedness and hybridity of colonial practice and ideas. Inspired by organisational anthropology, Schrikker understands the colonial archive as an institutional memory in which ideas, experience, and practices were passed on between generations of actors. This approach sheds new light on the history of ideas underpinning empire.