7th lecture: Colonial Workers

Question 1

When was the system of indentured labour instituted and what did it entail?

Answer 1

• from 1830s onwards
• Indian labourers were recruited to replace African slave labour and for railway constructions across the British Empire, in the colonial plantation economies

Question 2

2 important aspects of the creation of the indentured labour regime

Answer 2

• End of slavery within the
  british empire in 1830s
  (abolition slave trade 1808,
  1833 abolition of the
  institution of slavery)
• Context: expanding of classical colonial commodities / expanding european empires

Question 3

what were the main colonial commodities

Answer 3

tea, coffee, tobacco, sugar, opium -> all psychoactive, addictive

Question 4

Context of the production of colonial commodities

Answer 4

• require intensive labour
• none of them could be produced in Europe
• but high demand for them in europe
• Europeans have the power and force by military means and political possibilities to force people to work in the colonial commodity chain

=> Tropical climate needed + “cheap land” + “cheap”/ forced labour

Question 5

when was the Slavery Abolition Act?

Answer 5

1833

Context:
- Abolitionist lobby : Smithian doctrine of free trade
○ “free labour” = then
seen as whatever isn’t
slavery
- Monitoring costs -> so high to oppress enslaved

Question 6

Basis of indentured labour contracts for Indian workers

Answer 6

• Temporary contracts, in the
  long run 5 year work
  contracts became common
  but many forced to stay
  longer on plantation
• Labourers from all parts
  over india
• Immediate payments to
  families of labourers and
  then later wages (but costs
  of initial transport ,food,
  housing, clothing etc.
  detected from wage)
• Indians cause of poverty, famines
• After 1857 (rebellion) ->
  more ppl emigrated as
  labourers
  -> many rebells in prison
  were given the choice
  either indentured workers on
  plantation or prison -> many
  “chose” labour

Question 7

Kala Pani and indentured labour

Answer 7

• Idea that sth terrible
  happens to you if you cross
  the ocean (you can loose
  cast and therefore social
  community)
• So actual sending them to
  plantations overseas as
  harder punishment than
  prison
• caste had different role abroad than home

“The notion that tt than execution was a convenient means to dispose of the mutineers relatively humanely whilst providing much-needed assistance to the labour-starved sugar colonial in the wake of slave abolition and its drastic effect – economic collapse.”
Bates and Carter, “Kala Pani”,

Question 8

Women and indentured labour

Answer 8

• 20-30% women on
  plantations
  -> Widowhood, escape
  patriarchal oppression at
  home
• Women in higher castes esp
  widows left so they could
  remarry (remarriage act
  around 1930s)
• For men loosing caste more
  about loosing status than for
  women