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COLONIAL

POLICY

ANDPRACTICE

J. S. FURNIVALL

A il over the world colonial peoples are

in revoit. Empires shrink as day by day

their outposts take or are granted inde-

pendence.

After World War II, Britain had the bold

wisdom to grant independence to Burma,

one of the few present-day instances in

which the long-standing relationship be-

tween ruler and ruled did not frazzle out

in bitter hatred and fighting. After long

opposition by the Dutch, the Indonesian

Republic was recognized in 1947 .

In the words of J. S. Furnivall, foremostauthority on colonial administration,

Nothing less than independence could

transform nationalism from a destructive

fever into a Creative force. Problems of

administration, of the economy, and of

defense remain, but now they belong to

the Burmans and Indonesians. Evenbefore the invasions and occupation of

Burma and Netherlands India during

World War II, there were fundamental

problems in colonial administration, and

(Continued on back fap)


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COLONIAL

POLICY AND PRACTICE


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COLONIAL

POLICY AND PRACTICEA Comparative Study of

Burma and Netherlands India

b y

J. S. FURNIVALL

'916-

NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESSWashington Square New York


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First published in Grcat Britain by Cambridge Univcrsity Press 1948

in coopration with

The International Secrtariat, Institute of Pacific Relations

First United States dition 1956

. \

Library of Congress catalogue card number: 56-10677

Manufactured in the United States of America


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PREFACE

CONTENTS

page ix

L i s t o f A r t i c l e s C i t e d xiii

Chapter I. T h e B a c k g r o u n d o f C o l o n i a l P o l i c y a n d P r a c t i c e i

1. Colonies and Dominions, x. 2. The Background of Colonial Policy, 3. 3. TheBackground of Colonial Practice, 8. 4. Burma, 10. 5. Netherlands India, 20

Chapter II. B u r m a , 1826-70: L a i s s e z - F a i r e 23

1. The Wars of 1824-6 and 1852: (a) 1824-6, 23; (b) 1852, 25. 2. AdministrativePolicy: (a) 1826, 27; (b) 1852, 29. 3. The Foundations of Administrative Practice,29: Judicial System, 30; Revenue System, 33. 4. Administrative Machinery:(a) 1826-52, 35; (b) 1852-70, 39. 5. Economie Progress, 1826-52, 42: Communications, 43; Population, 44; Production and Trade, 45; Trade with Ava, 47.6. Economie Progress, 1852-70: Communications, 47; Population, 49; Production, 50. 7. Welfare: (a) Individual, 51; (b) Social, 53

Note on Growth of Population, 1826-72, 59

Chapter III. B u r m a , 1870-1923: E f f i c i e n c y a n dS o c i a l J u s t i c e , {a) P r o g r e s s 62

1. Administrative Policy, 62. 2. Upper Burma and the Third War, 64. 3. Administrative Practice, 71. 4. Economie Progress: Communications, 77; Population, 79; Trade, 80; Production, 83; Western Enterprise, 83; Native Enterprise, 84;The Rice Trade, 95

Chapter IV. B u r m a , 1 8 7 0 - 1 9 2 3 : E f f i c i e n c y a n dS o c i a l J u s t i c e , (b)W e l f a r e 99

1. Individual Welfare, 99: Imports, 100. 2. Social Welfare, 105. 3. AgrarianConditions, 109. 4. Social Evolution, 116. 5. Education, 123. 6. Litigationand Crime: Litigation, 131; Crime, 137

Chapter V. B u r m a , 1 92 3 - 40: P o l i t i c a l D e m o c r a c y ,(a) P o l i c y a n d P r a c t i c e 142

1. Administrative Policy, 142. 2. Burmese Nationalism, 142. 3. Local Self-govemment, 144: Municipal Self-govemment, 146; Rural Self-govemment, 151;Village Self-govemment, 153; Popular Control, 155. 4. National Self-govemment, 157. 5. Sparation from India, 165. 6. The Constitution of 1937, 168.7. Corruption, 170. 8. Defence, 178


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VI CONTENTS

Chapter VI. B u r m a , 1923-40: P o l i t i c a l D e m o c r a c y ,(b) P r o g r e s s a n d W e l f a r e page 185

1. Economie Progress: Communications, 185; Population, 186; Trade, 186;Production, 188. 2. Individual Welfare, 191. 3. Social Welfare: Village Com-munities, 194; Communal Discord, 196. 4. Clrical Disorder, 199. 5. Education, 202: Primary Instruction, 203; Secondary Instruction, 204; VocationalInstruction, 206; Morals and Discipline, 207; Female Instruction, 208; Literacy,208; Educational Progress, 211. 6. Review of Progress and Welfare, 212

Chapter YII. N e t h e r l a n d s I n d i a 2 1 71. Administrative Divisions, 217. 2. Netherlands India up to 1830, 218. 3. TheCulture System, 1830-70, 220. 4. The Libral System, 1870-1900, 223. 5. TheEthical System and Political Democracy, 226. 6. Economie Democracy andNation-building, 230. 7. Nationalism, 232. 8. Administrative Practice:(a) District Administration, 236; (b) Village Administration, 241 ; (c) Departmental

Administration, 243; (d) Judicial Administration, 243. 9. Reprsentative Institutions, 246. 10. Economie Progress, 251. 11. Welfare, 255. 12. Social Welfare,262. 13. Netherlands India and Burma, 264: Self-government, 265 ; Indebtedness,267; Litigation and Crime, 267; Clrical Unrest, 269; Corruption, 269; Authorityand Law, 271

1. The Study of Colonial Relations, 276. 2. Survey of Colonial Policy, 280: Spain

and Portugal, 281; Chartered Companies, 282; Liberalism, 282; Construction, 288.3. Tropical Economy, 290: Development by Native Enterprise, 293; Development

by Western Enterprise, 300; General Course of Development, 303. 4. The PluralSociety, 303: Political Features, 306; Economie Features, 308. 5. ModemColonial Policy, 312

Chapter IX. W e l f a r e : L a n d a n d L a b o u r 3191. The Instruments of Welfare, 319. 2. Public Works, 319. 3. EconomieServices and Production, 323. 4. Economie Services and Welfare, 332. 5. SocialServices: Protection, 334. 6. Native Enterprise and the Land, 335. 7. Western

Enterprise and Labour, 340 : The Provision of Labour, 342 ; Protection, 349

Chapter X. W e l f a r e : H e a l t h a n d E d u c a t i o n 3551. Health and Progress, 355. 2. Medicine, 357. 3. Hygiene, 362. 4. Education:Types of Schools, 371. 5. Education and Laissez-faire, 374. 6. ConstructiveEducation, 379. 7. Education and Progress, 381. 8. Education and Welfare, 388.9. Vemacular Education, 392. 10. Native Education, 400. 11. Education andInstruction, 402

ChapterXI. P r o g r e s s , W e l f a r e a n d A u t o n o m y 408

1. Colonial Policy and Autonomy, 408. 2. Welfare and Revenue, 409. 3. TheMeasurement of Welfare, 415. 4. The Machinery of Welfare, 417: (a) DirectRule, 419; (b)Indirect Rule, 427. 5. Compulsory Welfare, 430. 6. The Relation

between Progress and Welfare, 432. 7. The Concept of Welfare, 436. 8. Welfareand Autonomy, 440. 9. Autonomy, 442. 10. Personnel, 445. 11. Machinery,Local Government, 447. 12. Machinery, Central Government, 452. 13. Progress,

Welfare and Autonomy, 457. 14. The Problem of Autonomy, 466

ChapterVIII. C o l o n i a l P o l i c y 276


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ChapterXII. R i n t g r a t i o n page 4681. Conditions of Rintgration, 468. 2. Social Rintgration, 469: SpecialistServices, 473 ; Co-ordination, 473 ; Continuity, 474 ; Welfare Charges, 475 ; SocialEducation, 476; Motive, 477. 3. Economie Rintgration, 477. 4. WesternInstitutions in Tropical Dependencies, 484. 5. The Functions of Government,488. 6. Continuity, 491. 7. Du al Government, 492. 8. Semi-colonial Go vernment, 495: The Prsident, 495; Reprsentation and Responsibility, 496; TheNational Assembly, 498; Economie Council, 499; Presidential Election, 499.9. Conditional Independence, 500: Defence, 500; Territorial Integrity, 500;Economie Autonomy, 501. 10. Popular Government, 502. 11. Political Rintgration, 506. 12. Independence and Finance, 507

C O N T E N T S V I I

Chapter XIII. I n t e r n a t i o n a l C o l l a b o r a t i o n 5 1 31. The Need for Autonomy, 513. 2. Political and Economie Control, 518.

3. International Collaboration, 523. 4. International Supervision and Autonomy,530. 5. Rgional Councils: Functions, 534; Constitution, 536. 6. Burma,Netherlands India and Tropical Economy, 537

Appendix I. S e a b o r n e T r a d e o f B u r m a , G r o w t h 551

Appendix ll. S e a b o r n e T r a d e o f B u r m a , D i s t r i b u t i o n 5 54

L i s t o f R e f e r e n c e s 55 6

I n d e x 5 59

M a p o f B u r m a at end


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PREFACE

T h i s book originated in a request from the Government of Burmaat the end of 1942 for my views on reconstruction, with particular

reference* to features o f colonial rule in Netherlands India thatmight suitably be adopted in Burma. One cannot transplant administrative machinery without reference to the environment; in a newenvironment it may work better or worse, but it certainly will not

work in the same way. It was necessary therefore to emphasize thefact that British and Dutch colonial policy are founded on diffrenttraditions. Two basic principles of British colonial policy are the ruleof law and conomie freedom, whereas Dutch colonial policy hasaimed at imposing restraints on economic forces by strengthening

Personal authority and by conserving the influence of custom.In modem Burma under British rule there were five notorious evils:

the failure of western self-governing institutions; the growth of debt

and agrarian distress ; the multiplication of litigation and crime ; therise of disaffection and unrest among the Buddhist clergy ; and wide-spread corruption in the judicial and administrative services. I sug-gested that these can ail be traced to a common cause : the disintegra-tion of social life through the inadequacy of law to control the workingof anti-social economic forces. Although in other respects Dutch ruleis open to criticism which does not apply to Burma, yet in ail these

matters Netherlands India prsents a notable contrast. We would not,even if we could, abandon what is valuable in the traditions of Britishrule, and in any case we cannot break suddenly with old traditions,or escape the consquences of the past. But the contrast indicatesthat we ought to incorporate in our policy the principle of controllingeconomic forces in the interest of social welfare. I tried accordinglyto show how, by adapting certain devices of Dutch administrativemachinery, this principle might be applied to cure the ills of modem

Burma, and to lay the basis of a new and constructive policy.While formulating these proposais it occurred to me that the com-

parison between Burma and Netherlands India might be of somewhatmore gnral interest. In presenting it to a wider public there was,


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X PREFACE

however, one obvious difficulty. The officiais for whom the originalnote was written shared with the writer a common knowledge of

Burma and its administration. For readers without such spcialknowledge it was necessary to trace the course of development moreclosely and to illustrate the results more clearly, even at the risk ofmultiplying tedious dtail. Another difficulty, still more formidable,may be less obvious. For undesirable features of British rule in Burma,British officiais, conscious of their good intentions, naturally tend to

blme the Burman; Burmans, no less naturally, blme the British.Similarly in Netherlands India we find mutual rcriminations betweenDutch and Indonesians. Only by eliminating so far as possible ailpersonal and local factors can one arrive at a just estimate of anyparticular experiment in colonial rule. It seemed necessary thereforeto frame the comparison between Burma and Netherlands India ina gnral survey of colonial policy and practice. For such a survey,however, they provide a convenient introduction by presentingrespectively extreme types of the alternative systems of direct and

indirect rule.In venturing further afield one was inevitably treading on uncertain

ground. I was at home in Burma. After more than twenty years inthe Civil Service, I was occupied for some time in business and in thedirection of an agricultural bank, and also had the privilege of beingassociated with the University of Rangoon and the Education Department in various educational experiments. With the ready assistance ofDutch and Indonesian authorities I have made some study of Netherlands India, and I have visited Malaya, Siam and Cochin China.I also have some personal acquaintance with administration in BritishIndia. But of Africa, the other great field of colonial rule, I knewnothing at first hand. Fortunately it was possible to turn for information to Lord Haileys great African Survey, and the extent of my debtto it will be readily apparent. It would be hard to say how much I oweto the voluminous writings of Dutch colonial experts, but among

them I must mention in particular Dr J. H. Boeke, Professor ofTropical Economy in Leiden University, and Mr Meijer Ranneft,formerly Vice-President of the Raad van Indi. It is impossible forme to express adequately my gratitude to my friend Mr G. E. Harvey,for the care with which he read the first proofs of this book and for his


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P R E F A C E xi

generous comments and criticisms, and also for allowing me to use his

unpublished extracts from the records of early British rule in Arakan.

The book was written during the late war, and completed early in

1945. The delay in publication has been due partly to the difficultiesof the present time, partly to imperfections in the original script; and

in this connection I must gratefully acknowledge the help and patienceof the University Press. During the interval there have been greatchanges but, as the Japanese invasion of the Tropical Far East mustcertainly mark a turning-point in colonial rule, and subsquent events

are still too close to be reviewed in due perspective, it seemed ex-

pedient merely to revise the tense in references to the war.One change however calls for comment. Britain has granted Burmaindependence. On both parts this may seem bold even to the point ofrashness. Some contend that we have been too ready to throw off theresponsibilities of Government and Burmans over-ready to assumethem. It is a tumbled house that they inherit, and there is urgentneed to repair the damage, moral and material, inflicted on Burma ina war during which it was twice invaded. Exports have fallen by two-

thirds of the pre-war figure of 37 million. The annual revenuecovers only one-third of the current expenditure, and the nationaldebt of over 110 million, about seven times the revenue, is rapidlyincreasing. Despite the gnral inexperience of Burmans in modemindustry and commerce, their new leaders must enable Burma, so faras national interest allows, to make a due contribution to worldwelfare by the development of its resources. Moreover, in a country

where the tradition of military service has long been suffered todecay, they must train the people to defend their freedom. Now alsoit will fall on them to deal with problems long-standing and hithertoinsoluble : to adapt western institutions to an eastern people, provideremedies for agricultural debt and land alination, reduce litigationand crime to healthy proportions, restore order among the Buddhistclergy, and purify the administration of corruption. In a troubled

world, though less acquainted with affairs than their old rulers,

they face a situation far more difficult. In these circumstances it isimpossible to contemplate the future without misgivings, and we maywell regret that in the past more was not done to equip the people andtheir leaders for the responsibilities of independence.


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xii P R E F A C E

Some advocate Dominion status as an alternative. But, for countriessuch as Burma, Dominion status is an unmeaning formula. The

British Dominions are countries potentially able to stand alone butpreferring to be associated on equal terms with the other majorpartners in the Commonwealth. Burma is not in that position. Theracial divisions and sharp conflict of interest and sentiment, whichweakened the former Government, would still continue and areincompatible with Dominion status. On the other hand, if the Burmanleaders had accepted it, they would have split their party, strengthenedtheir rivais, especially the so-called Communists, and conferred on theprevalent dacoity the halo of patriotism and the semblance of civil

war. It is lamentable that we failed to capture the imagination of thepeople so as to inspire an instinctive loyalty to the British connection,but we cannot escape the consquences of the past. In purporting togrant Dominion status, we would have been promising somethingthat we could not give in return for support that the leaders of thepeople were unable to command. Once again we would have been

committed to the ungrateful task of pacification ; more difficult now,and far more costly, than after the wars of 1852 and 1885 when wecould employ Indian troops.

I hold then that on both parts the dcision in favour of independencewas as wise as it was bold, not only in their interest but in ours.Nothing less than independence could transform nationalism froma destructive fever into a Creative force. Yet national independence isnot a cause or guarantee of welfare. Burmans still need help, and by

our long connection we can do most to give the help they need. Butwe can help them only on terms acceptable to both parties. If we canhelp Burmans to stand alone securely, we may perhaps look forwardto a time when they will welcome a more intimate association.However that may be, we can at least feel that we have done ourbest to meet whatever dificulties lie ahead by responding boldly tothe challenge of a new ge.

J . S . F U R N I V A L L24 October 1947


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LIST OF ARTICLES CITED

B r o e k , Jan O. M. Indonesia and the Netherlands (.Pacific Affairs, 1943, pp. 329-38).

C r e u t z b e r g , K . F . Education in the Netherlands East Indies {Asiatic Review, 1934,pp. 118-26).

F e e l d , D r M. J. Some Difficults of Indirect Rule (Man , 1943, P* 9)*F i s c h e r , I. A. Hospital Accomm odation in the Netherlands Indies (Bulletin of

the Colonial Institute of Amsterdam, 1939, pp. 24-36).

F u r n i v a l l , J. S. Land as a Free Gif t of Nature {Economie Journal, 1909, pp. 554-62).

The Organisation of Consumption {Economie Journal, 1910, pp. 23-30).

Education and Economies {Economie Review, 1912, pp. 380-92).Economic Surveys in Netherlands India {Economie Journal of India, 1934,

PP- 295-312).Administration in Burma and Java {Asiatic Review, 1935, pp. 625-33).

The I.C.S. {Koloniaal Tijdschrift, 1938, pp. 273-81).

The Political Economy of the Tropical Far East {Royal Central Asian Journal,1942, pp. 195-210).

Manu in Burma {Journal of the Burma Research Society, X940, pp. 351-70).

India and a Rgional Council for the Tropical Far East {Asiatic Review, 1944,

pp. 265-75).Mass Education in Netherlands India {Proceedings of the Anglo-NetherlandsSociety, i944~45>PP- 7 *5)-

H a r t , G. D. H . International Co-operation in the Colonial Sphere {Asiatic Review,1941, pp. 625-33).

H i n d e n , D r R i t a . Imperialism To-day {Fabian Quarterly, 1945, pp. 5- 1 *)-

H u g h e s , T . L . Th e Campaign in and Evacuation of Burma {Royal Central AsianJournal, 1944, pp. 80-92).

Inns, Sir C h a r l e s . The Sparation of Burma (Asiatic Review, 1934, pp. 193-215).

The Future of Burma {Asiatic Review, 1937, pp. 177-90).L e a c h , F . B u r t o n . Autonomy on T r i a l in Burma {Asiatic Review,1939, pp. 631-43).

Burmas War Effort {Asiatic Review, 1940, pp. 745-50).

Burma {Quarterly Review, 1944, pp. 83-96).M e i j e r Ra n n e f t , J. W. Indische Economie {Koloniale Studin, 1928, p p . 151-61).

M o o k , H. J. v a n . International Aspects of the Future of Africa {Journal of theRoyal African Society, 1943, pp. 177-81).

P o r t e r , C a t h e r i n e . The Future of Philippine-American Relations {Pacific Affairs,1943PP* 261-76).

W i l d e ,A . N . d e . Dutch Policy in the East Indies {Asiatic Review,1934, pp. 216-33).


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C H A P T E R I

T H E B A C K G R O U N D O F C O L O N I A L P O L I C Y

A N D P R A C T I C E

i . C o l o n i e s a n d D o m i n i o n s

O n e outstanding feature of world history during the last few centuriesis the expansion of Europe. In some rgions, chiefly in North and

South America, settlements of European origin have become inde-pendent powers. Other settlements, in what are now the Britishdominions, are independent in ail but name and sentiment, thoughowing a voluntary allegiance to the Crown. But wide areas, mostly inthe tropics, still remain under the rule of a few western powers,reckoning as western powers the countries and dominions of westernorigin. Some, at the outset of the late war, were ruled by Japan,which had recently established itself in the position of a western

power. In law these subordinate rgions exhibit a wide variety ofstatus, but they may ail conveniently be termed colonies, and thepowers that have assumed responsibility for their welfare may betermed colonial powers. Colonization originally implied settlement,

but the tropics have been colonized with capital rather than with men,and most tropical countries under foreign rule are dependenciesrather than colonies, though in practice both terms are used in-differently. Some tropical countries, such as Siam, though in lawpolitically independent, resemble colonies because, in their economicrelations, they are largely dpendent 011 the West.

Up to the end of the last century, or even later, tropical peoplesseemed, after the initial troubles of pacification, to accept, and evento welcome, foreign rule. Of British dependencies it has been saidthat a sentiment of alination or estrangement has seldom shownitself in the earlier days of British administration__Where thesentiment occurs, it has tended to manifest itself most clearly as thepeople of the dependencies advance in ducation and standards of

living.1 That is generally true of tropical dependencies in their relations with colonial powers. Towards the end of the nineteenthcentury impatience of foreign control appeared both in India and the

1 Hailey, Lord, Britain and Her Dependencies (1943), p. 36.


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3

2. T h e B a c k g r o u n d o f C o l o n i a l P o l i c y

It would appear superfluous to argue that the western powers which

have come to exercise dominion in the tropics have a fundamentalunity. No one would suggest that Portuguese and Spaniard, Dutch,English, French and American are ail alike ; ail have their distinctivenational character which is an invisible export on every ship fromEurope. The towns which they have built in the tropics are as diffrentas those who built them. Similarly, each colonial power has stampedits own imprint on its system of administration. But the West hasa common civilization derived from Greece and Rome under the

vitalizing impulse of Christianity. When this civilization first madecontact with the tropics the rebirth of reason had already begun toliberate fresh sources of material power by the rationalization ofeconomic life; from that time onwards there has been a growingtendency in the West to base economic and social relations on reason,impersonal law and individual rights.

Similarly, throughout the tropics one finds everywhere a basic re-semblance in the social structure. There is a wide range of variation,

from primitive tribal communities to settled agricultural societies witha complex social and political organization, yet in ail the variations,from the most primitive to the most advanced, one can trace a commonpattern. Under native rule everywhere, even in settled agriculturalcommunities, social and political relations were customary, not lgal ;authority was personal, based on Will and not on Law; and bothcustom and authority*were closely bound up with religion. The socialorder rested not on impersonal law and individual rights, but onpersonal authority and customary obligations, and authority andcustom derived their sanction not from reason but from religion.

Wherever a western power has gained dominion in the tropics, oreven, as in Siam, a large measure of economic control withoutactual political sovereignty, an intimate contact has been establishedbetween these two contrary principles of social life: between theeastem system, resting on religion, personal authority and customaryobligations, and the western system, resting on reason, impersonallaw and individual rights. That is a common feature of ail colonial

relations. And it is common to them also that the contact has beenestablished for the advantage of the colonial power, and that the firstcondition of establishing dominion is the maintenance of order.

Ordinarily, the motive of colonial expansion has been economic


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advantage. Considrations of prestige and military strategy haveplayed their part, but in the main economic considrations have pre-

vailed. It is, indeed, generally true that colonization has arisen out ofcommerce, and not commerce out of colonization: the doctrine thattrade follows the flag is quite modem, and in history the flag hasfollowed trade. During the earlier stages of its expansion Europeproduced little that tropical peoples required, and the main objectof colonial policy was to get tropical produce at the lowest cost. That

was the economic end of empire in the days of Portugal and Spain.The same end was attained more efectively by the great chartered

companies, concentrating on economic activities, enjoying, as regardstheir nationals, a monopoly over eastern produce, and exercisingsovereign powers which enabled them to obtain part of their suppliesfree of cost as tribute. But, with the growing rationalization of life inthe western world, man has achieved a greater mastery over materialresources, and there has been a continuai readjustment of colonialpolicy to meet new conditions arising through economic progress.The first great change was the Industrial Rvolution, which enabledEurope to sell its products in the tropics. This required a newcolonial policy, no longer directed towards obtaining tropical producecheaply tnrough chartered companies, but towards opening upmarkets for the sale of European manufactures by the encouragement of native enterprise. Further economic development in Europebuilt up large-scale enterprise, needing a secure command over vastquantities of raw materials which natives working by their ownmethods were unable to supply; at the same time it created asurplus of capital available for overseas investment. Thus, from

about 1870, with the opening of the Suez Canal, the tropicalmarket ceased to be the main object of colonial policy, which nowaimed at obtaining the necessary raw materials of industry bythe rapid development of the tropics through western enterprise.Meanwhile, in some of the more closely populated rgions, theabundant supply of cheap unorganized labour was attracting capitalto oriental industry and manufacture, with the resuit that duringrecent years imports from India and Japan have reduced the value

of the tropics as a market for cheap European manufactures, thoughincreasing rather than diminishing their demand for capital goods.This has encouraged in the colonial powers a more sympatheticattitude towards local manufactures in their dependencies, and to

wards economic nationalism; but the full efect on colonial policy of

4 THE COLONIAL BACKGROUND


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T H E B A C K G R O U N D O F C O L O N I A L P O L I C Y 5

this new trend, which was interrupted by the recent war, is not yetclearly visible. In this graduai transformation of world economyduring the building of the modem world, ail colonial powers and ail

dependencies have been involved, and it has been necessary, as acondition of survival, that colonial powers should revise their policyto meet the challenge of new circumstances.

The course of economic progress has had a further reaction oncolonial policy by its effect on domestic politics within the colonialpowers. In Britain the transition from a policy of endowing a charteredcompany with a monopoly over tropical products to a policy ofopening a free market for British goods signalized, and was partly

the resuit of, the transfer of power from the aristocracy and Londonmerchants to the manufacturers of Manchester. When, in due course,policy tumed in the direction of developing the natural resources ofthe tropics by western enterprise, Manchester had to meet the growingrivalry of heavy industry in Birmingham, and of financial interests inthe City. But at this stage a new factor intervened. In order to secureits interests against the increasing power of capital, labour enteredpolitics. For some time this had no obvious reaction on colonial

policy. Manchester and Birmingham alike fumished employment,and imports of tropical produce encouraged production and reducedprices; colonial rule was profitable, more or less, to ail classes. Butthe clash between labour and capital in Parliament encouraged atendency towards colonial autonomy under capitalist control,answered by labour with demands for colonial autonomy on a dmocratie basis. Then, with the growth of tropical industry and manufacture, the conditions of labour in the tropics became a matter ofeconomic interest to various classes in Britain, and welfare measuresbegan to assume a new importance in colonial policy. In other lands,also, colonial policy has been moulded by the interplay of conflictingdomestic interests, and in gnral on much the same pattem, thoughin some countries the rivalry of industry and agriculture has had agreater influence on colonial policy than in Britain.

Naturally, colonial policy is framed with reference to the interests,real or imagined, of the colonial power. But modem colonization isan affair of capital and not of men, and capital knows no country. The

capitalist, the owner of capital, may be swayed by national or ethicalconsidrations, but reason impels him to disregard them and lay outhis capital where, on a long view, it will obtain the best retum, andwithin recent times capitalist activities, reaching out rapidly beyond


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national boundaries, have acquired an extra-national character.Labour interests have had to counter this by uniting in an international association with a common policy. Out of the adjustmentof the relations between capital and labour on an international planehas arisen a common rcognition that the economic development ofthe tropics is a matter of world welfare.

Not infrequently, however, there is a conflict between world welfare and particular national interests, and colonial powers, pursuingtheir own interests, tend to disregard world welfare and the interestsof other powers. The danger of rivalry in the colonial sphere firstfound public rcognition in the Berlin Confrence of 1884-5, whichmarked a new stage in the volution of a common colonial policy.Before that one can trace a common resemblance in the colonialpolicy of diffrent powers because they ail had similar interests ; fromthe closing years of the nineteenth century the common features ofcolonial policy are accentuated because colonial powers recognize, atleast in name, a common interest in the development of backwardareas. Colonial policy, though still directed with primary referenceto the interests, real or imagined, of the colonial power, must now be

justified to world opinion with reference to world welfare.But colonial policy is only one aspect of national policy; each gnr

ation evolves its own social philosophy with no direct reference tocolonial affairs, and inevitably colonial policy is framed in terms ofthe broad gnral conceptions which dominate the national outlook,and reflects the emergence of new gnral ideas. Moreover, althoughcolonial relations arise out of the search for material advantage, menlike to justify their activities on moral grounds and colour them

with the warm glow of humanitarianism. I do not pretend , says thehistorian of the Portuguese Empire, that our sole aim was to preach,if others will allow that it was not only to trade. When men came toaccept the principle of freedom of person, property and trade, con-sistency required that it should be extended to colonial relations.Similarly, the idea of social justice that took shape in Europe duringthe nineteenth century permeated colonial policy, and so likewise didthe ideas of democracy and self-determination or nationalism. It was

self-determination in Europe for which Asquith drew the sword in1914, but before the war was ended the right of colonies to self-determination had been recognized in principle. Again, popularDarwinism of the last century held that progress was achieved throughthe survival of the fittest, of the more efficient; accordingly, in the name


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T H E B A C K G R O U N D O F C O L O N I A L P O L I C Y 7

of progress and efficiency, men set themselves to run the colonies onmore business-like, efficient, lines. Thus colonial policy tends tofollow, even if at a distance, domestic policy. Liberty, Social Justice,Democracy, if approved as sauce for the domestic goose, are servedup a little later with the colonial gander; Free Trade is good forBritain, and good, therefore, for India; social lgislation protectsBritish labour and should, therefore, promote welfare in the tropics;democracy strengthens the political fibre of Europe and should,therefore, help dependencies towards autonomy. As one aspect ofnational policy, colonial policy reflects ideas transcending economicaims. It is true that, in retrospect, ideals claiming a moral basis haveoften worked in practice to the advantage of the colonial power ratherthan of the dependency, and men are apt to dismiss the humanitarian-ism of a former ge as humbug and its zealous advocates as hypocrites.That is partly because on the whole morality isa paying proposition;yet, though it pays to be honest, men are not honest merely becauseit pays. For ideas have an independent vitality; men accept themeven to their apparent prejudice. And the ideas may outlast theempire which they help to build, just as Roman law survived thefall of Rome and provides a steel framework to the fabric of themodem world, and as in the Spanish colonies the Faith survived thefall of Spain. So in Asia and Africa the ideas of Law and Liberty andSocial Justice may have a longer life than western rule. But the pointimmediately relevant is that the succession of these gnral ideas iscommon to western civilization and therefore to ail western colonialpowers, and forms a common feature in the volution of colonialpolicy.

If, then, colonial relations have so much in common, and colonial

policy reflects the application to colonial relations of ideas which arecommon to ail colonial powers, it might seem that a comparativesurvey of pronouncements on colonial policy should lead to theenunciation of certain principles of colonial mie. But the matter isnot so simple. One obstacle to the progress of the social sciences isthe difficulty that students find in maintaining an objective attitude.The mies for statesmen which the economist prescribes in hisacademic cloister reflect his political opinions; educationists ve-

hemently debate what ducation should and might be, and whatit could or must do with little heed to what ducation actuallyis and does; political philosophy has chiefly concerned itself withhow men ought to live, and what form of govemment they ought to


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have, rather than with what aretheir political habits and institutions \1Similarly, projects of colonial policy lay down the goal at which itought to aim, but the measures advocated to attain the goal, even if

free from unconscious bias and likely to succeed in Europe, oftenlead in tropical dependencies in a diffrent or even a contrary direction. In policy, as in law, men must be held to intend the naturalconsquences of their acts, and it is from the results of colonialpolicy rather than from statements of its objects that its true charactermay be ascertained. In the study of colonial affairs statements ofpolicy need scrutiny in the light of practice. That is far moredifficult. For if a survey of colonial policy reveals a fundamental

identity in colonial relations, the study of colonial practice gives afirst impression of diversity.

3. T h e B a c k g r o u n d o f C o l o n i a l P r a c t i c e

In respect of colonial practice, however, one can distinguish twofactors characteristic of colonial relations in gnral. Since colonialrelations are predominantly economic, colonial practice is conditionedby economic laws, and we shall see that in the tropics the workingof these laws has certain features common to ail dependencies.The second factor common to ail colonial practice is that theresponsibility for maintaining order is assumed by the colonialpower; an organic autonomous society maintains order with moreor less success in virtue of its inherent vitality, but a dependencyis kept alive, as it were, by artificial respiration, by pressure exercisedmechanically from outside and above. These two factors are commonto ail colonial relations, though it is in connection with them that

divergences in colonial practice first arise.The prime care of any colonial power must be to maintain order,

for order is essential to such advantages as it anticiptes from im-posing its rule on the dependency. In maintaining order the colonialpower must choose between the western principle of law and thetropical system of relying on personal authority, between direct andindirect rule. Secondly, to attain the prospective advantages thecolonial power must choose between the western principle of freedom

and the tropical system of compulsion. These are the two main linesalong which colonial practice divides, and the line actually followedis a rsultant of complex factors. General ideas carry some weight:

1 Fortes, M. and Evans-Pritchard, E. E., African Political Systems (1940), p. 4.


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T H E B A C K G R O U N D O F C O L O N I A L P R A C T I C E 9

compulsion will be less uncongenial in an ge which values welfaremore than freedom. So also do national traditions: reliance onauthority will be less uncongenial to a western power with a strongly

centralized administration. O f greater importance is the relativestrength of the ruler and the ruled : a chartered company reinforcedonce a year by a small fleet of sailing vessels must show more regardto native sentiment than a Govemor who at need can summon byradio the assistance of modem naval and military forces. These thingsaffect colonial practice, but the dominating factor is the nature ofthe advantage envisaged by the colonial power from its relations withthe dependency ; whether it is chiefly concerned to sell its own goods

or to obtain tropical produce. Ail these conditions vary from onecolonial power to another, from one dependency to another, indiffrent dependencies of the same colonial power, and in the samedependency at diffrent times; and colonial practice varies accord-ingly. Naturally then in any comparison of colonial relations it is thediversity of practice which first impresses the observer, and only bytracing their volution can the first impression be corrected.

Yet even a historical study may be misleading. For colonial re

lations arise out of the impact of western civilization on the tropics,and the violence of this impact varies with the width of the gapbetween the particular western and tropical cultures, and the rateat which the process of bringing them together is effected. In theirmastery over the material world, India and Europe in the sixteenthcentury were far doser together than modem Europe and the modemtropics; the connection dates from before the Industrial Rvolution,and both have grown up in the modem world together. Again, Indian

society stands alone in resting on the institution of caste, which hasfortified it to some extent against the impact of the West. For boththese reasons care is needed in drawing parallels between conditions inIndia and in the tropics generally. Where tropical conditions elsewhereresemble those of India, one may prsum that they are inhrent incolonial relations. For example, one feature of the modem tropicsthat is not confined to India is the growth of agricultural indebted-ness; another feature is the increasing impatience of foreign mie. Onthe other hand, if India is in some measure exempt from the atomiza-tion of society that is found elsewhere in the tropics, the explanationmay lie in the fact that the impact of the West has been less violent,and that caste has afforded a considrable measure of protection.

Still it remains true that, if one would understand colonial practice,


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one must study it both comparatively and historically. Such a surveycould hardly be compressed within the limits of a single volume, even

of the dimensions of Lord Haileys African Survey, and would needabilities to which the present writer can make no pretence. It is,however, as a contribution to such a study that the following com-parison of British rule in Burma with Dutch rule in Netherlands Indiais intended. It is a comparison with many points of interest. Bothcountries came under the effective rule of the home Governmentshortly after the Industrial Rvolution had transformed the economic,and therefore the social and political, relations between Europe and

the tropics, and when the social philosophy of Europe was dominatedby libral ideas; in both, therefore, it is possible to trace the reactionon colonial practice of subsquent economic progress and of the procession of gnral ideas. Both countries, like the tropics in gnral,lacked the consolidating bond of caste to protect them against thesolvent influence of western thought and economic forces. In thesethings both countries are alike. But in respect of colonial practice theyshow a striking contrast. In Burma the British have from the first reliedon western principles of rule, on the principles of law and economicfreedom; in Netherlands India the Dutch have tried to conserve andadapt to modem use the tropical principles of custom and authority.In each case the choice was dictated in the first instance by the interests of the colonial power. When Britain first established contactwith Burma it could already sell its produce in the East and looked toBurma as a market. The Dutch at that time had neither manufacturesnor capital ; they wanted tropical produce at the lowest cost and couldbest obtain it through the native chieftains. For an understanding of

subsquent developments it is necessary to have some knowledge ofphysical conditions and past history in the two rgions.

4. B u r m a

The dominant factor in the social life of Burma is immediatelyapparent on a first glance at the map. It is eut of from the world bymountains and the sea. Though marching with India, China and

Siam, land traffic with these countries on any considrable scale isalmost impossible. From the mountains on the north two rivers mnthroughout the length of Burma, the Irrawaddy and the Salween, andbetween them is a third river, the Sittang, rising in the middle ofBurma and also running south. The mountains and hills, separating


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B U R M A II

these rivers and on either side of them, are covered with forest, andare sparsely inhabited by backward hill tribes. Apart from the hillcountry there are five natural divisions: Burma Proper, the central

tract of rolling uplands; the Shan Tableland, open country in theeastem hills; Pegu, comprising the deltaic plains; Arakan, a brokenstrip of land along the Bay of Bengal, eut off from Burma by theArakan Hills; and Tenasserim, the Southern projection towards theMalay Peninsula. Burma Proper, the Shan Tableland and the sur-rounding hills are known as Upper Burma; the rest of the country,comprising Pegu, Arakan and Tenasserim, is known as LowerBurma. The Salween, forcing its way through narrow mountain

gorges, is of little use to commerce, but the Irrawaddy is navigable bysteamboats for nearly a thousand miles, and its main tributary, theChindwin, is also open to steam navigation. The Sittang, owing to abore, is difficult of navigation, but is open to large country boats forsome two hundred miles. Thus within Burma, even under primitiveconditions, it has always been easy to travel north and south, and thefacility of communications has favoured the growth of a commonsocial life, while at the same time the difficulty of communications

between one valley and the next has been an obstacle to the permanentestablishment of a common political authority. The only part ofBurma where a man may pass easily in ail directions is the centre,commanding the valleys of the Chindwin, the Irrawaddy and theSittang. Farther south the level plains formed in the deltas of therivers are eut up by innumerable creeks, and the heavy rainfallpromtes dense forest growth, but in the centre of the country thereare few streams, and the arid climate allows only of scrub jungle that

forms no barrier to traffic. Natural conditions, therefore, mark outCentral Burma as the seat of political authority. This has had anunfortunate reaction on the course of social volution, for, in a countrynaturally isolated, social life has centred in the rgion most remotefrom the quickening impulse of contact with the outer world. Onthe other hand, isolation has allowed Burma to build up its owndistinctive culture.

Burmans in gnral1 have a basis of indonesian or nsiot blood, mixedwith more primitive elements and strongly overlaid with mongoloid

1 Here, and so far as possible subsequently, the term *Burman connotes ail theindigenous inhabitants of Burma together with permanent residents of alien originwho have corne to regard themselves as natives of the country ; this leaves Burmese *for use as a distinctively racial term.


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characters, derived from successive waves of migration from thenorth. Until recently the inhabitants of the deltaic plains along the

southem coast were Mons or Talaings, a people with an austronesianlanguage but a mongoloid physique. Formerly, their northern neigh-bours were the Pyus, but these were conquered and assimilated bythe Burmese who came down into the plains about a .d . 600-800. By1100 the Burmese had conquered the whole of Burma. Two hundred

years later the Shans, cousins of the Siamese, broke across the easternborder, and the subsquent course of Burmese history is largely a taieof conflict between Burmese, Shans and Mons, punctuated by wars

with Siam and Arakan. In the event the Burmese gained the mastery,drove the Shans back to the eastern hills to rule petty states as vassalsof their Burmese overlord, and subjugated, and in great part assimilated, the Mons. They also conquered the Arakanese. Of the otherpfeoples of Burma it will suffice to mention here the Chins andKachins, backward hill tribes but in racial stock and language akin to

' the Burmese, and the Karens, a mixture of mongoloid peoples withdoubtful affinities, who have gained in importance under British rule

by the conversion of large numbers to Christianity. The Burmese,Shans and Mons, though of somewhat diverse racial origin and

widely diffrent in language, ail partake the common Buddhist culturethat they have absorbed from India.

During the first millennium of the Christian era, though at longintervais, merchants from India established trading posts and settlements ail along the coasts and up some of the larger rivers of theTropical Far East. They brought with them their religion and ahigher civilization than had hitherto been known. Some were

Hindus, and some Mahayanist or Hinayanist Buddhists. In Burma,Hinayanism seems always to have predominated and was the religionwhich finally prevailed. Early Chinese sources portray among thePyus a social life that in its leading features was still characteristic ofBurma during the nineteenth century. There was little intercourse

with India after the tenth century, but contact with Hinayanism wasmaintained by the occasional interchange of missions with Ceylon.It is Buddhism that has moulded social Burman life and thought, and

to the present day the ordinary Burman regards the terms Burmanand Buddhist as practically quivalent and insparable. The wholepolitical and social life of Burma, from the palace to the village,centred round the Buddhist religion and the monastic order. TheKing had his domestic chaplain and every village its monastery.


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B U R M A 13

The Crown regulated clrical affairs through a patriarch who, withthe assistance of a council of ecclesiastics, presided over the wholeorganization and had jurisdiction over the monks and over matters

of religion.1 Within the Order there were sectarian divisions, repre-sented on the central council, and a dignitary of one sect had noauthority over monks of a diffrent sect. Although a monk could beunfrocked and excommunicated for heresy or gross sin, obedienceto a superior was voluntary and the monasteries were largely auto-nomous. Each village appointed, or rather invited, its own monk,

just as the King selected his own chaplain, but a monk once inductedto a monastery was almost independent of control. Another feature

of the organization was its dmocratie character. Anyone of approvedlife could obtain ordination by taking the prescribed vows, and thegreat majority of the monks were ordinary villagers. If the monasticdiscipline and vows of chastity and temperance should prove toorigorous, a monk could at any time return to secular life. But so longas anyone wore the yellow robe, he was the object of superstitiousvnration. The King, as head of a Buddhist State, was head alsoof the Church and had large patronage, but, as an individual, he

recognized yesterdays new monk as his superior. This loosely knitreligious organization helped greatly to preserve social continuitywhen civil government collapsed.

One tradition of Buddhism, which has been observed in Burmawith great faithfulness, is that every boy should learn at least hisletters. Under Burmese rule there was a monastery in every village,with a monastic school, in which ail boys, regardless of rank or wealth,learned from the presiding monk the creed and moral precepts oftheir religion, and gradually absorbed the national traditions of theirpeople. There was a tradition also of female ducation, though, infact, not many girls learned to read and write. The freedom and highsocial status of the women, a feature common to ail the peoples ofthe Tropical Far East, even among those which adopted Hinduismor, later, Islam, has always been especially conspicuous in Burma.Along with their religion the Indians brought the arts of architecture,sculpture, wood-carving, and painting, and these also the Burmanpeoples made their own in a form distinct from that of India but

common to the whole of Burma, so that ail the leading peoples, andeven those hill tribes which accepted Buddhism, had a commonsocial culture, shared also by Siam. Neither in leaming nor the arts

1UBG, 11, 1 ff.


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did their civilization attain a level comparable with that of India,China, or Japan, but it had its own distinctive character and was very

generally diffused among the people.The social and political structure was in the main indigenous. Theunit of social life was naturally the agricultural village or settlement,but the higher organization was partly tribal and partly territorial.Groups of ten or twenty villages up to fifty or more were governed bya hereditary local chieftain. But his authority was personal, notstrictly local; the political organization was quasi-regimental, and if,within the territory of a local chieftain, there were people of anotherregiment or group, they were subject to the jurisdiction of their ownleader and not to that of the local chieftain. Above the local organization there was a central administrative system; how far this derivedfrom China or India is uncertain. At times the Supreme King ruledthe country through subordinate kings or vassals governing largeprovinces, but from a very early period there was a tradition of a morecentralized form of government, and this acquired sharper dfinitionunder the dynasty that ruled from the middle of the seventeenth century.The Crown, with an Advisory Council, serving also as a High Court,was the centre from which there radiated an official administrativeorganization linking up through the hereditary petty chieftains withlocal affairs. The functioning of the system has not yet been adequatelystudied, but certain features are clear. One is that there was a dualsystem, with a purely official central element and an hereditary localelement. The next is that it was a product of graduai volution withthe complexity inherent in such a process. Thirdly, it had no firmbasis either in law or on military force and was accordingly unstable.

There was no regular army beyond the quasi-feudal levies, no regularpolice, and there were practically no prisons. Thus, although in theoryabsolute, and in practice often arbitrary, the King had no means toenforce orders that were not regarded as within his customary powers.There were law books regarded as expositions or adaptations of aBuddhist version of the Laws of Manu, and, in addition to the HighCourt, already mentioned, the provincial governors and their sub-ordinates exercised judicial functions, in addition to their other duties.

But they acted as arbitrators rather than as judges, referring to thelaw books for guidance, but not for rules, and aiming to effect asettlement between the parties rather than to dcid on points of lawand fact. The officiais drew no fixed salary. Some were paid by allot-ment of the revenue of a particular district, but for the most part their



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B U R M A 15

moluments were derived from a commission on revenue collected, orfrom fees paid by the parties to a case. One great source of revenue

was from local tolls on the transport or sale of goods.

In theory life was minutely regulated. The whole kingdom, accord-ing to an eighteenth-century traveller, was govemed by the pen. Noone could move without permission from one village to another.No one could transfer to another regiment or group, nor could anyonemarry outside the regiment or group without paying a fine. No onecould build a house, or dress, or even be buried except in a styleappropriate to his rank. But the periodical census rolls whichillustrate some of these precepts show also that many of them were

often disregarded. And anyone of the humblest birth, with few exceptions, could aspire to the highest position, one broad avenue topromotion being the monastery.

This complex social organization, mdival in its tharacter, wasbased almost entirely on agriculture. External trade was unimportantand subject to severe restrictions, exports being regarded with dis-favour. There was little in Burma to tempt the outside world untilthe eighteenth century, when the teak forests acquired a new value for

shipbuilding during the wars in Indian waters between the French andEnglish. At long intervais when, as during the late war, the sea route andmain land route to China from the West were blocked, Burma figuresin history as a backdoor to China, and it is probable that the earlyIndian settlements up the Irrawaddy at Prome and Pagan may have

been in connection with this trade. But the silks of China, and spicesfrom the Moluccas, ordinarily went straight across Asia or round bysea, and Burma was left in a backwater eut off from the outer world.It had little to attract the outer world, and, on the other hand, it pro-duced at home ail the requirements of a simple mdival agriculturalcivilization; its own food, rice, millet, vegetable oils, fish and sait;its own silk and cotton; its own pottery and tools and weapons. Inits agricultural resources it was exceptionally fortunate. CentralBurma with its dry climate grew cotton and oil-seeds, while the deltaicplains of Lower Burma, with their regular and heavy rainfall, could

yield vast quantities of rice, and an ample supply of fish and sait. Atone time the rice plains seem to have been closely peopled, but they

were the chief scene of the wars between the Burmese and the Monsand, during the last war leading to the final victory of the Burmese in1752, they were laid waste so thoroughly that a gnration or morelater the census rolls report some tracts as almost uninhabited.


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i6 THE COLONIAL BACKGROUND

A comparatively small area yielded a surplus adequate to meet therequirements of Upper Burma, and fresh land came under cultivationonly as the population gradually increased and required more food.

In such conditions it is a slow and difficult process to reclaim landthat has once been abandoned to the jungle, and it was not until sometime after the British occupation that, with the opening up of a foreignmarket, cultivation spread rapidly. Thus at the time of the first war withBritain in 1824-6, Upper and Lower Burma presented a striking contrast. In the central dry tract of Upper Burma there was an establishedpeasantry practising mixed agriculture on dry land, whereas in thedeltaic plains the chief occupations of a scanty people were the culti

vation of rice, fishing, and salt-boiling, and (except in the partsbordering on Upper Burma and supplying it with rice, fish and sait) afew small market towns and some villages and hamlets were sparselyscattered among wide areas of swamp and waste. Those conditionshave very largely determined the whole course of the subsquenteconomic and social development of Burma.

One other feature must be noted. Although the history of Burmais so largely made up of war between Burmese, Shans and Mons,

yet during long periods they have been united. From the end ofthe eleventh century to the end of the thirteenth, Burmese kingsruled in Pagan over a rgion corresponding to the Burma of thepresent day. During this period the Burmans absorbed the Moncivilization, and research indicates that the kings were partly of Mon

blood. In the middle of the sixteenth century a Burmese prince madehimself master of the Mon country and adopted Mon ways, while hissuccessor on the throne of Pegu, the capital of the Mons, extended hisrule over the Burmese homeland, and reunited under one rule thewhole of the former Burmese Empire of Pagan. After a suddencollapse in 1600 the whole country was once again brought under asingle rule for a hundred and fifty years. This dynasty fell when thelast king was taken captive by a Mon rebel, but the Burmese immedi-ately rose again under a new leader who reconquered the wholecountry, and established a new line which held the throne up to thetime of the British conquest. Thus for the greater part of the timesince 1100 the whole country recognized a common rule. When the

Burmese finally defeated the Mons in 1752 they laid waste the country,but for the most part re-established the hereditary local chieftains,and although most of the provincial govemors were Burmese and theofficial language was Burmese, Mons were eligible for the highest


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B U R M A 17

offices under the Burmese Crown, and their separate national feelingwas fast disappearing.1 The whole country, marked out by nature asa distinct political unit, and with a common religion and a uniformsocial culture, had a far more national character than one could find

anywhere in India. The Burmans, in fact, correspond far moreclosely to the ordinary conception of a nation than the Indians.They had developed what may fairly be called a nation State, andpossess a national consciousness ;2the Mons and even many Karenspreferred to be considered Burmans.

In this national society, however, authority was personal.Burmese, Shan, Mon and Karen were ail ruled by chieftains of theirown people. The Court and the central administrative organization

were largely Burmese, but the local administration was racial, notbecause of the diffrence of race, but because rule was based onpersonal relations. The Karens had their own head, but so also hadthe brokers, and the manufacturers of palm-sugar.3 Racial diffrences were not reflected in economic functions and, so far as thepeople were Buddhist, they had a common civilization and ail metand mixed together. This civilization which the people of Burma,despite frequent and prolonged civil and foreign wars, built up

through the centuries, had many pleasant features. In every villagethe monks, in a community singularly free of scandai, imparted to ailthe boys the elements of letters and practical morality. The monasticorder, free to ail and spread over the whole country, was influential butnot oppressive, and Church and State, instead of dividing the country

by their rival laims, lent each other mutual support. The womenenjoyed a freedom greater in some ways than in other countries of theTropical Far East, unparalleled elsewhere in Asia and, until recently,

exceptional in Europe. And if one aim of the State be the organizationof happiness, then, by common consent, few people have been morelight-hearted than the Burmese, a happiness that the numerous andsevere political catastrophes must have interrupted but did not dispel.This national civilization was held together mainly by two stronglinks ; the monastic order and the hereditary local chieftains. Throughintervais of anarchy these survived, and it was round them thatsociety grew up anew, but on the old lines, when order was restored.

The best picture of life in Burma under native rule is that given by1 Gouger, p. 266; Trant, pp. 117-18; BBG , 11, 168.2 IS C, xi, 570; Harvey, CHI, v, 566; vi, 447; BBG , 11, 553.3 Harvey, Burma, p. 352; B B G , 1, 483; 11, 127, 181.


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i8 THE COLONIAL BACKGROUND

Gouger, who was a prisoner in Burma during the first war withBritain. He was a merchant who had found it impossible to competeagainst the agents of the East India Company in Bengal, and came to

sell his cotton goods to Burmans. On his arrivai in Rangoon he wasfavourably impressed by the absence of ail unauthorized exactions,1and took his goods to the capital in Upper Burma with no annoyingexactions or tolls to impede them on their passage .2When he reachedit no royal or municipal dues were demanded; no troublesomeofficial appeared to obstruct the course of business, and he foundhimself comfortably established in his new quarters with less vexationand annoyance than he would have encountered in any town inEurope .3 British envoys had always complained of vexatious delaysbefore they could secure a reception, but nothing of the kind wasexperienced by the foreigner who had no State dignity to uphold.There was, he remarks, far less difficulty in gaining an audience withthe King than he would have had in interviewing the Secretary ofState in Downing Street; a few questions were asked at the Byadike(secrtariat), and in less than an hour I was in the presence of theKin g . Like the others present he squatted on the floor, half sittingand half kneeling, but the King, noticing his discomfort, desired himto be at ease, and before long he had the audacity to sit upright andstare His Majesty in the face.4

His next visit, when he brought samples of his goods, gave him apleasant impression of the freedom allowed to the inmates of thePalace. The hilarity, good humour, and cheerfulness exhibited by theladies of the Royal household, were sufficient evidence that no excessive strictness of discipline was exerted to mar their happiness.The girls dressed up in his wares and no effort was made to restrain

the laughter and fu n . Even when the Queen entered, her presencedid not serve to impress more than a salutary restraint\ The Kinghimself saw that ail the girls paid for what they took, and enteredinto the spirit of the trafficking, laughing heartily at every dispute.5A like cheerfulness prevailed among the common people, and he wasgreatly struck by the free-and-easy bearing of the natives, contrastingso harshly with the obsequiousness and the polished insincerity towhich he had been accustomed in Hindostan . On the other hand,

towards their own rulers there was certainly no lack of servility\Every one in authority was despotic, and the people were submissive.6

1 Gouger, p. 15. 2 Ib. p. 24. 3 Ib. p. 27.4 Ib. pp. 29, 33. 5 Ib. p. 43. * Ib. p. 10.


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B U R M A *9

As customers he found them very satisfactory. To some he had togrant crdit, and was astonished at their very loose manner of com-mitting engagements to writing, with merely a record of the transaction, and the witnesses, written in pencil and unsigned. He was

assured that this was their custom, and that the debt could beestablished by the witnesses, and it spoke well for the people thatnone of them failed in their payments.1

In view of his freedom from unauthorized exactions when landinghis goods and taking them up-country, it is rather strange to read that bribery is the mainspring by which ail manner of business is movedthroughout the country . But this was brought home to him when hewished to go back to India with his profits, as the law allowed him

to take neither money nor goods. Restrictions were so numerous, andregulated life so closely, that it was inconvnient and almost impossibleto live within them; but it was always possible to get round them.When he wanted to get round the rgulations, he became as experta briber as the rest .2 In other respects, however, his account of theconduct of official business is favourable. He gives a very interestingdescription of the disposai of affairs in the Privy Council, which wasalso the High Court. This was presided over by the King, and met

every day at sunrise. Nothing could exceed the order and solemnitywith which business was transacted, for although I very imperfectlyunderstood what was going forward, and although bribery and corruption might be at the root of every subject discussed, yet it wase vident that there was a discussion, that rival interests were repre-sented, and that the semblance at least of a certain amount of freedomof opinion was preserved. The usual form of introducing a topic wasby a written document, which was read, or rather sung, or intoned,

by an officer of the C o u rt.. .and before the Royal order was givenon it, those present were permitted to express themselves__Thesight was altogether an imposing one, calculated to inspire confidencein a stranger by the strict order and apparent dlibration thatprevailed in the assembly.3

Thus, although social life in Burma had a very limited horizon, andits political institutions, lacking any secure foundation in law, wereunstable, yet the country when first brought into contact with theWest provided a good example, both in its virtues and defects, of amdival eastern society embodying a system resting on personalauthority, custom and religion.

1 Gouger, p. 63. 2 Ib. p. 50. 3 Ib. p. 56; cf/Trant, pp. 241 ff.


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5. N e t h e r l a n d s I n d i a

If we turn over the pages of the atlas from Burma to NetherlandsIndia, we find a map suggesting conditions very diffrent from thoseof Burma. In place of a comparatively small country shut in by seaand mountain there is an open archipelago, comprising numerousislands, large and small. Yet, as is apparent in the British Empire,to a seafaring people the sea is a bond and not a barrier. Man learnedthe art of sailing earlier than the art of making roads, and in earlytimes, indeed until quite recently, the waterways were the mainhighways. The peoples of Netherlands India have in gnral acommon racial stock, similar to that of Burma, though less stronglymongoloid and more profoundly nsiot, and they speak indonesianlanguages, distantly akin to that spoken by the Mons. Now they arecommonly termed Indonesians and their common home is often calledIndonesia. Three times the whole rgion, or the greater part of it, has

been united under a common rule: during the ninth century underShri-Vijaya in Sumatra; in the fourteenth century under Majapahitin Java, and then under the Dutch. Shri-Vijaya and Majapahit wererespectively Mahayanist and Hindu, and had their origin in the

Indian settlements of the first millennium. Civilization in the archipelago, as in Burma, has an Indian basis and, although from about1300 Islam has spread gradually and has become the dominant creed,it was India that moulded social life.

The attraction of Indonesia for these Indian merchants, as for latermerchants from the West, was presumably the trade of China and,more especially, the spices of the Moluccas. It was only along thecoasts on the main routes to China and the Moluccas that they founded

settlements and spread civilization. Their chief settlements were onthe mainland in the Malay Peninsula and Indo-China, and in thearchipelago on Sumatra and Java. The other islands, even Borno andCelebes, show little trace of direct Indian influence. In Java thereevolved an agricultural civilization similar in many ways to that ofBurma. The diet of the people consisted of rice, vegetable oils andfish, and they grew and wove their own cotton. As in Burma the

women enjoyed great freedom, and the conditions of land tenure were

very similar in Burma and Java. The social and political organizationalso was very much the same. In Java there were three distinctpeoples, the Sundanese, Javanese and Madurese, sometimes independent and sometimes under a common overlord, but ail had a dual


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administrative system in which provincial officers of the centralGovernment ruled the people through hereditary chieftains.

Within the archipelago Sumatra and Java have always been rivaisfor supremacy. Sumatra commands the gateway and the trade, but

Java is the main granary. When the Dutch came East, they found thePortuguese, strongly entrenched in Malacca, guarding the northernseacoast of Sumatra, and they established themselves in Java, wherethey gradually extended their rule over the whole island. They alsoheld the Spice Islands, but elsewhere they had only garrisons andtrading posts. Up to about the beginning of the present centuryregular administration hardly extended beyond Java (including theadjacent small island of Madura) and the Spice Islands; the whole

rgion outside Java and Madura was known collectively as the OuterPossessions or, later, Provinces. It was in Java that the Dutch systemof administration took shape, and subsquent references to Dutchrule disregard the Outer Provinces unless otherwise indicated by thecontext.

Dutch rule in Java dates from the occupation of Batavia and thesurrounding territory in 1619. Their chief concern was to obtain riceand other requirements, including products for export, among which

coffee and sugar came to be the most important. They recognizedthose native chieftains who would undertake to supply them withwhat they wanted, and for long they abstained so far as possible fromfurther interference with native life. These native chieftains came ingnral to be known as Regents. A European official was posted atsuitable headquarters to see that the Regent fulfilled his obligations ;this officer became known as a Resident. In order to obtain produce,and especially coffee, subordinates were charged with the duty of

supervising cultivation, and eventually spcial officers for that purposewere appointed as Contrleurs (inspectors) who had no authority butserved merely as the eyes and ears of the Resident. That, in brief, wasthe origin of the Dutch system of indirect rule. There was a dualsystem comprising a European responsible for the business of theCompany, and a native responsible to the Resident for the supply ofproduce, and with the Contrleur as a link between the two. On thisplan the Resident was regarded as the overlord, or elder brother,

of the Regent who held the position of a largely autonomous vassalchieftain. On no other plan could the Dutch obtain the coffee andother things they wanted, as they had nothing to exchange forthem.


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This system, which arose by a process of graduai volution, survived until the fall of the Company, largely as a resuit of the warsarising out of the French Rvolution. In 1800 its possessions were

taken over by the State. An acute controversy then arose as to themanner in which the country should be administered. Reformerswished to introduce a system somewhat resembling that of direct rule,then recently adopted in British India. Finally, it was decided toretain the system of indirect rule, but the Resident, as elder brother,was expected to prevent the abuses that the people had formerlysuffered from the Regents. Before the new systeri could be intro-duced, Java passed by the fortune of war into the hands first of the

French and then of the English. From 1811 to 1816 it was governedby Raffles on behalf of the East India Company. Raffles was con-spicuous among the many leading servants of the Company at thattime who believed fervently in the new Libral faith. He set aside theRegents and introduced direct rule through officiais, with the villageunder an elected headman as the unit of administration; in place ofcompulsory cultivation and services, he substituted taxes in money,thereby encouraging the people to sell their produce and buy im-

ported British manufactures. At the end of the Napoleonic wars,however, the Dutch regained their territories. By this time Libraldoctrines were held by ail enlightened men, and the Dutch came backto Java with the intention of ruling it on new Libral principles, onlyto find that Raffles had applied these principles far more thoroughlythan the Dutch had ever contemplated. That was the gnral positionat the beginning of the modem period of Dutch rule in NetherlandsIndia.


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C H A P T E R I I

1. T h e W a r s o f 1824-6 a n d 1852

(a) 1824-6. Up to the beginning of the nineteenth century Burmanswere still living in the Middle Ages, and in their mdival world theyhad good reason for complacency. In 1759 they conquered Pegu, andshortly afterwards their troops overran Siam and repelled an invasionfrom China, the traditional great power of the Tropical Far East. In

1785 they conquered Arakan and, with the new century, carried theirarms still further, defeating Manipur in 1813 and Assam in 1816. Thisbrought them into political contact along a common frontier with theexpanding British power in India. At the same time they were makingcontact with the British on a common economic frontier. The longstruggle between England and France during the eighteenth centurycreated a demand for Burma teak, and, when the Continental Systemof Napolon made British manufacturers look outside Europe to dis

pose of the cheap cotton goods produced by the recent IndustrialRvolution, Burma offered a potential market. Thus quite suddenly,within a few years, the rulers and peoples of Burma were faced with anew challenge. Burma was brought into political and economic relations with the modem world ; its whole political, economic and socialorganization needed readjustment to these new conditions and, failingreformation from within, forces that would not be denied were workingfor foreign intervention.

The mlers of Burma, secluded in the centre of their kingdom, wereincapable alike of recognizing their danger and of imagining reforms,and they refused intercourse with the outer world except on their ownterms. But, in standing out against the current of world progress,they were challenged by moral and material forces that they werewholly unable to resist; subjugation by some outside power was invitable, and that Burma became involved with British India wasmerely the accident of propinquity. The two countries faced oneanother on the frontier of two diffrent civilizations, and naturallythere was a succession of difficult incidents culminating in the warof 1824-6, which showed that the power to determine the frontierbetween Burma and the modem world lay with Britain.

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When hostilities began the British expected help from the Arakaneseand the Talaings. These expectations were largely disappointed.1 In1785 Arakanese chieftains, in rebellion against their own King, had called

on the King of Burma for assistance, but tumed against him on findingthat he treated their country as a conquered province. When their re-peated insurrections failed, the rebels found refuge across the border inBritish territory which they used as a base for new attacks. This keptthe spirit of rsistance alive among the Arakanese and gave them a

juster estimate of British power, so that, on the outbreak of war, theBritish were able to recruit an Arakanese levy. In Pegu the situation

was diffrent. Many, if not most, of the local chieftains were Talaings,

whose ancestors had held the same position under their own kings;even the Governor of the important charge of Syriam, commandingthe entrance to Rangoon, was a Talaing, with a sister married to theBurmese King.2 They had accepted Burmese rule and, believing theBurmese to be invincible, made no attempt to rise until after theBurman power had been broken. The Burman forces, though nomatch for modem troops in armaments or military skill and discipline,made a brave but ineffectual rsistance and, after oprations in which

the invaders suffered heavy losses from disease but few in battle, theBurmese Government was compelled in 1826 to accept the Treaty ofYandabo, including among its terms the cession of the two maritimeprovinces, Arakan and Tenasserim. These gave the British a bridge-head on each side of Burma in the event of further strife; Arakanmarched with Chittagong and had formerly been the centre of aflourishing trade in rice; Tenasserim had valuable teak and wasexpected to open up a channel of trade with China and Siam.

For several years conditions were unsettled. Arakan gave mosttrouble. The chieftains, who had welcomed British aid againstBurmese mie, were equally impatient of British mie. After a succession of petty risings, a widespread rebellion which had long beensmouldering came to a head in 1836.3 This was promptly suppressed,and there was no further serious disturbance. Tenasserim was quieter,but here also the men who had sided with the British tumed againstthem. Under Burmese mie Tavoy and Mergui had been the seats ofprovincial governments. In 1830, insurgents captured Tavoy and in

Mergui the British garrison, either panic-stmck or misled by falserumours, withdrew, leaving the town in the hands of the rebels.4

1 BBG , il, 553; Gouger, p. 266; Hall, Europe and Burma (1945), p. 114.2 BBG , 11, 675. 3 BBG , 1, 480; 11, 290, 623. 4 BBG , 1,483; n, 382, 691.

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T H E W AR S O F 1 8 24 - 6 AN D 1 8 5 2 25

Order was restored and subsequently British power remained un-challenged.

(b) 1852. Relations with the Burmese Government, however, grewno better. Burma was unfortunate in its kings; two in succession

became insane and the third was at best unstable. King and peoplealike bitterly resented their defeat and the loss of territory, and failedto profit by the sharp lesson of the first war. The Treaty of Yandaboprovided that each Government should be represented at the otherscapital, but the Burmese had no wish to be represented at Calcuttaand regarded the British reprsentative in Ava as a spy. SuccessiveResidents found the position so difficult that in 1840 the Residency

was withdrawn. This was the more unfortunate because one resuit

of the extension of British power over the maritime provinces wasa growth of trade with the Burmese. But more trade meant greaterfriction. British merchants in Tenasserim complained of the restrictions on trade, and were supported by local officiais in pressing for aforward policy and for the extension of British rule over the interior.The grievances of traders in Rangoon were partly their own fault,as the unruly conduct of some of them tended to invite oppressionrather than inspire respect .1 Many complaints against the Burmese

Government had no better foundation than similar complaints inTenasserim, where the merchants grumbled that after fourteen yearsof British rule no one had yet been able to engage in their tradewithout loss.2 The Indian Government, mindful of the great cost ofthe first war and apprehensive lest a further contest should beruinously embarrassing, was reluctant to support even legitimategrievances. Moreover, the possession of Tenasserim proved unprofit-able, and for some years there were suggestions that it should be

restored to the Burmese or even sold to Siam.3 The Indian Government was more inclined to eut its losses than to extend its liabilities.The appointment of Dalhousie as Govemor-General brought a

change of policy. He regarded the expansion of the British Empireas a law of nature, and was acutely sensitive on matters of prestige.Complaints from two ships captains of unfair treatment in Burmesecourts gave him an occasion to intervene. His demand for redresssoon took the form of an ultimatum backed by an expeditionaryforce, and in 1852 the Burmese Court found itself at war almostbefore it was aware that negotiations had begun.

1 Gouger, p. 76. 2 SL , p. 268.3 Desai, pp. 57, 132-7.


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Dalhousie anticipated that the Talaings of Pegu would be activelyfriendly1 but, apart from furnishing supplies in rgions occupied by theBritish troops, they gave little help. In the earlier stages of the opra

tions, according to the despatches of the gnral commanding the expdition, the Burmans showed themselves better armed and bolder thanin the first war; they displayed skill in defending Rangoon, put up anobstinate rsistance in Bassein, made a formidable attack on Martaban,and stood their ground with great resolution in Pegu ; their fortifications were carefully and substantially built in a manner that would havedone no discrdit to a European engineer; and they were no less bravethan in the former war and would fight until the enemy reached themuzzle of their guns. Other witnesses and the British casualtiessuggest that this account of the rsistance w'as exaggerated. TheBurmans were morally beaten ; most of their troops had little trainingin the use of their weapons; their fire was inefective, and they wereno better able than in the first war to make any prolonged stand againstwestern military science and discipline. The British expdition wasmuch better organized than in 1824, and could rest on advanced basesin Arakan and Tenasserim instead of depending on the long communications with Calcutta and Madras. By the end of June theBritish were masters of Lower Burma. The Burmese however wereholding out in Upper Burma, and Dalhousie feared that, even afterfurther victories, the King would still oppose to our advance thepassive rsistance of a retreat beyond our reach\ He decided, therefore, merely to stand fast, and on 20 December 1852 issued aproclamation annexing the Burmese provinces of Pegu and Martaban,thereby linking up Arakan with Tenasserim and giving the Britisheffective control over the trade of the whole country by cutting off

Upper Burma from the sea. Thus the second war decided that Burmacould no longer hold aloof from the modem world. The Britishprovinces came to be known collectively as British Burma, andthe independent Burmese kingdom was usually distinguished as Ava,after its capital.

The annexation of Pegu synchronized with a palace rvolution.This strengthened the British hold on Lower Burma, as the troops

were called back to the capital to suppress it;2it also proved helpful

to the British by placing on the throne the Kings brother, Mindon,who was pacifically inclined and more enlightened than most membersof his family. But Dalhousie was soon compelled to realize that he had

1 1852-53, Cmd. 1608, pp. 48-9. 2 BB G , il, 665.

26 BURMA, 182 6-70: LAISSEZ-FAIRE


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T H E W AR S O F 1 8 24 - 6 AN D 1 8 5 2 27

been optimistic in expecting a gnral welcome.1 The Talaings werecowards, if not worse, and the Karens, apart from the Christians,

were unhelpful; for three years the British had to conduct minoroprations against gurilla bands. Those who still held out were

treated for the most part as dacoits, liable to summary execution oncapture. Some, however, earned respect for their prowess, as, forexample, one of the most famous, Myat Htoon. A m an, wrote Dalhousie, who has 4000 men under him, who repuises three Britishattacks and after a very stout defence is routed only by a Brigadier-General after a months oprations and with severe loss to us, must

be regarded as a Chief and a Soldier and a good one too. 2 Afterabout three years, serious military oprations ceased, but disorder still

required firm handling. In 1857 a rising under a Karen pretender inMartaban spread to the Delta of the Irrawaddy and Bassein,3and eightyears elapsed from the first annexation before Pegu could be regardedas finally pacified.

2. A d m i n i s t r a t i v e P o l i c y

(a) 1826. When Arakan and Tenasserim were first added to theIndian Empire British policy in India was in a stage of transition. Thetransformation of the East India Company from a body of merchantsinto a sovereign State was still quite recent, and, indeed, not yetcomplt. In early days the Company had been content with tradingprivilges but, with the dissolution of the Mogul Empire, it began totrade in kingdoms, seeking a profit in tribute rather than in commerce.Most of t

colonial policy and practice

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