Technology and Ethical Idealism: A History of Development in the Netherlands East Indies

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dc.contributor.authorMoon, Suzanne
dc.date.accessioned2015-07-11T01:27:06Z
dc.date.accessioned2016-03-30T15:33:56Z
dc.date.available2015-07-11T01:27:06Z
dc.date.available2016-03-30T15:33:56Z
dc.date.issued2007
dc.description.abstractTechnology and Ethical Idealism investigates a pivotal intellectual and political moment in twentieth-century Indonesian history, the establishment of development as both an ideal and a practice. The focus of this study is on technological development as a central concern of colonial political life from 1900 to 1942 in the Netherlands East Indies. The foundations of developmentalist thinking and practice in the turn-of-the-century colonial reforms were called the Ethical policies. Tracing the interplay of Ethical politics at the highest levels of the Netherlands Indies colonial government with the technical practices of development taking place in the fields of ordinary Javanese farmers, it shows how and why technological development became such an enduring part of political and material life in the archipelago.
dc.description.abstractThis study offers a new history of the Ethical policies that focuses on their often-neglected technopolitical character, and the formative influence they exercised on development thinking in Indonesia among both Dutch experts and members of the community of Indonesian activists known as the pergerakan. In startling contrast with many histories of development, it shows how the interaction of colonial idealism and scientific practice led the Dutch to commit to small-scale change in their development of the native peoples. As experts tailored technical solutions to ecological, social, and economic conditions of local areas, they eschewed high modernism in their search for colonial moderni-zation, unexpectedly prefiguring the appropriate technology movements that arose decades later. Based on extensive research in the colonial archives in The Hague, the National Library in Jakarta, and the Bogor Library of Biology and Agriculture, this study draws on official documents and scientific research of the era, as well as public discussions in both Dutch and Indonesian language newspapers and journals in order to capture not just the official plans, but also a wide range of public critiques and responses to development, and the day-to-day practices that shaped the productive lives of ordinary farmers. Offering a new exploration of politics and technology in colonial Indonesia, this book will interest historians of Indonesia and Southeast Asia, historians of technology, and those seeking to understand the complex colonial roots of international development.
dc.description.peerreviewYesen_US
dc.description.peerreviewnotesThis was sent to outside readers who provided feedback, which was then incorporated into the final version of the book. The editor at Leiden University Press also made requests for specific developments.en_US
dc.identifier.citationMoon, Suzanne. Technology and Ethical Idealism, Leiden: CNWS Publications, 2007en_US
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11244/15226
dc.languageen_USen_US
dc.relation.ispartofseriesStudies in Overseas History;9
dc.relation.urihttp://www.cnwspublications.com/series/soh.asp#SOH9
dc.subjectIndonesia, history, agriculture, technology, developmenten_US
dc.titleTechnology and Ethical Idealism: A History of Development in the Netherlands East Indiesen_US
dc.typeBooken_US
ou.groupCollege of Arts and Sciences::Department of History of Scienceen_US

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