Rulers without subjects

It has been a trend for some years in Asian historiography to show that colonial regimes were not always terribly inventive or creative but in fact were often constructed on the foundations of previously existing, indigenous regimes. Thus, the European powers often unintentionally ended up imitating local, usually obscured, patterns of political or economic organization. As a result, they often helped preserve and maintain certain traditional institutional continuities that, once revealed, help demystify and explain much of the colonizer's apparent political genius in achieving what would otherwise be inexplicably rapid and complete transitions to foreign rule. In Malay history, however, studies of such subtle processes are still relatively rare. Thus, Trocki’s book contributes significantly toward filling this void for the history of Singapore and Johor. It is a welcome addition to the field and should be of great interest to other Asianists and comparativists as well as to those who are interested in the colonization process and the indigenous response and relationship to it

Political science · Historical Economic and Social Studies · History · Psychology