Gisting as a Colonial Agrarian Frontier: Indo-European Settlement and Social Engineering, 1926–1942

Ajeng Diah Kinanti, Ririn Darini, Wildhan Ichzha Maulana — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 11:21:47 +0000

Indo-Europeans, as a marginalised group, fought for their rights to education and fair wages through the moderate IEV organisation, which supported Dutch colonial government policies. This study examines Indo-European agricultural colonisation in Gisting as an instrument of the colonial government for social and agrarian control. The method used is historical, with four stages: heuristic process, verification, interpretation, and historiography. The results of the study show that (1) The success of Gisting's agricultural colonization as a tool to strengthen colonial domination over the region and agrarian resources and to form an independent community loyal to colonial power (2) The colonization of Gisting tested Indo-European solidarity not only in terms of social experimentation but also in terms of the stake of Indo-European dignity amid the ambitions of the colonial government. (3) The transformation of the Gisting landscape not only turned forests into coffee plantations but also led to economic competition and the emergence of Javanese coolies, which made the Indo-Europeans in Gisting small landlords. For the colonial government, the colonisation of Java was a strategic way to manage Indo-European conflicts in Java while opening up economic opportunities with shared financial burdens. Still, the physical risks and dignity were entirely borne by the Indo-Europeans, so that the colonisation of Gisting can be described as an unequal mutualistic symbiosis.

Making Land Leaseable: Woeste Gronden and the Genealogy of Colonial Agrarian Governance in Priangan (1830–1870)

Muhamad Rio Novandana, Nur Aini Setiawati — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 08:09:54 +0000

Studies of colonial agrarian history often place the Agrarische Wet 1870 as the starting point for land liberalization in the Dutch East Indies. This article argues that key infrastructures for privatized access to land were assembled earlier through the leasing of woeste gronden (uncultivated ‘waste’ lands), with focus on Priangan. Using critical historical methods, the study operationalizes Foucault’s analytics by reading colonial archives as instruments of knowledge production: Koloniaal Verslag tables and Staatsblad regulations are analyzed as techniques of calculation and legibility (governmentality), while the language and evidentiary rules that defined which land could be leased are examines as a ‘regime of truth’. Sources include Koloniaal Verslag reports and statistical appendices (mid-1850s-1880), Staatsblad 1856 No. 64 and related reglations, lease contracts and dispute correspondence, and the 1857 Priangan residency map. The study finds: (1) a marked growth of leased parcels and rental revenues before 1870, indicating the conversion of land into fiscal assets; (2) woeste gronden was operationalized through exclusions of cultivated and desa lands, allowing customary tenure to be treated as administratively ‘unproven’; (3) implementation relied on hybrid state-capital-local-elite arrangements to secure labour and boundaries; and (4) maps and contracts stabilized claims through survey, boundary-making, and documentary inscription. The article reframes 1870 as a legal consolidation of earlier classificatory and leasing practices, and cautions that ‘empy land’ labels can enable agrarian dispossession when documentary legibility overrides lived tenure relations

Diakronika

Gisting as a Colonial Agrarian Frontier: Indo-European Settlement and Social Engineering, 1926–1942

Making Land Leaseable: Woeste Gronden and the Genealogy of Colonial Agrarian Governance in Priangan (1830–1870)