This book discusses the comparative legacy of colonial rule in the Netherlands Indies and Belgian Congo during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries from a wide range of social, political, economic and institutional perspectives.

Preface Introduction 1. Extractive Institutions in the Congo: Checks and Balances in the Longue Durée 2. Colonial Extraction in the Indonesian Archipelago: A Long Historical View 3. Varieties of Exploitation in Colonial Settings: Dutch and Belgian Policies in Indonesia and the Congo 4. The land tenure system in the Congo, 1885-1960: actors, motivations and consequences 5. In the shadow of opium: Tax farming and the political economy of colonial extraction in Java, 1807-1911 6. Fiscal Policy in the Belgian Congo in Comparative Perspective 7. Colonial Education and Postcolonial Governance in the Congo and Indonesia 8. (Un)freedom, Colonial Labor Relations in Belgian Congo and the Netherland Indies Compared 9. Rubber cultivation in Indonesia and the Congo from the 1910s to the 1950s: divergent paths 10. Manufacturing and foreign investment in colonial Indonesia 11. The Industrialization of the Belgian Congo 12. Mobutu, Suharto and the Challenges of Nation-Building and Economic Development (1965-97) Conclusion