Secret trades, porous borders smuggling and states along a Southeast Asian frontier, 1865-1915 - Tagliacozzo, Eric (Yale University Press, 2005)
Includes bibliographical references (p. 377-415) and index
Building the frontier : drawing lines in physical space. Mapping the frontier -- Enforcing the frontier -- Strengthening the frontier -- Imagining the frontier : state visions of danger along the border. The specter of violence -- "Foreign Asians" on the frontier -- The indigenous threat -- Secret trades, porous borders. The smuggling of narcotics -- Counterfeiters across the frontier -- Illicit human cargoes -- The illegal weapons trade across the Anglo/Dutch frontier. Munitions and borders : arms in context -- Praxis and evasion : arms in motion -- A frontier story : the sorrows of Golam Merican. Contraband and the junk Kim Ban An -- Worlds of illegality, 1873-99
Over the course of the half century from 1865 to 1915, the British and Dutch delineated colonial spheres, in the process creating new frontiers. This book analyses the development of these frontiers in Insular Southeast Asia as well as the accompanying smuggling activities of the opium traders, currency runners, and human traffickers who pierced such newly drawn borders with growing success. The book presents a history of the evolution of this 3000 km frontier, and then inquires into the smuggling of contraband: who smuggled and why, what routes were favoured, and how effectively the British and Dutch were able to enforce their economic, moral, and political will. Examining the history of states and smugglers playing off one another within a hidden but powerful economy of forbidden cargoes, the book also offers new insights into the modern political economies of Southeast Asia