Colonial officials were expected to favor planters and sultanates, not coolies

Evidence

But the most serious accusation was directed at his indiscriminate and persistent harassment of the planters. For the latter, he was considered to have been guilty of three reprehensible acts. The first was to carry out his administrative and juridical duties in ways that consistently favored the coolies, “for ill-advisedly taking the Chinese coolies, the scum of Singapore and Penang, under his protection,” when he should have been supporting the disciplinary actions of Europeans. The second was to neglect a key feature of his job: currying favor with the Deli sultanates whose cooperation and collaboration (in both annexing and policing the plantation belt) were critical to the region’s security and the estate industry’s growth. Finally, he had misinterpreted the letter of the law concerning breach of coolie contracts, releasing workers of the obligation to return to the plantations from which they fled. — Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ Epistemic…, 1263

Categorization

• DEFINE: Itemizes the actual duties (protecting European planters, courting collaborating sultans, enforcing coolie contracts) that defined a ‘correct’ colonial administrator, against which Valck was judged.