How Generations Matter

In de historiografie spelen generaties een rol, en dit is zeker het geval inzake het langdurige proces van dekolonisatie. In deze forumbijdrage bespreken wij de artikelen die opeenvolgende generaties sinds 1970 over kolonialisme, imperialisme en dekolonisatie in BMGN – Low Countries Historical Review publiceerden. Deze bijdrage gaat over verschillen en continuïteiten in de onderzoekspraktijken tussen de oudere generatie historici die het kolonialisme zelf nog meemaakten, en de daaropvolgende generaties. De geschiedschrijving van het koloniale verleden is verweven met debatten over dekolonisatie; dat houdt ook het idee van ‘deimperialisatie’ in, oftewel het bevorderen van een geschiedschrijving waarin Europa niet in het centrum staat. Door de inhoud van de BMGN onder de loep te nemen kunnen we deze ontwikkelingen enigszins volgen, ook al figureerde de thematiek van kolonialisme, imperialisme en dekolonisatie bepaald niet prominent in de BMGN van de voorbije vijf decennia. Qua historiografie laten de artikelen echter wel degelijk veelzeggende trends zien, zoals veranderingen op het vlak van bronnenkritiek, van de internationale reikwijdte van het debat en met betrekking tot de gekozen conceptuele benaderingen. We zien bijvoorbeeld dat een toenemende belangstelling voor het koloniale verleden, ook buiten de geschiedwetenschap zelf, de perceptie heeft beïnvloed van historici ten aanzien van koloniaal geweld – zowel in diens fysieke, socio-culturele als in zijn kennistheoretische vorm. Ondanks allerlei lacunes, laat het groeiende aantal publicaties in de BMGN sinds 2006 over kolonialisme en dekolonisatie zien dat deze thematiek voor de huidige generatie historici een integraal onderdeel is geworden van de geschiedschrijving in Nederland en België.Generations matter in historiography, and this is certainly the case when it concerns the enduring process of decolonisation. This forum contribution discusses how different generations published about colonialism, imperialism and decolonisation in BMGN – Low Countries Historical Review since 1970. It raises questions about contrasts and continuities in research practices between the older generation of historians with first-hand experience with colonialism, and subsequent generations. Writing the history of colonialism intersects with debates about decolonisation, including what we characterise as de-imperialisation, namely decentring Europe, in history writing. Examining the content of BMGN allows us to trace this development, even though the subject of colonialism, imperialism and decolonisation did not feature prominently in BMGN over the past five decades. However, in terms of historiography, the articles do show significant trends, such as changes in source criticism, in the international scope of the historical debate, and in conceptual approaches. We observe how a growing interest in the colonial past beyond the discipline of history as such has influenced perceptions among historians of colonial violence, in its physical, socio-cultural and epistemic forms. Despite its lapses, the increasing number of articles on colonialism and decolonisation published in bmgn since 2006 show that for the current generation of historians, colonialism and decolonisation have become an integral part of history writing in the Netherlands and Belgium.


suwignyo, schrikker and legêne
This contribution focuses on approaches and historical practice. How did historians who published in bmgn operate? Who did they work with? Who did they read? But also, what was not published in bmgn? Writing the history of colonialism intersects with debates about decolonisation, including what we call de-imperialisation (namely decentring Europe) in history writing. Our snapshots from bmgn will show that this is a matter of source interpretation and more: changing conceptions also relate to the then current political and societal debates and questions of background, perspectives and transnational connections among historians from the formerly colonising and colonised countries with respect to the history of the Low Countries. We end this quick scan with a discussion of the most recent publications in bmgn from an Indonesian perspective.

Snapshot
Let us start with the following case: we were pleasantly surprised to find the same letter, sent by the Dutch missionary family Van Hasselt from Papua New Guinea to the Netherlands, quoted in one of the first and last articles published in bmgn between 1970 and 2020: Until around 1900 slave trade existed in New Guinea, not clandestinely but publicly [...] As long as the male and female slaves were strong, it was in the best interest of the owners to treat them well, but small children, sick, weak or old slaves were killed, often with accusations that they were bewitched. 2 In 1971, Steven van Randwijck took this quotation at face value in an article that discussed the relationship between Protestant missionaries and Dutch imperialism. He argued that indeed imperialism and conversion often went hand in hand, but in his view, whereas Dutch imperialists were driven by selfinterest, the missionaries acted out of interest for the population. which the children were welcomed in their households and downplayed the services and labour the children provided'. 4 She further argues that the children became set apart from their community, and the cultural values with which they were raised became lost. In her view, the missionaries played a key role in Dutch colonialism. 5 The interpretation of the same source by these two historians could not have been more different.
The contrast between the analysis of Van Randwijck and Mak suggests that bmgn changed its approach to colonialism over the course of fifty years: from a colonialist perspective, where historians reproduced visions from their sources, to a critical post-colonial approach that questions precisely the message the source intended to convey. This shift conforms to international developments in the field and in that sense should not surprise us. But this was not a gradual process; rather, it reflects a generational change that happened only ten years ago. Over the past ten years or so, bmgn has experienced a true explosion in the number of articles, special issues, discussion dossiers, forums and review essays on the history of colonialism, imperialism and decolonisation.
In 2020 alone we counted nearly twenty contributions. This large number of colonialism-related publications in bmgn starkly contrasts with the preceding four decades, which counted barely more than one colonialism-related article per year, and surely reflects the current academic, societal and political interest in the history of colonialism in the Netherlands and Belgium. Authorship  suwignyo, schrikker and legêne of Dutch imperialism. However, both in conceptual and empirical terms, their articles fit in a narrow frame of reference that nowadays would no longer be satisfactory. Van Randwijck's lack of source criticism may be explained by his background as Secretary-General of the Nederlandsch Zendeling Genootschap. In that respect he was still inhabiting the colonial world whose history he was evaluating. Others, such as Willem Wertheim or Jan Pluvier, did raise more critical questions which have reappeared in historical debates in bmgn to this day: they questioned the traditional Dutch exceptionalist selfperception as a non-imperialist colonial power and they explained the Dutch presence in terms of colonial enclaves which had limited contact with and little understanding of the Indonesian world around them, even if the Dutch at the time thought otherwise. They also highlighted the strong European character of Dutch colonial society. 6 These are all subjects that returned in fora and themed issues in the 2010s. 7 The major differences in the more recent contributions on such themes are the more explicit source-critical approaches, comparative insights and stronger commitment to theory.

Generations
An examination of the authorship of the 1971 issue provides yet another snapshot: that of a generation of historians whose lives and careers had been entangled with the colonial world. Some served as officials in Indonesia, others were raised in the colonial enclaves they later wrote about.      de Caraïben, 1940de Caraïben, -2000de Caraïben, , i, 1940de Caraïben, -1954de Caraïben, , ii, 1954de Caraïben, -1975de Caraïben, , iii, 1975de Caraïben, -2000

Decolonisation, de-imperialisation and their historical representations
In the last ten years, bmgn has published extensively on themes of decolonisation and de-imperialisation. With these terms we mean historiography that critically examines the former colony's process of gaining independence from its European patron. In these articles, authors explore different dimensions, for example of people who were ruled by colonialism and those who ruled, and they also question the legacy that still lingered on after colonial polities ended.  has accelerated over the past ten years, but with a diversification of themes, sources, methods and perspectives, which probably go beyond what he had in mind at the time. In our capacity as authors, editors and reviewers, we realise that we have played a role in this, of course, and it is up to a next generation of scholars to review these developments from a greater temporal distance. 60 When looked at from the perspective of Indonesia, the articles provide analyses that are useful for academic readers from the former colonies to understand how the colonial past has been reconstructed in the contemporary scholarship of the former metropoles. 61 Many of the recent articles represent a paradigm shift aimed to revisit colonial and imperial historiography.
Unfortunately, a parallel picture about what has happened in the academic world of the former colonies has been relatively absent from the journal. forum Over the past twenty years in Indonesia, public and academic historians have worked on the decolonisation theme beyond the nationalist approach.
A history of the Padri War in West Sumatra (1803-1837), for example, has been re-examined not merely as a war against the Dutch, but as one that stemmed from conflicting identity politics between the Muslim Minang and the Christian Batak peoples. 62 A history of the Indonesian political revival of the early twentieth century has been rewritten in the frame of social modernisation, rather than a narrow political history of the nationalist movement only. 63 The migration of the Javanese people, to cite yet another example, has recently been reappraised in the framework of global migration that begun in the eleventh century, thus reassessing the traditional Europerelated periodisation of migration. 64 And finally, after the dissolution of the colonial society, the relationship between the former colonial and metropole countries continues within a different political realm. But the renewed relationship has been neglected in the study of decolonisation. It is time for collaboration between scholars of the former colonised and coloniser societies to intensify and to explore the varied dimensions of the pasts with a fresher look.