Patronage, Patrimonialism, and Governors' Careers in the Dutch Chartered Companies, 1630-1681: Careers of Empire, 2022
Out now with Brill! This book is based on my PhD thesis, but there are some major changes, includ... more Out now with Brill! This book is based on my PhD thesis, but there are some major changes, including more sources. Lobby your University Library to add it to their collection. If they do, you can get a print on-demand paperback for €25.
Book abstract:
How did individuals advance to the highest ranks in the Dutch colonial administrations? And how, once appointed, was this rank retained? To answer these questions, this book explores the careers of Dutch colonial governors in the 17th century with a focus on two case-studies: Johan Maurits van Nassau-Siegen, governor of Dutch Brazil (1636-1644) and Rijcklo f Volckertsz van Goens, Governor-General in Batavia in the 1670s.
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Papers by Erik Odegard
Book abstract:
How did individuals advance to the highest ranks in the Dutch colonial administrations? And how, once appointed, was this rank retained? To answer these questions, this book explores the careers of Dutch colonial governors in the 17th century with a focus on two case-studies: Johan Maurits van Nassau-Siegen, governor of Dutch Brazil (1636-1644) and Rijcklo f Volckertsz van Goens, Governor-General in Batavia in the 1670s.
Could early modern chartered companies effectively ensure that their agents overseas were working in the best interests of the firm rather than in their own personal interests? This principal-agent problem has been the topic of a number of important studies in early modern economic history. This article contributes to the debate by elaborating on two case-studies from the two large Dutch chartered trading companies, the East- and the West India Companies (VOC and WIC respectively). Exploration of the careers of two individuals within these companies shows that supervision – and indeed career-making – was frequently a matter of unwritten rules and codes of conduct. While formal written rules might be found lacking, control could still be exerted through patronage or family ties. But this presented the companies with other challenges as well. In studying principal-agent problems, researchers in economic history need to be aware of informal mechanisms of control as well as formal ones.
Book abstract:
How did individuals advance to the highest ranks in the Dutch colonial administrations? And how, once appointed, was this rank retained? To answer these questions, this book explores the careers of Dutch colonial governors in the 17th century with a focus on two case-studies: Johan Maurits van Nassau-Siegen, governor of Dutch Brazil (1636-1644) and Rijcklo f Volckertsz van Goens, Governor-General in Batavia in the 1670s.
Could early modern chartered companies effectively ensure that their agents overseas were working in the best interests of the firm rather than in their own personal interests? This principal-agent problem has been the topic of a number of important studies in early modern economic history. This article contributes to the debate by elaborating on two case-studies from the two large Dutch chartered trading companies, the East- and the West India Companies (VOC and WIC respectively). Exploration of the careers of two individuals within these companies shows that supervision – and indeed career-making – was frequently a matter of unwritten rules and codes of conduct. While formal written rules might be found lacking, control could still be exerted through patronage or family ties. But this presented the companies with other challenges as well. In studying principal-agent problems, researchers in economic history need to be aware of informal mechanisms of control as well as formal ones.
This chapter investigates the entangled role of trade networks, power networks, and lobby networks in the rise and fall of Dutch Brazil (1630-1654).
The Dutch arrival, conquest and quick exit in Brazilian history deserves attention beyond the tale of conquest and loss in the disputes between two rival empires in the exchanges of colonial expansion. This chapter raises and answers three specific questions. In the first place, what were the reasons that the conquest of Brazil was faced with support from certain groups within Dutch society? We will argue that support for the Brazilian conquest was rooted in the imagery of Brazil as a profitable colony, allied with deeply rooted interests guided by the sugar and the brazilwood economies and markets that are better understood when looking at the business networks involved in the South Atlantic–Lisbon–Amsterdam trade.
Notwithstanding the economic interests in the conquest of Dutch Brazil, the political establishment in the Republic seems to have failed to meet the needs of the colony for which it is pertinent to inquire about the reasons why the lobby efforts of businessmen established in the Republic, as well as local politicians/administrators in Dutch Brazil, convinced of the viability of the colony, were unable to convince the WIC and the States General to defend the survival of the settlement. The reasons for this failure, we argue, are contained in Republican politics and games of power, rather than in colonial policymaking. We focus here on the disputes on governance of the colony, showing that the differing visions of company, generality and colonists often worked at cross purposes and prevented a stable plan for governance from being implemented. Indeed, differing visions within the WIC prevented a stable system of colonial administration from being implemented.
The third question, directly connected with the first two, inquires about the way in which different groups in Dutch Brazil did lobby in the Republic, the routes they chose and the options they contemplated. These groups, we will show, represented separate trans-Atlantic networks of influence that were forced to unite in search of common goals, mostly regarding the prosperity and survival of the colony. Regardless of their efforts, lobby for Dutch Brazil met with utter failure.
Ultimately, this chapter will argue that the lack of entanglement and goal-sharing by business networks in the Dutch Republic, administrators in Dutch Brazil and Republican politicians sealed the end of the largest colony of settlement under Dutch administration before the mid-eighteenth century.
This is a first draft version of my transcriptions of the letters received from Tobago (there are still a few to go!) which I plan to translate and which would form part II of a larger source publication of Dutch sources on Tobago, with part I covering the De Moor and Lampsins patroonships, part III the Benckes fleet and part IV the post-1677 Dutch plans for Tobago (until the mid-18th C.). I will shortly post a document with the first translations of some of the documents.
If I publish this as part of my VENI-output, I will need to submit it to a publisher which does open-access books, but I likely will have NWO-funding to make it so. Suggestions for publishers are also welcome!
How did individuals advance to the highest ranks in the Dutch colonial administrations? And how, once appointed, was this rank retained? To answer these questions, this book explores the careers of Dutch colonial governors in the 17th century with a focus on two case-studies: Johan Maurits van Nassau-Siegen, governor of Dutch Brazil (1636-1644) and Rijckloff Volckertsz van Goens, Governor-General in Batavia in the 1670s.
By comparing a Western (Atlantic, WIC) and an Eastern (Asian, VOC) example, this book shows how networks sustaining career-making differed in the various parts of the empire: the West India Company was much more involved in domestic political debates, and this led to a closer integration of political patronage networks, while the East India Company was better able to follow an independent course. The book shows that to understand the inner workings of the Dutch India companies, we need to understand the lives of those who turned the empire into their career.