ABSTRACT

The liberal Thomas Stamford Raffles believed that the Dutch rule in the East Indies was vicious and unjust and that the Javanese masses would be better off under the benign protection of the British. The British needed the tropical produce as much as the Dutch, but unlike the latter, they had a line of cheaply manufactured goods, particularly textiles, to sell in exchange for raw materials from the colonies. Raffles's humanitarianism helped to liberate the masses from the oppression of their native rulers; his pragmatism acted to put money into the peasants' pockets so that they might buy English cottons. Raffles's opposition to returning Java to the Dutch stemmed from his personal conviction that it would be detrimental to British political and commercial interests in the East. The Dutch actions infuriated Raffles, who used his able and persuasive pen to warn the East India Company directors of the danger of Dutch monopolistic practices to British trading interests.