ABSTRACT
Asian capitalist plantations were organised by conceptions of racial and moral difference between Europeans and others. In Fiji, an enacted European vision of 'coolies' gave shape to the indenture system, its form of labour commodity and its penal disciplinary mechanisms. The efforts to make 'coolie' status real generated contradictions in Indian social life and exploitation of Indian women. Indians resisted 'coolie' status and found direct and effective ways to attack European claims to dignity. We can understand better the history of Fiji's plantations if we do not presume that the descriptive tools provided by political-economic discourse can grasp colonial capitalist realities.
