Carceral Spaces and Punitive Mobilities: Re-examining Chinese migration in Colonial Maritime Southeast Asia, 1900-1957

监狱空间与惩罚性流动：重新审视 1900-1957 年东南亚沿海殖民地的华人移民

• 批准号: 2749487
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: London School of Economics and Political Science
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2022 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2749487
• 关键词: Carceral; Spaces; Punitive; Mobilities; Re

My proposed research approaches the research on Chinese migration in twentieth-century Southeast Asia from a hitherto new perspective, specifically through the prism of punitive policies. Focusing on the processes involved in the migratory process, the key issue to address is how did this play out in specific spatial sites, such as ships, plantations and internment camps, and specific mobilities, such as banishment and forced resettlements. My study involves a transnational approach that examines both intra- and inter-imperial movements that historically linked Chinese communities in Federated Malay States, Straits Settlements, Borneo in British Malaya and Sumatra in the Netherlands East Indies.Focusing on the migration of Chinese labour, this study stems from both historical concerns and historiographical insights surrounding the import of labour for the extractive economy in the colonies. The central preoccupation for colonial labour policy had hitherto been about securing a large labour supply. The management and control of labour was not merely effected through the passing of labour legislation and immigration ordinances, but mediated by quotidian practices in various spaces, such as ships, plantations, internment camps and the prisons. Viewing these spaces as 'carceral' not only highlights the practical aspect of curtailing the mobility of Chinese workers in the management of their labour, it supports growing evidence against the conflation of 'free' wage labour with commodification of labour in global labour history. The significance of these carceral spaces and controls over the intra- and inter-imperial movements of workers also did not diminish with the prohibition of Chinese indentured labour in the early twentieth century.This study also extends from recent historiographical development in histories of punishment, labour and imperial histories. Attending to the significances of punishment and penal transportation in the history of empires, there is a need to consider other forms of punitive mobilities beyond convict transportation, for the purpose of studying my topic. With the demographic and political changes in the European colonies in Southeast Asia in the twentieth century, the punitive regimes had to contend with both the threats posed by specific individuals and significant Chinese populations of an alien and 'criminal' disposition. Interpreting punitive mobility as a form of punishment necessarily means extending beyond the scope of the traditional criminal justice system, through considering how the uses of banishment and deportation for the individual, and forced resettlements of entire populations, interacted with incarceration in the colonial context. Central questions to be asked in my study include, but are not restricted to, the following: what did the formation and evolution of the carceral spaces reveal about the repression and negotiations in the construction of an 'incomplete' imperial sovereignty; how did the people within interpret these spaces and what strategies did they use to cope with their predicament; and how did the politics over punitive mobilities engage with wider political and security issues in the empires?Informed by debates within the field of global history, a micro-spatial approach will be adopted for the study of Chinese migration. The examination of individual localities and moments adopts the prism of the micro-analytical perspective to highlight the discontinuities and significance of local conditions in mediating the movements of Chinese people along the established migratory networks. This is integrated with a spatially aware perspective that emphasises the interconnectedness of the different global, regional and local scales. A qualitative analysis of specific 'carceral sites', and individuals and groups who were subjected to 'punitive mobilities' will be undertaken.

我提出的研究从迄今为止的新视角，特别是通过惩罚性政策的角度来研究二十世纪东南亚的华人移民。着眼于移民过程所涉及的过程，需要解决的关键问题是移民在特定的空间场所（例如船舶、种植园和拘留营）以及特定的流动性（例如流放和强迫安置）中如何发挥作用。我的研究涉及一种跨国方法，考察历史上将马来联邦、海峡殖民地、英属马来亚的婆罗洲和荷属东印度群岛的苏门答腊岛的华人社区联系在一起的帝国内部和帝国间的运动。这项研究聚焦于华人劳动力的移民，源于对殖民地采掘经济劳动力进口的历史关注和史学见解。迄今为止，殖民地劳工政策的核心关注点一直是确保大量的劳动力供应。对劳工的管理和控制不仅通过劳工立法和移民法令来实现，而且还通过船舶、种植园、拘留营和监狱等各种空间的日常实践来实现。将这些空间视为“监狱”不仅凸显了限制中国工人在劳动力管理方面的流动性的实际问题，而且还支持了越来越多的证据反对将“自由”工资劳动与全球劳动史上的劳动力商品化混为一谈。这些监狱空间以及对工人在帝国内部和帝国之间流动的控制的重要性也并没有随着二十世纪初中国契约劳工的禁止而减弱。这项研究还延伸到了惩罚史、劳动史和帝国史的最新史学发展。考虑到惩罚和流放在帝国历史上的重要性，为了研究我的主题，有必要考虑除了流放罪犯之外的其他形式的惩罚性流动。随着二十世纪欧洲在东南亚殖民地的人口和政治变化，惩罚性政权必须应对特定个人和大量具有外来和“犯罪”倾向的华人所构成的威胁。将惩罚性流动解释为一种惩罚形式必然意味着超越传统刑事司法系统的范围，通过考虑对个人的放逐和驱逐以及对全体人口的强制重新安置如何与殖民背景下的监禁相互作用。我的研究要提出的核心问题包括但不限于以下内容：监狱空间的形成和演变揭示了关于“不完整”帝国主权建构中的镇压和谈判的哪些内容？里面的人们如何解释这些空间以及他们使用什么策略来应对困境？惩罚性流动的政治如何与帝国中更广泛的政治和安全问题产生联系？以全球历史领域内的辩论为基础，将采用微观空间方法来研究中国移民。对个别地点和时刻的考察采用微观分析视角的棱镜，突显当地条件在调节中国人沿​​着既定移民网络流动的过程中的不连续性和重要性。这与空间意识视角相结合，强调不同全球、区域和地方尺度的相互联系。将对特定“监禁场所”以及遭受“惩罚性流动”的个人和群体进行定性分析。