ter of the programs of empire-building as a means
to regiment male morality as well as to provide an
example to native women of a civilized and morally
appropriate way of life. Wives of missionaries, for
instance, who worked side by side with their
spouses in colonial settlements, were regarded as
having a “gracious influence of wise and thought-
ful womanhood” on local women (Langmore
1989, 165–84). White women, as the bearers and
breeders of ethnic markers, consequently had to be
protected. In 1926 in British New Guinea the
White Women’s Protection Ordinance was issued
to protect white women, and indirectly whiteness,
from the “black peril.” In Indonesia, although in
1901 the Dutch enacted the so-called Ethical
Policy, which called for consideration of native
adat, this was accompanied by the simultaneous
enactment of welfare programs concerning parents
and parenting, servants, orphanages, nurse maids,
and nurseries (Stoler 2002, 1996). In 1898, the
Mixed Marriage Law, which called for the abroga-
tion of polygamy had been issued (Stoler 2002,
101–6). The motive adduced to its promulgation
was that it aimed at protecting native men’s rights.
In reality it went to correct the 1848 Civil Code,
which, ruling that marriage partners of European
and native standing were subject to European law,
allowed European men living in concubinage with
native women (nyai) to legalize their union and
legitimate their mestizo children. Policies regulat-
ing marriage arrangements were also implemented
in British Malaya, in particular in regard to child
marriage. The Age of Consent Act of 1891 raised
the age of consent to sexual relations for girls from
10 to 12 and the Child Marriage Restraint Act of
1929 forbade marriages of girls below the age of
- In the Dutch East Indies laws of this kind were
never promulgated: child marriages took place in
the form of betrothal to be followed later by mar-
riage. Muslim women maintained a certain degree
of freedom in particular in matters regarding
divorce and property (Keddie 1990, Locher-
Scholten 2000, 193–6).
During the 1930s, amendments introduced to the
law in order to protect European women who mar-
ried Indo-Malay men generated a debate within the
Muslim community instigated by local Muslim
women and religious authorities in both Indonesia
(Locher-Scholten 2000, 187–209) and Malaysia
(Manderson 1980, 17–18, 22–4), which brought
about its withdrawal. Muslim Indonesians argued
that such a law subverted the issue of marriage and
gender relations in Islam (Locher-Scholten 2000,
187–8) since women and family law play an essen-
tial role in the preservation of Islamic unity and
east asia, southeast asia, australia and oceania 65identity (Eickelman and Piscatori 1996, 83–94).
The colonial government argued that the law
inherently aimed at protecting European women
against Muslim practices in inter-religious and
inter-ethnic marriages. In reality it acted as a means
for preventing European properties from falling
into the hands of Muslim subjects, which would
have led to a change in European practices of inher-
itance and property ownership. The law, however,
encroached upon the structural semantics of
Islamic ™adìth(tradition) and consequently its
application was strongly resisted, generating wide-
spread calls for its abrogation. What emerges from
the dynamics and dialectics of the debate is that the
categories of race, gender, and class came to inter-
sect with those of religion (Locher-Scholten 2000,
209–10), placing the latter at the center of the
structuring of inter-ethnic relations and later of
nationalist ideologies.Conclusions
Colonial policies and practices prompted cul-
tural and social change in the autochthonous tem-
plates of colonized populations. These changes are
evident when comparing precolonial cultural tem-
plates with the programs of nation-building and
state-crafting implemented during the decoloniza-
tion era. The hiatus that exists between the two
periods not only indicates the deep transformations
that took place during colonial rule but also calls
for a re-examination of the dynamics and dialectics
of anti-colonial struggles and resistance. Colonized
populations, in a frenzy to shake off the yoke of
European dominance, did not completely reverse
the practices that generated particular gender rela-
tions. Women’s bodies continued to represent the
tabulaon which to draw nationalist ideologies and
policies. The control of the reproductive function
of women was vital to the reproduction and per-
petuation of the nation and to the legitimacy of
claims of nationhood. Presumably the veiling of
women in Islamic societies was prompted by the
need to preserve community, and later national,
integrity and unity: the discussion regarding the
asymmetric position of women in Islam vis-à-vis
their male counterparts should, therefore, be set in
the particular context and regarded as a legacy of
the effects of colonial practices and policies.Bibliography
I. Ahmad, The administration of Islamic law in Southeast
Asia, in Islamic Culture57 (1973), 37–55.
L. Ahmed, Women and gender in Islam. Historical roots
of a modern debate, New Haven, Conn. 1992.
J. Bowker (ed.), The Oxford dictionary of word religions,
Oxford 1999.