2021/12/20 by Pim de Zwart, Daniel Gallardo-Albarrán, Auke Rijpma · 1 citation
Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Social Sciences · #Asian Studies and History #Colonialism #Culture, Economy, and Development Studies #Demographic economics #Econometrics #Economics #Endogeneity #Geography #Historical Economic and Social Studies #Instrumental variable #Java
paper · pdf · doi:10.1017/s0022050721000577
openalex publication_date 2021/12/20 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04
We investigate the demographic effects of forced labor under an extractive colonial regime: the Cultivation System in nineteenth-century Java. Our panel analyses show that labor demands are strongly positively associated with mortality rates, likely resulting from malnourishment and unhygienic conditions on plantations and the spread of infectious diseases. An instrumental variable approach, using international market prices for coffee and sugar for predicting labor demands, addresses potential endogeneity concerns. Our estimates suggest that without the abolition of the Cultivation System average overall mortality in Java would have been between 10 and 30 percent higher by the late 1870s.