Apr 15, 2025

Empire of Labor

How the East India Company Colonized Hired Work

Titas Chakraborty

Hosted by Rounak Bose

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Summary

Empire of Labor: How the East India Company Colonized Hired Work (U California Press, 2025) tells the story of how hired workers experienced and responded to the rise to power over the long eighteenth century of the English East India Company (EIC), which perennially hired thousands of people in and around its settlements in Bengal. Focusing on boatmen and silk reelers as well as sailors and soldiers--a remarkable look at both indigenous and European workers--the story begins with the earliest accounts of the EIC's dealings with hired labor in the region, from 1651. Prior to EIC dominance, hired workers drove hard bargains with their employers, making demands that drew upon their own notions of wages, work rhythms, and time. When their demands were not met, they ran away, often to rival indigenous or European employers.

Empire of Labor explores these demands and how they conflicted with the EIC's notions of discipline. Analyzing Bengali literary sources and Dutch and English archival materials, the book rethinks the ascendancy of the company state as a violent process involving removing competing employers, imposing army and police power, introducing new production technologies, and instituting draconian regulations which eliminated indigenous cultures of work. Most importantly, it depicts the lifeworlds of these recalcitrant workers, showing how they lived and resisted. A major intervention in histories of colonialism, labor, migration, and law, Empire of Labor ultimately recasts colonial rule as a novel form of state-labor relationship.

Rounak Bose is a doctoral student in History at the University of Delaware. His research explores questions of caste, religiosities, sacred geographies, and mobilities and circulatory regimes across modern and early modern South Asia and Indian Ocean networks. Besides these specific research interests, his interests revolve across anthropology, literatures, and more recently, AI and its histories. When not reading or writing in the university library, Rounak can be found organizing ambitious culinary ventures for friends and family at home.

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Rounak Bose

Rounak Bose is a doctoral student in History at the University of Delaware. His research explores the historical categories of caste, religion, ecology, and sovereignties in South Asia and Indian Ocean networks. Besides these specific interests, his disciplinary interests revolve around public history, anthropology, literary studies, the digital humanities, and more recently, the history and politics of Artificial Intelligence. When not reading or writing in the university library, Rounak can be found taking long walks along Delaware's trails.

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