Indian Migration and Empire

How did states come to monopolize control over migration? What do the processes that produced this monopoly tell us about the modern state? In Indian Migration and Empire Radhika Mongia provocatively argues that the formation of colonial migration regulations was dependent upon, accompanied by, and generative of profound changes in normative conceptions of the modern state. Focused on state regulation of colonial Indian migration between 1834 and 1917, Mongia illuminates the genesis of central techniques of migration control. She shows how important elements of current migration regimes, including the notion of state sovereignty as embodying the authority to control migration, the distinction between free and forced migration, the emergence of passports, the formation of migration bureaucracies, and the incorporation of kinship relations into migration logics, are the product of complex debates that attended colonial migrations. By charting how state control of migration was critical to the transformation of a world dominated by empire-states into a world dominated by nation-states, Mongia challenges positions that posit a stark distinction between the colonial state and the modern state to trace aspects of their entanglements.

"Indian Migration and Empire presents a detailed analysis of the history of colonial Indian migration of indentured labor to Mauritius, the Caribbean, Canada, and South Africa. . . . This illuminating research makes an important contribution to the fields of colonialism, migration, and political studies. . . . Recommended. Advanced undergraduates and above.", "Methodologically innovative and theoretically rigorous . . . Mongia has written a pathbreaking book. In the wake of this work it will no longer be possible to tell the story of border-making without a scrutiny of how human labor was dehumanized on an imperial and global scale.", "Mongia’s book is a methodological tour de force in migration studies and theories of the state. But the commendable feat of this book is that these accomplishments do not stand apart – her contribution to migration studies is enriched by the careful theorising of states, at once colonial, transcolonial and metropolitan.", "Indian Migration and Empire cautions us in the epilogue that the project of modern nation state and who belongs in such a nation state is a project still incomplete and can inflict terrible oppressions and restrictions as in the example of Iroquois/Haudenosaunee of North America. For this caution alone, this book is a must-read for all who are interested in historiography of migration and political theory.", "Mongia’s account is a fresh, fascinating explanation of the intricacies of migration and its impact on host-countries, nation-state and bureaucratic development, and at the heart of it all, the emigrant. There has been a steady change in academia to consider a more global and cultural perspective, and this book is relevant to many scholars, including those in political science, history, sociology, women’s studies, migration, Asian studies, colonial and post-colonial studies, and global issues."

Radhika Mongia is Associate Professor of Sociology at York University.