Indenture Beyond the ‘Coolie’ Trade: Reinitiating Chinese Indentured Migration to Cuba after the Chinese Commission Report (1874–1920)

Abstract

ABSTRACT The historiography of Chinese indenture in Cuba is very clear when it comes to its periodization, establishing the start date of the trade in 1847 and the end in 1874. This periodization is based upon the arrival of the first and the last ships carrying Chinese indentured labourers. Thus, studies on the so-called ‘coolie trade’ focus on the period between these dates. What happened after the arrival of the last ship has attracted less attention. The end of the trade, after all, did not coincide with the end of indenture in Cuba, either in legal terms or in practice. By the 1880s there were still Chinese indentured labourers in Cuba who had not finished their contracts. Furthermore, after 1874 there were attempts to restore the trade in Chinese migrants: firstly, in 1877; and later, in 1919. Chinese indenture in Cuba is an excellent case study by which to problematize the meaning of ‘abolition’ and inquire on the nature of ‘indenture’. Using multilingual source material, this article suggests a continuous view of indenture in Cuba beyond the 1874 hallmark, and pinpoints the debt generated at the moment of recruitment to pay for the emigrating costs as the single most important defining mechanism of indenture.