Since the end of World War II the study of Southeast Asia has changed unrecognizably. The often bitter end of colonialism caused a sharp break with older scholarly traditions, and their tendency to see Southeast Asia as a receptacle for external influences—first Indian, Persian, Islamic or Chinese, later European. The greatest gain over the past forty years has probably been a much increased sensitivity to the cultural distinctiveness of Southeast Asia both as a whole and in its parts. If there has been a loss, on the other hand, it has been the failure of economic history to advance beyond the work of the generation of Furnivall, van Leur, Schrieke and Boeke. Perhaps because economic factors were difficult to disentangle from external factors they were seen by very few Southeast Asianists as the major challenge.

In its reply to the Report of the Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Representatives (The Hockin Committee) on Independence and Internationalism (1986), the Government of Canada reiterated its intention to treat the Asia-Pacific as ‘an area of concentration in the National Trade Strategy’ (Canada's International Relations, 1986, p. 60). Within the National Trade Strategy, significant attention is being given to the development of Canada's economic relationship with the countries of Southeast Asia, most notably the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) grouping. The policy mechanisms deployed to promote closer economic and social ties with Southeast Asian countries include those pertaining to international trade and finance, development assistance, transport, immigration and cultural relations.

The history of coal mining in Malaya is synonymous with the history of Malayan Collieries and Batu Arang town since coal was only ever economically mined in this small area in Ulu Selangor. The town of Batu Arang, the Malayan Collieries and the mines left an indelible mark on Malayan history. Previous accounts of the history of coal mining are restricted to mentions in general works on labour and the labour unrest of 1936–37 and 1946–47. This paper outlines the role of coal mining in the Malayan economy in the first half of the twentieth century. It also focuses on the history of labour at the collieries and the significant role that labour played in the development and growth of industrial activism in Malaya.

From 1919 through 1921, a combination of poor rice harvests and speculative buying caused unprecedented rice shortages in Southeast Asia and led to imposition of government controls over the rice industry. Because there were large workforces in South and Southeast Asia entirely dependent upon imported rice, the shortages were potentially very serious. Malaya and the East Coast Residency of Sumatra, for example, exported non-edible primary products such as tobacco, rubber and tin, and imported rice from Burma and Siam. Two-thirds of the rice consumed each year in Malaya, and one-half of that used in Sumatra's East Coast Residency, was imported, and local food production fell far short of the minimum needed if imported grain could not be obtained. Tea cultivation in Ceylon, tobacco and rubber planting in British North Borneo, and sugar planting in the Philippines were conducted along much the same lines.

Sometime in the late 1890s, Sayyid Mumtaz Ali visited Aligarh and happened to show Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan the manuscript of his treatise in defense of women's rights in Islamic law, Huquq un-Niswan. As he began to read it, Sir Sayyid looked shocked. He then opened it to a second place and his face turned red. As he read it at a third place, his hands started to tremble. Finally, he tore up the manuscript and threw it into the wastepaper basket. Fortunately, at that moment a servant arrived to announce lunch, and as Sir Sayyid left his office, Mumtaz Ali snatched his mutilated manuscript from the trash. He waited until after Sir Sayyid's death in 1898, however, to publish Huquq un-Niswan.

To the South Asianist India appears unique in the modern world. A country characterized by vast poverty and widespread illiteracy, it nevertheless has managed to maintain the civil liberties and democratic politics bequeathed to it by an enlightened colonial power. In spite of a two-year long hiatus of ‘Emergency Rule,’ few third world countries can make such a proud claim. Of those that can, such as Sri Lanka, none have the extraordinary size or social complexity of India.

Imagine you are in a dark and lofty interior. All around you can dimly see huge racks piled high with cloth bundles—blue, red, green and white. In the middle of the space a rickety ladder leads up to another level also filled with racks and bundles, over and above which rises another ladder and another level. If you decide to move you must step carefully between piles of old papers strewn across the floor and, perhaps, small channels of water. If you try to grasp hold of one of the coloured bundles to see what it contains you will be assailed by clouds of gritty dust that catch at your eyes and throat and may even force you to retire quickly from that dark and inhospitable place. Is this a dacoits' hideout or perhaps the cave of Ali Baba? No—as you've certainly guessed by now—it is or could be almost any district record room anywhere in Pakistan.