The Civiele lijst (“civil list”) was the fixed stipend paid to the native rulers of the zelfbesturen (self-governing territories) of the Outer Possessions from the landschapskas (territorial treasury) of their landschap, in place of the older practice in which all revenues of a landschap were considered the private income of the ruler. In the Encyclopaedisch Bureau’s account, the introduction of the civiele lijst was the principal financial innovation of the newer regulation of the political relationship between the Gouvernement and the zelfbesturen — a regulation codified by the Zelfbestuurs-ordonnantie of 1914 and applying to all zelfbesturen, including those of the Atjeh and Dependencies residency.
Account from De Buitenbezittingen (1917) — Civiele lijst
The Encyclopaedisch Bureau’s account of the civiele lijst appears in the chapter on administrative organisation. The Bureau frames the introduction of the civiele lijst as the principal innovation of the newer regulation of the political relationship between the Gouvernement and the zelfbesturen — a regulation that applied equally to the older politieke contracten and to the Korte Verklaring regime introduced in 1899.
The Bureau writes: “the principal principle that has been introduced in the newer regulation of the political relationship — whether laid down in contracts or in the K. V. — is that the revenues of the landschap, instead of being — as formerly — considered as the private revenues of the rulers, who only inadequately spent a part of them for the benefit of land and people, belong to the landschap and must therefore be paid into a landschapskas, in order to fund from it all kinds of expenditures in the interest of land and people, including — under our guidance and oversight — the income of the rulers in the form of a ‘civiele lijst’.”
The Bureau notes that “in the landschappen where the establishment of our authority had to be accompanied by force of arms, this has been taken as the occasion to decide at once on the taking of this measure.” The introduction of the civiele lijst in the landschappen of Atjeh and Dependencies — that is, in the landschappen where the pacification had been accomplished by force — was thus an immediate accompaniment of the military conquest. The civiele lijst was, in the Bureau’s framing, the financial instrument through which the native rulers of the Atjehnese landschappen were transformed from autonomous sovereigns into paid functionaries of the Dutch colonial order.
Significance
The civiele lijst is, in the Encyclopaedisch Bureau’s account, the principal financial instrument of the post-pacification consolidation of Dutch rule in the zelfbesturen of the Buitenbezittingen — the instrument through which the native rulers were transformed from autonomous sovereigns into paid functionaries of the Dutch colonial order. Its introduction in the landschappen of Atjeh and Dependencies was an immediate accompaniment of the military conquest; its codification by the Zelfbestuurs-ordonnantie of 1914 marks the legal consolidation of the new financial relationship.
See Also
- Landschapskassen
- Zelfbestuurs-ordonnantie
- Korte Verklaring
- Politieke Contracten
- Zelfbesturen
- Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden
- Pacificatie van Atjeh
- Buitenbezittingen
- 1899
- 1914
Sources
De Buitenbezittingen 1904 tot 1914, Deel I, bewerkt door het Encyclopaedisch Bureau, Mededeelingen van het Bureau voor de Bestuurszaken der Buitenbezittingen, Aflevering X (Weltevreden: Landsdrukkerij, 1917), pp. 7–8 (Bestuurs-organisatie).