This book identifies three grand themes in Indonesia's economic history: globalisation, state formation and economic integration. Globalisation affected the Indonesian archipelago even before the arrival of the Dutch: the New Order experience was only the most recent wave. Modern state formation began in the Napoleonic era with the despatch to Java of Governor-General Daendels (1808-11) and culminated in the centralised, military-bureaucratic state of the late New Order. A national economy emerged after the 1930s as the Outer Islands were reoriented towards an industrialising Java.

These three themes link chronological chapters from the pre-1800 period through the modern colonial era to the breakdown of the colonial system after 1930, the birth of modern Indonesia, and the remarkable economic transformation under the New Order. This overarching story gives a unity to Indonesia's modern history, while helping to explain why the future is likely to be different.

The four authors, senior scholars from Australia (Howard Dick), Germany (Vincent Houben), The Netherlands (Thomas Lindblad) and Indonesia (Thee Kian Wie), use a very wide range of sources to combine the insights of history, economic history and economics. All four authors have published widely in the field of Indonesian economic and social history. They have contributed to an array of conferences in the 1980s and 1990s that stimulated new research in this field.