In his dissertation, Philipp Krauer pursues the traces of around 5,800 Swiss mercenaries who served in the Dutch colonial army in Indonesia from the foundation of the Swiss federal state in 1848 until the outbreak of the First World War in 1914. Occasionally, the Swiss provided up to 10 per cent of the European troop contingent and thus contributed to the violent Dutch expansion in the Malay Archipelago.

Based on sources from various archives in Switzerland, the Netherlands and Indonesia, this work examines the social backgrounds of the mercenaries: What motivated them to join the colonial army? What experiences did they gain within the colonial space and how did they interact with the local population and authorities? Second, this project sheds light on the money flows from Batavia (now Jakarta) to the colonial veterans and their families in Switzerland. Another aim of this work is to analyse the ideas, images and imaginations that circulated within this colonial space from the Malay Archipelago to the Alps.

The project thus attempts to contribute to the growing scholarship on the transnational, interconnected histories of Switzerland, the Netherlands and Indonesia. It aims to point out how colonialism was a common, often shared, European project, which not only influenced the colonies but also shaped the European hinterland across social strata far away from the metropolises.