Although Switzerland never had a formal empire, it was integrated across national boundaries into larger processes of western European imperial expansion. Various Swiss mercenaries, plantation owners, entrepreneurs, traders, as well as missionaries, had a significant presence in British, Dutch, French and other empires. Scholars have termed the case of Switzerland as that of ‘colonialism without colonies’; while Swiss had limited political influence in the empires, they nevertheless benefitted from and aided governance of the colonised.
Against this backdrop, this article examines the case of the Basel Mission in Malabar and South Canara in South India during the second half of the nineteenth century. The Basel Mission was a peculiar Protestant Missionary Society – it set up and engaged in various economic activities in its mission stations, such as printing, weaving, tile-making. This paper examines the Basel Mission’s weaving factories. It shows that the workers in the Weaving Establishments perceived their work more for livelihood than for adherence with an imposed religious lifestyle, in contrast to the missionaries who expected gratitude and conformity from the workers. Missionaries imposed supervision and hierarchical management in factories which caused tensions between them and the workers. By examining such instances which were often exacerbated by famine conditions, the article explore the limits of the Basel Mission in regulating labour.
