Philip Post is a historian of colonialism and empire, with a particular interest in the political and administrative history of the Dutch colonial world. He received his PhD from Leiden University in 2025. 

His dissertation examined how Dutch colonial officials in Ambon and Ternate justified their authority between 1750 and 1870. It focused on the transition from VOC to colonial state rule and on a central paradox within that transition: while nineteenth-century administrators distanced themselves from the VOC and presented their rule in terms of civilisation, welfare, and progress, they continued to rely on many of the Company’s laws, practices, and traditions. By analysing governors and the narratives through which they legitimised their authority, the dissertation shows how apparent political change could coexist with substantial continuities in colonial governance.

At KITLV, he works as a postdoctoral researcher on a project examining the colonial histories of taxation and customs in the Dutch empire. His research focuses on the development and circulation of fiscal and administrative practices across the Dutch colonial world, with particular attention to the connections between the Netherlands, Suriname, the Caribbean, and the Dutch East Indies. More broadly, his research interests include colonial governance, political culture, institutional change, and the circulation of administrative knowledge within and between empires.

Selected Publications

Post, P.G., ‘Leven in de schaduw van de Compagnie: Vestigingskolonialisme in Nederlands-Indië in de jaren 1850’, Internationale Neerlandistiek 63-3: 252–273, 2025. DOI. 

Post, P.G., Constructing colonial legitimacy in the Moluccas, 1750–1870, PhD dissertation, Leiden University, 2025. DOI.

Post, P.G., ‘A benign empire? The instrumentalization of abolitionism in the Moluccas, 1817–1879’, BMGN – Low Countries Historical Review 139-3: 118–140, 2024. DOI.

Post, P.G., ‘Revolution and resistance: An exploration of the looping effect in the Moluccas in 1817’, Itinerario 48-2: 136–151, 2024. DOI.

Post, P.G., ‘Governors, regents, and rituals: An exploration of colonial diplomacy in Ambon at the turn of the nineteenth century’, Diplomatica 3-1: 74–94, 2021. DOI.