In 1961, the Trinidadian writer VS Naipaul, by then a major literary figure, was in the Dutch colony of Suriname researching his controversial Caribbean travelogue, The Middle Passage. Like many before and since, he was astonished at the all-pervasive cultural influence of the Netherlands:
The talk everywhere is of ‘Hol-lond’ and ‘Omsterdam’. In Surinam, Holland is Europe; Holland is the centre of the world … Surinam feels only like a tropical, tulip-less extension of Holland.
Though routinely scathing about colonial and postcolonial Caribbean society, Naipaul was impressed by Suriname’s governance and political stability, though he thought the capital Paramaribo was provincial and dull compared to his native Port of Spain.
Dutch colonialism seemed pragmatic, and Surinamers appeared genuinely attached to the Netherlands, which provided generous subsidies and an open migration policy. He acknowledged the existence of a nationalist movement, but did not think independence was imminent.
But only 14 years later, Suriname was indeed an independent republic, parting ways with the Kingdom of the Netherlands on 25 November, 1975 — half a century ago. The celebrations in Paramaribo were exuberant as 25,000 people crammed into the capital’s football stadium to see the Dutch flag lowered and the Surinamese tricolour raised before a spectacular firework display.
Earlier, the prime minister and leader of the opposition — representing the country’s African- and East Indian-descended communities — had publicly embraced in an emotional gesture of reconciliation. Princess Beatrix was there to express the Dutch Crown’s approval.
There was joy mixed with relief and apprehension. The run-up to independence had been tense, with antagonisms surfacing between ethnic and political rivals. Tens of thousands had migrated to the Netherlands in the preceding months, fearful of what was to come.
Neighbouring countries such as Brazil and Guyana were watching carefully with unresolved border disputes in mind. But above all, there was a sense of great and irreversible change, as over three more or less uninterrupted centuries of colonial rule came to an end.
The Dutch legacy was deep and mixed. The colony’s earlier period had been dominated by the plantation system and slavery. In this sense, Suriname was more akin to the Caribbean islands than to its South American neighbours because — like Jamaica, Cuba, or Haiti — it had been the scene of mass enslavement as a mechanism for producing tropical commodities such as sugar and tobacco.
The Dutch planters had a reputation for extreme cruelty, and three very different but influential books depicted Suriname as a merciless killing ground for enslaved Africans: Aphra Behn’s Oronooko (1688), Voltaire’s Candide (1759), and John Gabriel Stedman’s The Narrative of a Five Years’ Expedition Against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam (1796).
The last of these detailed the horrors of Suriname’s plantation system, but also the appearance of the Maroons, escaped African slaves whose descendants — distinct from coastal Creole — inhabit the forested interior and account for about 20% of the population.
The abolition of slavery in 1863 saw the beginning of a less repressive colonial system, and the arrival of large numbers of indentured (contract) labourers from British-run India and Java in the Dutch colony of Indonesia. Combined with Europeans, Indigenous Peoples, Chinese from the Dutch East Indies, and Jews who had moved from Brazil, these migrants formed a uniquely mixed population, with extensive diversity in language, culture and religion.
These migrants formed a uniquely mixed population, with extensive diversity in language, culture and religion
But the Dutch colony somehow held together, unified under a paternalistic model that recognised difference within a dominant European structure of education, law, and culture. From 1954, Suriname was a constituent country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands (with Holland itself and the Dutch Caribbean island colonies), with self-government and unlimited rights of migration. In 1961, Naipaul was able to remark perceptively that Suriname was “the only truly cosmopolitan territory in the West Indian region”.
This history of benevolent imperialism could have been quite different, however, if negotiations at a peace treaty in 1667 had failed to reach an agreement. The Peace of Breda ended the Second Anglo-Dutch War that had begun in March 1665 — ignited by trade disputes.
In a carve-up of colonial territories disputed during the conflict, the treaty ceded Suriname (then Dutch Guiana) from England to the Dutch Republic. In return, the Dutch gave away its control of an area it called New Netherland. This vast expanse of North America would subsequently become the colonies of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Delaware.
It seemed that the English got the better bargain, but before the independence of 1975, the Dutch would argue that Britain had lost New York but the Netherlands still owned Suriname.
This surprising turn of events points to the fact that the country we now know as Suriname was an English possession before it was taken over by the Dutch, and that it was briefly called Willoughbyland after it was claimed in 1650 by Lord Francis Willoughby — Governor of Barbados and a keen supporter of the exiled King Charles II.
He planned to create a Royalist refuge from Cromwell’s forces on the northeastern coast of South America. A short-lived colony of 30,000 acres grew up around a fort (now Fort Zeelandia in Paramaribo), and sugar plantations were worked by Indigenous labourers and enslaved Africans.
Willoughby was mostly absent from his colony and drowned during a hurricane near Guadeloupe in 1666. The following year, Willoughbyland became Dutch Guiana after the peace treaty.
Yet the British were not entirely finished with their territorial ambitions. From 1799 to 1816, Britain took control of Suriname while France occupied the Netherlands — but the colony was returned to the Dutch after the defeat of Napoleon.
In one episode of this complicated colonial saga, the British attacked and routed a Dutch garrison with a new armament invented by one Henry Shrapnel. The 1804 assault on Fort Nieuw Amsterdam was successful because of an exploding artillery projectile that scattered lethal bullets along a shell’s trajectory. It was the first time that shrapnel — now sadly familiar to all of us — was used as a targeted weapon of war.
Intercolonial bloodletting eventually came to an end, the Dutch ruled Suriname for 300 years, and finally left the country — the smallest in South America — as a culturally isolated enclave where nearly all economic activity still takes place on a small coastal strip.
Fifty years on, independent Suriname recalls some dark days — a state of near civil war, military takeovers, and economic hardship — but can also look forward to a brighter future. The country’s first female president was elected in July 2025, and Suriname now anticipates a lift in its fortunes when recently discovered offshore oil and gas start commercial production in 2028.
Long belittled as a place that few people could identify on a world map, Suriname may soon be riding a tourist — as well as energy — boom. The imprint of the Netherlands is still clearly visible in Paramaribo’s elegant Inner City — a UNESCO World Heritage site where Dutch architectural tastes are fused with indigenous materials and craftsmanship.
The city and Atlantic coast quickly give way to rainforest, which covers more than 90% of the country and is extraordinarily rich in biodiversity. Rainforest tours are available; Paramaribo is different from anywhere else in the region — and Suriname is easily reached from Guyana and Trinidad & Tobago courtesy of Caribbean Airlines!