The concept of comprador colonialism is academically vaguely defined and remains debated. It originates from the Portuguese term "Compradore" which translates into buyer, referring to agents of commercial enterprises based in Europe and North America and primarily operated in East, South, and Southeast Asia as well as Africa and South America.[1][2][3] In the height of Western European Colonialism in the 19th and 20th centuries, the compradors emerged as a new class that acted as intermediaries for colonial powers or foreign capital.[2] The new class profited from the colonial structure as it acted to strengthen foreign rather than national or local control over the political economy.[4] During the 19th and 20th centuries, the comprador class became critical agents of global capitalism.[1] By serving as so-called ‘Middlemen’ in the colonial enterprise, this new distinct bourgeoise class enabled the development of imperial trade networks, negotiated the supply of labor that extracted profit from the local landscape, established new patterns of consumption and taste, and facilitated cultural as well as economic exchange that was critical to the growth of colonized cities.[1] Scholars such as Robert Vitalis perceive the comprador and by extension the comprador bourgeoisie, as an important unit of analysis in studying economic and political change under colonialism and imperialism.[4] These colonial agents, the compradors, integrated the local economies into the global capitalist system in a subordinate position by facilitating the exploitation of local resources, labor, and markets.[2]