Casting grievances as parental feeling allowed protestors to depoliticize them before the Governor-General
Evidence
Together, the principal organizersāVan HoĆ«vell, Ardesch, and Cantervisscherāpersuade the Governor-General that āparental feelingsā and the hardship parents experienced by having to school sons afar were not āmatters of stateā (staatkundige zaken) but āsocialā issues that posed no political threat. ā¦ Feeling that here [with respect to the Radikaal certiļ¬cate and secondary education] I was on less favorable terrain, I answered [Van HoĆ«vell] that with regard to this question, in which the parental feelings and the ļ¬nancial interests of city fathers was so closely concerned, I did not consider these of a purely political nature and if any respectable citizens and city fathers wanted to raise this with moderation and discretion, I would not be opposed but would present their petition to the King. ā Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ Epistemicā¦, 473
Categorization
Category: Causal Relationships
- XREF: Directly supports the bookās central thesis that sentiment was admitted into colonial political life; resonates with how other scholars have shown affect used to bracket or enable colonial rule.
Related
- Colonial officials permitted dissent reframed as social, not political. (similarity 0.88)
- Colonists framed parental grief as the core grievance (similarity 0.81)
- Colonial metropoles treated heartfelt parental feeling as politically dangerous discontent (similarity 0.80)
- Colonial officials invoked a private-mother-care versus public-state-care boundary to block reform (similarity 0.78)