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oa ‘De spijkers zijn eruit, maar de gaten zijn gebleven’
Van slaafgemaakten tot burgers van Suriname 1863-1940
- Amsterdam University Press
- Source: Tijdschrift voor Geschiedenis, Volume 137, Issue 4, Dec 2024, p. 372 - 393
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- 01 Dec 2024
Abstract
‘The nails are out, but the holes remain’. From enslaved people to citizens of Suriname
This contribution examines the policy of the colonial administration in Suriname between 1863 and 1940 to integrate formerly enslaved people (called Creoles after 1863) into Surinamese society after the abolition of slavery. The focus is on socio-economic, socio-cultural, and political measures. These measures are examined in order to discover to what extent they led to full citizenship for the former enslaved people in socio-economic, socio-cultural, and political terms. The starting point is 1863, when slavery was abolished in Suriname, and the end point is 1940, when the outbreak of World War II ended Suriname as an agricultural colony. On the socio-economic front, planter interests dominated, with the former enslaved and their descendants continuing to provide cheap labour on the plantations. Government measures to create a structural class of Creole smallholders (peasantry) were absent. In socio-cultural terms, the policy was to encourage Creole assimilation of Dutch language and culture (Dutchification or going Dutch). After 1863 the colonial administration banned African-American religious and other cultural expressions. Suriname had had limited suffrage since 1866, and because of this the Creole working class was excluded from political life. Rather than full citizenship, we can speak of a ‘debased’ form of citizenship.