"Sexual Affronts and Racial Frontiers: National Identity, 'Mixed Bloods1 and the Cultural Genealogies of Europeans in Colonial

Southeast Asia" Ann Stoler CSST Working Paper #64

May 1991

CRSO Working Paper #454

"SEXUAL AFFRONTS AND RACIAL FRONTIERS: NATIONAL IDENTITY. "MIXED BLOODS" AND THE CULTURAL GENEALOGIES OF EUROPEANS IN COLONIAL SOUTHEAST ASIA

Ann Stoler Departments of Anthroplogy and History University of Michigan

This paper is concerned with the construct ion of colonial categories and national identities. and with those people who ambiguously straddled, crossed and I begin with

threatened these imperial divides.'

a story about m b t i s s a ~ e (interracial

unions; and the sorts of progeny t o which it gave rise ("indos". "mbtis", "mixedbloods") in French Indochina at the turn of the century. It is a story whose multiple versions are about people whose cultural s.ensibilities, physical being, and political sentiments called into question the distinctions of difference which maintainea the neat boundaries of colonial rule. Its plot and resolution defy the treatment of European nationalist impulses and colonial racist policies a s discrete projects, since here it

An much shorter and earl ier version of the paper was original ly presented at a session in honor of Eric Wolf at the Annual Meetings of the American Anthropological Association. New Orleans. December 1990. This version was prepared for the TNI Conference "The Decolonization of Imagination: The New Europe and Its Othersu, Amsterdam. 3-5 May 1991.

'

was i n t h e c o n f l a t i o n of

r a c i a l c a t e g o r y , sexual m o r a l i t y , c u l t u r a l competence and

it

n a t i o n a l i d e n t i t y t h a t t h e case was c o n t e s t e d and p o l i t i c a l l y charged. More b r o a d l y . allows m e t o address one o f t h e t e n s i o n s o f empire which t h i s paper o n l y b e g i n s t o sketch; t h e r e l a t i o n s h i p between t h e r h e t o r i c s o f i n c l u s i o n , humanitarianism and

e q u a l i t y which informed l i b e r a l p o l i c y a t t h e t u r n o f t h e c e n t u r y i n c o l o n i a l Southeast Asia. and t h e e x c l u s i o n a r y , d i s c r i m i n a t o r y p r a c t i c e s which were r e a c t i v e t o , 2 co-existent

i

w i t h , and perhaps i n h e r e n t i n l i b e r a l i s m i t s e l f .

Nowhere i s t h i s r e l a t i o n s h i p between i n c l u s i o n a r y impulses and e x c l u s i o n a r y p r a c t i c e s more e v i d e n t t h a n i n how m e t issage was l e g a l 1y handled, c u l t u r a l 1y i n s c r i b e d and p o l i t i c a l l y t r e a t e d i n t h e c o n t r a s t i n g c o l o n i a l c u l t u r e s o f French I n d o c h i n a and t h e Netherlands I n d i e s . French Indochina was a c o l o n y o f commerce, occupied by t h e m i l i t a r y i n t h e 1860s. s e t t l e d by colons i n t h e 1870s w i t h a m e t i s p o p u l a t i o n which numbered no . ~ Netherlands I n d i e s b y more t h a n several hundred by t h e t u r n o f t h e ~ e n t u r y The c o n t r a s t . had been s e t t l e d s i n c e t h e e a r l y 1600s w i t h those o f mixed-descent o r borne i n t h e I n d i e s numbering i n t h e tens o f thousands i n 1900, making up n e a r l y t h r e e - q u a r t e r s o f those l e g a l l y designated as European. T h e i r I n d i s c h e mestizo c u l t u r e shaped t h e contours o f c o l o n i a l s o c i e t y f o r i t s f i r s t two hundred y e a r s . 4
.
.

I n conventional

historiography.

French c o l o n i a l i s m i s f r e q u e n t l y d e f i n e d by i t s a s s i m i l a t i o n i s t p o l i c y

and "acceptance o f r a c i a l e q u a l i t y " i n c o n t r a s t t o t h e B r i t i s h " c o l o u r b a r " , w i t h t h e Netherlands I n d i e s s t a n d i n g somewhere i n between.

What i s s t r i k i n g i s t h a t s i m i l a r d i s c o u r s e s were mapped on t o such v a s t l y

I owe t h i s p a r t i c u l a r f o r m u l a t i o n t o Uday Mehta ( " L i b e r a l S t r a t e g i e s of E x c l u s i o n " P o l i t i c s and S o c i e t y 18(4):427-54) who c o g e n t l y argues f o r t h e more r a d i c a l c l a i m t h a t t h e t h e o r e t i c a l underpinnings o f l i b e r a l i s m a r e e x c l u s i o n a r y and cannot be e x p l a i n e d as ''an e p i s o d i c compromise w i t h t h e p r a c t i c a l c o n s t r a i n t s o f i m p l e m e n t a t i o n " , p.429.

3 . Cochinchine's European p o p u l a t i o n o n l y increased from 594 i n 1864 t o 3,000 b y 1900 (Charles Meyer. De Francais en I n d o c h i n e . 1860-1910. Paris:Hachette, p . 7 0 ) . By 1914 t h e r e were o n l y 149 p l a n t e r s q u a l i f i e d as e l e c t o r s i n t h e Chamber o f A g r i c u l t u r e of Tonkin and Annam; on Java alone t h e r e were s e v e r a l thousand. See John L a f f e y ' s "Racism i n Tonkin b e f o r e 1914" French C o l o n i a l S t u d i e s (1977):65-81. See Jean T a y l o r ' s (1983) h i s t o r i c a l l y and conceptual 1 y r i c h gendered a n a l y s i s t h e mestizo f e a t u r e s o f c o l o n i a l c u l t u r e i n t h e Netherlands I n d i e s .
Of

See M a r t i n Lewis' "One Hundred M i 1 1 i o n Frenchmen: The " A s s i m i l a t i o n " t h e o r y i n French c o l o n i a l p o l i c y " Comparative Studies i n S o c i e t y and H i s t o r y (1961)4:129-51.

d i f f e r e n t r a c i a l and p o l i t i c a l

landscapes: t h a t i n b o t h t h e I n d i e s and Indochina, w i t h

t h e i r d i s t i n c t demographics and i n t e r n a l rhythms, mbtissage was a f o c a l p o i n t o f p o l i t i c a l , l e g a l and s o c i a l debate, conceived as a dangerous source o f subversion, a t h r e a t t o w h i t e p r e s t i g e , an embodiment o f European d e g e n e r a t i o n and moral decay .= would suggest t h a t b o t h were so charged, i n p a r t because such " m i x i n g " c a l l e d i n t o
I

quest i o n t h e v e r y c r i t e r i a b y which "Europeanness" c o u l d be i d e n t i f i e d , c i t i z e n s h i p s h o u l d be accorded and n a t i o n a l i t y assigned. Mbtissane r e p r e s e n t e d n o t o n l y t h e dangers . o f f o r e i g n enemies a t n a t i o n a l b o r d e r s , b u t t h e more p r e s s i n g a f f r o n t f o r European nation-states, nation. what t h e German p h i l o s o p h e r F i c h t e so a p t l y d e f i n e d as t h e essence o f t h e
7

i t s "interior frontiers".

The concept o f an " i n t e r i o r f r o n t i e r " i s c o m p e l l i n g p r e c i s e l y because o f t h e c o n t r a d i c t o r y c o n n o t a t i o n s i t i m p l i e s . As E t i e n n e B a l i b a r has noted, a f r o n t i e r l o c a t e s

S
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' a , '

-;

b o t h a C s i t e o f enclosure and c o n t a c t . o f s u r v e i l l e d passage and exchange. Coupled w i t h t h e word " i n t e r i o r " i t c a r r i e s t h e sense o f i n t e r n a l d t s t i n c t i o n s w i t h i n an t e r r i t o r y

.
*.

i-

: -

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( o r empire); a t the l e v e l o f the i n d i v i d u a l , subject r e t a i n s her/his national

i t marks t h e moral p r e d i c a t e s by which a

.
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i d e n t i t y despite l o c a t i o n (outside the national As F i c h t e deployed i t , an

f r o n t i e r ) and d e s p i t e h e t e r o g e n e i t y w i t h i n t h e n a t i o n - s t a t e . " i n t e r i o r f r o n t i e r " r a i s e s two p r o b l e m a t i c s :

= .
l i .

t h a t t h e " p u r i t y " o f t h e community i s prone

t o p e n e t r a t i o n on i t s i n t e r i o r and e x t e r i o r b o r d e r s , and t h a t t h e essence o f t h e community i s an i n t a n g i b l e "moral a t t i t u d e " . "a m u l t i p l i c i t y o f invisible ties".

8

Viewing l a t e 1 9 t h c e n t u r y r e p r e s e n t a t i o n s o f a " n a t i o n a l essence" i n these terms, we can t r a c e how mbtissaqe emerges as a powerful t r o p e f o r i n t e r n a l contamtnation and

For an extended d i s c u s s i o n o f t h e p o l it i c s o f degeneracy and t h e eugenics o f empire see m y "Carnal Knowledge and I m p e r i a l Power: The p o l i t i c s o f race and sexual m o r a l i t y i n c o l o n i a l A s i a " i n Gender a t t h e Crossroads: F e m i n i s t Anthropology i n t h e Post-Modern Era, ed. M i c a e l a d i Leonardo, U n i v e r s i t y o f C a l i f o r n i a Press, forthcoming. I n t h e f o l l o w i n g s e c t i o n I draw h e a v i l y on E t i e n n e B a l i b a r ' s h i g h l y informed and s u b t l e d i s c u s s i o n o f t h i s concept i n " F i c h t e e t l a F r o n t i e r e I n t e r i e u r e : A propos des D i s c o u r s a l a n a t i o n allemande". Cahiers de Fontenay ( f o r t h c o m i n g ) .

F i c h t e quoted i n Bal i b a r ,

i b i d . ,p.4.

c h a l l e n g e , m o r a l l y , p o l i t i c a l l y , and s e x u a l l y c o n ~ e i v e d ,The . ~ changing d e n s i t y and i n t e n s i t y o f i t s d i s c u r s i v e f i e l d o u t l i n e s the f a u l t l i n e s o f c o l o n i a l a u t h o r i t y ; l i n k i n g domestic arrangements t o t h e p u b l i c o r d e r , f a m i l y t o t h e s t a t e , sex t o in

subversion, and p s y c h o l o g i c a l essence t o r a c i a l type, metissaqe might be r e a d as a metonynm f o r t h e b i o p o l i t i c s o f empire a t l a r g e . I n b o t h Indochina and t h e Netherlands I n d i e s , t h e r e j e c t i o n o f m d t i s as a d i s t i n c t l e g a l c a t e g o r y o n l y i n t e n s i f i e d how t h e p o l i t i c s o f c u l t u r a l d i f f e r e n c e were p l a y e d o u t i n o t h e r domains.i0 I n both colonies, t h e m & t i s / " i n d o U problem produced a

d i s c o u r s e i n which f a c i l e t h e o r i e s of

r a c i a l h i e r a r c h y were r e j e c t e d . w h i l e c o n f i r m i n g

t h e p r a c t i c a l p r e d i c a t e s o f European s u p e r i o r i t y a t t h e same t i m e . The e a r l y Vietnamese and Indonesian n a t i o n a l i s t movements c r e a t e d new sources o f c o l o n i a l v u l n e r a b i l i t y , and some o f t h e debates over t h e n a t u r e and d e f i n i t i o n o f Dutch and French n a t i o n a l i d e n t i t y must be seen i n t h a t l i g h t . As Paul R i c h suggests, t h e resurgence o f European

n a t i o n a l i s t r h e t o r i c may p a r t l y have been a response t o n a t i o n a l i s t r e s i s t a n c e i n t h e c o l o n i e s . b u t i t cannot be accounted f o r i n these terms a l o n e . For French I n d o c h ~ n a .

d i s c o u r s e s about t h e dangers o f metissane were s u s t a i n e d i n p e r i o d s o f quiescence and cannot be viewed as r h e t o r i c s o f r e a c t i o n t o u t c o u r t . T h i s i s n o t t o suggest t h a t t h e r e was no correspondence between them. The p r o f u s i o n o f French j u r i d i c a l t r a c t s i n the

1930s as t o whether m d t i s should be made a separate l e g a l c a t e g o r y ( d i s t i n c t from "European" and " i n d i q e n e " ) , and t h e p o l i t i c a l e f f e c t s o f d o i n g so, were f o r g e d i n t h e tense environment i n which Vietnamese n a t i o n a l i s t s were making t h e i r o p p o s i t i o n most

See m y "Carnal Knowledge and I m p e r i a l Power" on mdtissaqe and c o n t a m i n a t i o n . Also see Andre-Pierre T a g u i e f f d s La Force du Prdjugd (1987). where he discusses " l a h a n t i s s e du m6tissaget1 and argues t h a t t h e m e t i s problem i s n o t a q u e s t i o n o f mixed-blood b u t a q u e s t i o n o f t h e i n d e t e r m i n a t e " s o c i a l i d e n t i t y " which metissage i m p l i e s , pp. 345.
lo T h i s i s n o t t o suggest t h a t t h e French a n i Dutch r e j e c t i o n o f Y m d t i s u as a l e g a l c a t e g o r y f o l l o w e d t h e same t r a j e c t o r y o r o c c u r r e d i n t h e same way. As I l a t e r show, t h e l e g a l s t a t u s o f m e t i s c h i l d r e n w i t h unknown p a r e n t s was s t i l l a s u b j e c t o f French j u r i d i c a l debate i n t h e 1930s. i n a d i s c o u r s e i n which " r a c e ' and " u p b r i n g i n g " were o f f e r e d as two a l t e r n a t i v e c r i t e r i a f o r j u d g i n g whether a m d t i s c h i l d s h o u l d be granted t h e r i g h t s o f a c i t o y e n . See Jacques Mazet (1932). La c o n d i t i o n j u r i d i q u e des m e t i s dans l e s possession f r a n c a i s e s . Paris:Domat-Montchresiten.

l1 Paul R i c h . Race and Empire i n B r i t i s h P o l i t i c s . Cambridge: Cambridge U n i v e r s i t y Press ( 1 9 8 6 ) , where he argues t h a t t h e a n t i - b l a c k r i o t s i n L i v e r p o o l and C a r d i f f i n 1919 represented "the extension of r i s i n g c o l o n i a l nationalism i n t o the heart o f the B r i t i s h m e t r o p o l i s i t s e l f a t a t i m e when n a t i o n a l i s t ferment was b e i n g expressed i n many p a r t s o f t h e empireoi.p. 122.

5 strongly felt. l 2 But anti-colonial challenges in Indochina, contrary ,to the discourse which characterized the metis as a potential subversive vanguard, was never predominantly led, nor peopled, by them. In the Indies on the other hand, where persons of mixed descent made up a potentially powerful constituency, the bids they made for economic, social and political reform. were more often made in contradistinction to the demands of the native population, not in alliance with them. While the content of the metis problem was in part responsive to popular threats to colonial rule. I would suggest that the particular

form

that the securing of European

privilege took was not shaped in the colonies alone. The focus on moral unity, cultural genealogy and language joined the imagining of European colonial communities and 'metropolitan national entities in fundamental ways. Both visions embraced a moral rearmement, centering on the domestic domain and the family. as sites where state
.

authority could be secured or irreparably undermined.

13

In both metropole and colony, the liberal impulse for social welfare. representation and protective legislation at the turn of the century focused enormous energy on domestic arrangements, sexual morality, parenting and more specifically on the moral environments in which chi ldren 1 ived.l 4 Both educatibn and upbringing emerged as national projects, but not as we might expect, with a firm sense of national identity

+ !

12.See David Marr's two important studies of the Vietnamese nationalist movements, Vietnamese Anticolonialism, 1885-1925. Berkeley: California Press: and Tradition on Trial, 1920-1945. Berekely: California Press. It is noteworthy that Marr makes no reference to the metis problem (generally.or as it related to citizenship. immigration and education) in either text.
l 3 This is not to suggest, however, that the battles for legal reform regarding, for example. paternity suits. illegitimate children and family law waged by jurists, feminists and religious organizations in the Netherlands and the Indies at the turn of the century, were animated by the same political projects or fears; on the contrary, in the colonies. the "social menace" of illegitimate children, as we shall see, was more than about future criminals and prostitutes, but about mixed-blood criminals and prostitutes, about European paternity and native mothers, and thus about the moral landscape of race and the protection of European men by the Dutch colonial state. For contrasting discourses on paternity suits in the Indies and Holland compare Selma Sevenhutjsen's comprehensive study of this political debate (Oe Orde van het Vaderschap:Politieke debatten over onqehuwd moederschap, a f s t a m m i n ~en huwelijk in Nederland 1870-1900. Amsterdam: Stichting Beheer IISG) to R.Kleynls "Onderzoek naar het vaderschap" Het Recht in Nederlandsch-Indie 6 7 (1896):130-50. l 4 On the relationship between racial supremacy and new conceptions of British motherhood at the turn of the century see Anna Davin's "Imperialism and Motherhood" History Workshop (1978)5:9-57.

imported t o t h e p e r i p h e r y from t h e m e t r o p o l i t a n c o r e . As Eugene Weber has argued f o r l a t e 1 9 t h c e n t u r y France. " p a t r i o t i c f e e l i n g s on t h e n a t i o n a l l e v e l , f a r from

i n s t i n c t i v e , had t o be l e a r n e d " . l5As l a t e as 1901, s i x o u t o f e v e r y t e n French army r e c r u i t s had n o t heard o f t h e Franco-Prussian war. l6 Thus t h e F r e n c h i f i c a t i o n o f France and i t s c o l o n i e s through compulsory education, moral i n s t r u c t i o n and language was n o t a

one way process, w i t h an consensual template f o r t h a t i d e n t i t y f o r g e d i n t h e metropole and l a t e r t r a n s p o r t e d by new m e t r o p o l i t a n r e c r u i t s t o c o l o n i a l c i t i z e n s . Between 1871 and 1914, as Raoul G i r a r d e t has noted. French a u t h o r i t i e s were preoccupied w i t h t h e t h r e a t o f n a t i o n a l diminishment and d e c l i n e - - e x t e r n a l and i n t e r i o r f r o n t i e r s were i n

For France, t h e i s s u e was compl i c a t e d (and d i s t i n g u i s h e d quest i o n a t home and abroad. l7 from t h e s i t u a t i o n i n t h e N e t h e r l a n d s ) , by a d e c l i n i n g n a t a l i t y throughout t h e 1 9 t h c e n t u r y w h o s e . a c c e l e r a t i o n i n t h e 1880s placed a premium on s t a t e s t r a t e g i e s t h a t would a l l o w a wider membership i n t h e French n a t i o n a l community w h i l e p r o t e c t i n g t h e c u l t u r a l contours o f what i t meant t o be French. 18

See Eugene Weber's Peasant i n t o Frenchmen (1976) S t a n f o r d : Stanf o r d U n i v e r s i t y Press, p.114. While Weber's argument t h a t much o f France's r u r a l p o p u l a t i o n n e i t h e r considered i t s e l f French n o r embraced a n a t i o n a l i d e n t i t y has been s t r o n g l y r e f u t e d by many s c h o l a r s , f o r m y purposes h i s a n c i l l a r y argument h o l d s ; namely, t h a t debates over t h e n a t u r e o f French c i t i z e n s h i p and i d e n t i t y were h e a v i l y c o n t e s t e d a t t h e t i m e .
l6 Weber,

i b i d . . p . 110.

l7 Raoul G i r a r d e t . L e n a t i o n a l i s m e f r a n c a i s (1983) S e u i 1 : P a r i s . 30-31. Also see Robert Nye.'s Crime, madness and p o l i t i c s i n modern France: The medical concept o f n a t i o n a l d e c l i n e where he n o t e s t h a t " t h e ' s c i e n t i f i c ' study o f n a t i o n a l c h a r a c t e r was a p.140. v e r i t a b l e i n d u s t r y i n France i n t h e t h i r t y years b e f o r e World War I",

French f e r t i l i t y r a t e s began t o d e c l i n e i n t h e l a t e . 1 8 t h c e n t u r y , much e a r l i e r t h a n i n o t h e r European c o u n t r i e s b u t decreased most s h a r p l y a f t e r 1881 (See C l a i r e Goldberg Moses, French Feminism i n t h e 19th Century. 1984: Binghamt0n:SUNY. pp. 20-24). Demographic d e c l i n e , as opposed t o i n d i v i d u a l f e r t i l i t y p e r se, was p a r t i c u l a r l y low i n 1900 w i t h t h e number o f French c i t i z e n s s h r i n k i n g as those o f Germany. f o l l o w i n g t h e l o s e of Alsace-Lorraine i n 1870 increased (See Jan Romein's The Watershed of Two Eras: Europe i n 1900. p . 6 ) . While French a n x i e t i e s over n a t i o n a l i d e n t i t y d u r i n g t h i s p e r i o d a r e most commonly a t t r i b u t e d t o t h e l o s s o f Alsace-Lorraine, o f equal import and perhaps more s a l i e n c y was t h e c o l l e c t i v e a s s i m i l a t i o n o f over 100.000 A l g e r i a n Jews under t h e Crbmieux Decree i n t h e same y e a r . Debates over who was " r e a l l y ' French and who was n o t s t r o n g l y i n t e n s i f i e d over t h e n e x t twenty years as i n c r e a s i n g numbers o f w o r k i n g - c l a s s I t a l i a n s . Spanish and M a l t e s e i n A l g e r i a were accorded French c t t i z e n s h i p . Thus, o f t h e 200.000 "Francaise d ' A l q e r i e U . more than h a l f were o f non-French o r i g i n . Coupled w i t h t h e 20.000 P a r i s i a n p o l i t i c a l u n d e s i r a b l e s deported t h e r e by t h e 2nd R e p u b l i c i n 1851 (commonly r e f e r r e d t o as " l e s s a n s - t r a v a i l " , " l e s r 6 v o l t 6 s " . I 1 l e s d b r a c i n b s " ) , t h e equivocal n a t i o n a l l o y a l t i e s o f A l g e r i a ' s French c o l o n i a l p o p u l a t i o n were reopened t o q u e s t i o n . See P i e r r e N o r a ' s Les Francais d l A l g e r i e (1961) Paris:Renb J u l l i a r d .

T h e convergence of. domestic arid colonial iocial reform- in the ~ e t h e r l a k d s ' ii'eve". . . . .. . . more striking. if of a somewhat different order. The two decades before and after the

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turn of the century are marked b y G o newly formulated sociopolitical projects: o n the ..-. . one hand, by a middle-class preocc&tion with the chi ldrearing practices of D U ~ C ~ -. -. -. . - . work i ng-cl a s s fam i i i es, and kith a more general "civilizing offensiventhat focised 6n inoral "uplift"
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,-.
,

A s A l l d e Regt argues, middle class energies and

. ..

. -

- ..

. --.? ..

state intervent ions were focused, not o n popular education per se, but on"the 'small . <.-. minority of "neglected" and "del i n ~ u e n t u ~ ~ w o ~ k ci la ns gs chi ldren whose uoovo&dihou

(upbringing) i l l-prepir&d them fbr "their future place in the social system" and thus marked them a s a danger to the state.'' I n tandem with this domestic 'civili'zing"

--

. . .- -.

..

impulse w a s -also a n imperial one: 'issues of upbringing and education brought metropolitan c i a s s and imperial visions together in new sorts of

.-

The securing

of D u t c n influence in South Africa just prior to the outbreak of the Boer War centered o n a specific set of cultural strategies: here too education, language and a cultural

belonging w e r e to mark the new boundaries of a "Greater Netherlands" that would embrace Flanders, S o u t h ~ f r i c aand the

in die^.^'

The point is that in both metropolitan class

and imperial projects. eaucation. childrearing and national belonging were intimately tied. Thus. w h o might be consiaered ''truly" French or Dutch resonated from ccre to CClOny and f r o m colony to core.22 In t h e Indies and Indochina. it was cultural milieu. both upbringing and education. that w e r e seen to oemarcate which mbtis children would

l 9 See A1 i d e R e ~ r ' s "De vorming van een opvoedings-tradi tie: arbiederskinceren rond lS00" in Geschiecenis van oovoedino e n onderwijs. 8 . Kruithof. J . Nordman. Piet c e R3oy. eds. (1982). Nijmepen.

" S e e M. Kui tenbrcuwer . 1985. Neder 1 and e n d e ookomst van he? modern imoer ial i sme: kclonien e n buitenlandse oolitiek. 1870-1902. Amsterdam. pp.176-177.
22 For t h e Netheriands. compulsory education w a s only instituted in 1900 rt about the same time it was i n ~ r o d u c e dt o t h e Indies (see J a n Romein [I9781 The Watershed of Two Eras: Eurooe in 1P00. Wesleyan. p.278. On the relationship between the development of the modern Dutch strte and the new f o c u s o n family morality and motherhood at the turn of the century see Siep Stuurman's Verzuilino. Kaoitalisme e n Patriarc3aat:asoezten van c o ontvikkelino van a e moderne staat in Nederland (1987). For France, see Jacques Dcnzelot's The Policino cf Families ( 1 9 7 9 ) that traces state interventions in fzmily life a n c c3ildreering ,crzctices to a half century earlier.

turn into revolutionaries? patricldes,~loyal subjects citizens of -the , . . . . or-full-fledged .* - . . . .

1 . '
I

nation-state. As T.H. Marshal 1 has . .when the -.State guarantees that, a1 1 A ., , .., . l ,: a ,. , . - , . . .* , -. r:, ., .:. ' . - ---. ,argued.
_1

- -

8 . 2

-J.-.

. ,

children shall be ed.ucated i t has the requirements a,nd the nature, . . of. ci tizensh!p - - . definitely in
....

. ..

Mktis education ups -about retaining .colonial boundaries ..

. . .
a:,

. ...

- .

and

regenerat tng the nation. At i&ue

were the means by .which European, beschavlnq, . , :

_*

(civilization/ culture) vould be disseminated-wlthout undercutting the criteria by which., . . _ ..,. . . . . - ... Euhopeans claims to prlvtlege were made.
.-..

..

As such. the discourses about mbtissaqe expressed.more pervasive if

?

inchoate

.-,..

dilemmas of colonial rule, and a fundamental contradiction of. imperial domination; whzt Gerald Sider. in another context. Identified as the tension between a_f.orrn of domination .. . predicated on both inc-orporation and distancing at one and the same time.24 This tension expressed itself in "the m6t'i.s . ~ r o b l e m o l : quintessentiel form: some met is were
.. -

in

candidates for Incorporation, to others it was categorically denied. In-either case', the decision that a mbtis should be granted citizenship or subject status, could not be made On the basis Of race alone. since some degree of European de,scent was, by definjtion. .. what all metis shared.'How then to mark out the candidates for exclusion from the national community while retaining the possibility that some individuals would be granted the rights of inclusion because French and Dutch "blood prevailed in their veins?" I explore that'question in this paper by working off a disparate set of texts and contexts: a criminal court proceeding in Haiphong in 1898, the Hanoi campaign against child abanaonment in the early 1900s. the protracted debate on mixed marriage leg,islation in the 1ndies between 1887 and 1898; and finally, the confused and failed efforts of the Indo-European movement itself in the Indies to articulate i t ; 0~00~iti0n to "pure-b1oo.d" Dutch by call ing upon race, place, and cultural genealogy to make its demands. In each of these texts, class, gender and cultural markers deny and designate exclusionary practices at one and the same time. We cannot,determine which of these

23 See T.H. Marshall. Class. citizens hi^ and Social Develoornent. .Westport.Conn.:Greenwood. p.81.
24 See Sider. "When Parrots Learn to Talk, and Why They Can't: Domination. .Deception, and Self-Deception in Indian-White ~ e l a t i o n s "C o m ~ a r a t i v eStudies in Sociefv and Historv (19!27):3-23.

categories i s p r i v i l e ~ e d a t any g i v e n moment by s o r t i n g o u t t h e f i x e d primacy o f race over gender, o r gender over c l a s s . O n the c o n t r a r y ,

I t r a c e an u n s t a b l e and uneven s e t

o f d i s c o u r s e s i n which d i f f e r e n t i n s t i t u t i o n a l a u t h o r i t i e s c l a i m e d primacy f o r one over another i n r e l a t i o n s h i p t o how o t h e r a u t h o r i t i e s attempted t o designate how p o l i t i c a l boundaries were t o be p r o t e c t e d and assigned. For m i d - V i c t o r i a n England, Mary Poovey

argues t h a t discourses about gender i d e n t i t y were g r a d u a l l y d i s p l a c e d i n t h e 1850s b y t h e i s s u e o f n a t i b n a l i d e n t i t y . 2 5 However, on t h e i s s u e o f m b t i s s a ~ e , t h e r e i s n o t h i n g l i n e a r about these developments; r a t h e r , c l a s s d i s t i n c t i o n s , gender p r e s c r i p t i o n s .

c u l t u r a l knowledge and r a c i a l membership were s i m u l t a n e o u s l y invoked and s t r a t e g i c a l l y f i l l e d w i t h d i f f e r e n t meanings f o r v a r i e d p r o j e c t s . Nor were p a t r i a r c h a l p r i n c i p l e s alwavs a p p l i e d t o shore up government p r i o r i t i e s . C o l o n i a l a u t h o r i t i e s w i t h competing agendas o n l y agreed on two premises: t h a t c h i l d r e n had t o be taught b o t h t h e i r p l a c e and

race, and t h a t t h e f a m i l y was t h e c r u c i a l s i t e i n which f u t u r e s u b j e c t s ' a n d l o y a l c i t i z e n s were t o be made. Given t h i s ,

,

i t i s not s u r p r i s i n g t h a t t h e domestic l i f e o f

i n d i v i d u a l s was i n c r e a s i n g l y s u b j e c t t o t h e p u b l i c s c r u t i n y o f a wide range o f p r i v a t e and government o r g a n i z a t i o n s who charged themselves w i t h t h e task o f p o l i c i n g t h e moral b o r d e r l a n d s o f t h e European community and the p s y c h o l o g i c a l p r o p e n s i t i e s o f i t s m a r g i n a l , . as w e l l as supposedly f u l l - f l e d g e d , members.

CULTURAL COMPETENCE A N D METISSAGE

I n 1898 i n t h e French Indochinese c i t y o f Haiphong. t h e 19 year o l d son o f a French minor naval employee. German naval mechanic. Sieur Icard, allegedly without provocation assaulted a

s t r u c k h i s temple w i t h a whip. attempted t o c r u s h h i s eye, and

was sentenced by t h e t r i b u n a l c o u r t t o s i x months i n p r i s o n . 2 6 Subsequent t o t h e sentence and spurred by t h e f a t h e r ' s e f f o r t s t o make an appeal f o r an a t t e n u a t e d p r i s o n term, some h i g h e r o f f i c i a l s questioned whether t h e p e n a l t y was unduly severe. Clemency

25 See Mary Poovey's Uneven Developments: The I d e o l o q i c a l Work o f Gender i n MidV i c t o r i a n Enaland.Chicago: Chicago U n i v e r s i t y Press.
26 Archives d10utre-Mer. P r o t e c t o r a t de 1 'Annam e t du Tonkin,

no. 1506. 17 December.

1898.

was not accorded by the Governor General and the boy, referred to by the court as "Nguyen van Thinh di t Lucien'
#

(cal led Lucien) was sentenced to bear out his full term.
. .

The case might have been less easily dismissed if it were not for the fact that the son was metis (Eurasian) the.child of a man who was a French citizen and a woman who was a colonial subject, his concubine and Vietnamese. How the boy was referred to in the exchange of letters and reports between the Governor-General, the father. and the court, imparted very different evaluations of his cultural identity, giving substance to their separate claims. For the Governor-General. the boy was "Nguyen van Thinh -Lucienn (thereby invoking not only the double naming

of the son, privileging first Nguyen van Thinh over Lucien, but suggesting the dubious nature of his cultural affinities--his real name was Nguyen van Thinh, although he answered to the name "Lucien"). For the father, Icard, the boy was simply "Lucien", (Nguyen van Thinh erased, thereby affirming the Frenchness of his son); and to an angry president of Haiphong's tribunal court, the boy was only "Nguyen van Thinh" with Lucien

dropping out all together. Icard was named as his "alleged father", thereby putting the very kinship between the two in question. Icard's plea for pardon was carefully conceived. invoking his own patriotic sentiments as well as those of his son's; he protested that the tribunal, instead of seeing Lucien as that which he was--the son of a Frenchman--rather, treated him as a " v u l ~ a i r eannamite" (common annamite) despite Icard's legal recognition of Lucien as his own. Not only, he claimed, had his son been provoked and only then struck the German in retaliation, but more importantly. Lucien had been raised in a French patriotic milieu. in a household in which Germans were held in "m6pris et d6dain1' (contempt and disdain). He pointed out that their home was full of drawings of the 1870 (Franco-Prussian) war and that like any impressionable [read French] boy of his age, these images struck and excited Lucien's imaglnation. The tribunal's refusal to accept the appeal confronted and countered Icard's claims. At issue was whether Nguyen van Thinh U L u c i e n , could really be considered culturally and politically French, and to what extent he could be and was inculcated wlth the patriotic feelings and nationalist sentiments which might have provoked such a loyal response. The tribunal argued that Icard was sailing too much of the time to impart such

a love of patrie t o his son. and that, Icard's

hate of Germans must have been of very

recent origin. since he had spent so much time sailing with foreigners. The non-French inclinations of Icard's child, however, were most firmly established with the court's

observation that Lucien was illiterate and only familiar with a few words in French. Icard's argument w a s thus further undermined since Icard himself "spoke no annamite" and therefore had no language in common with his offspring. While these counter-arguments may have been sufficient to convince the GovernorGeneral not t o grant leniency. there was another vague, unclarified, scandalous and therefore decisive reason invoked to deny the son's c a s e and the father's appeal; namely that there were "immoral relations ,which could have existed between the detainee and the one who declared himself his father". ["relations immorales qui ont pu exister entre le ddtenue et celui qui s'est declard son p&rel'] Or as p u t ' b y Villeminot, the Clty Attorney in Haiphong, charged with further investigating Icard's appeal, there were n o circumstances under which the boy should be

accorded leniency o n the grounds that ( 1 ) "his morality was always detestable" and ( 2 ) that the police reports permitted one "to entertain the most serious suspicions concerning the nature of the relations which Nguyen van Thinh maintained with his alleged father".

27 .

whether this was a coded allegation of homosexuality or a reference to a possibly illegal recognition of the boy by Icard (pretending t o be his father) is unclear Icard's c a s e c a m e u p at a time when acts of "fraudelent recognition" of native children were said t o be swelling the French citizenry with a bastard p o p u l a t ~ o nof native poor.28 What is clear is that pervers'on and patriotism specifically, and immorality and

nationalist sentiments, were considered mutually exclusive categories. As George Mosse describes for 19th century Germany, adherence to a middle-class European sexual morality

27 A O M , NO. 1792. 12 December 1898

28 According t o the procureur-general , Raoul Abor, these "f raudel ent a deluge of acknowledgementsU were threatening "to submerge" t h e "French element" by ' naturalised natives". See Raoul Abor (1917) Des Reconnaisances Frauduleuses d l E n f a n t s Naturels e n Indochine. Hanoi: Imprimerie Tonkinoise, p.25.

12

was one i m p l i c i t r e q u i s i t e f o r f u l l - f l e d g e d c i t i z e n s h i p i n t h e European n a t i o n - s t a t e .

29

But w i t h a l l these a l l u s i o n s t o s u s c i p i o u s and d u p l i c i t o u s behavior perhaps what was more u n s e t t l i n g i n t h i s case was another unspeakable s t o r y ; sentiment between f a t h e r and son, namely, t h e power o f t h e

t h e f a c t t h a t I c a r d had n o t o n l y recognized h i s

Eurasian son, b u t went so f a r as t o p l e a d t h e case o f a boy who had v i r t u a l l y none of t h e e x t e r i o r q u a l i t i e s ( s k i n tone. language o r c u l t u r a l l i t e r a c y ) - - a n d w i t h i n t h e have none o f t h e i n t e r i o r a t t r i b u t e s - - o f

p r e v a l e n t c o l o n i a l episteme t h e r e f o r e c o u l d b e i n g French a t a l l .

What was scandalous and rmmoral i n t h e i r r e l a t i o n s h i p was t h a t

I c a r d c o u l d have shown such d e d i c a t i o n and l o v e f o r a c h i l d who was i l l i t e r a t e . i g n o r a n t o f t h e French language and who spent most o f h i s t i m e i n a c u l t u r a l m i l i e u which was much l e s s French t h a n Vietnamese. Under such circumstances. I c a r d l s concern f o r Lucien

was i n a p p r o p r i a t e and improper; h i s f a t h e r l y e f f o r t s t o excuse h i s son's misdeeds were n o t lauded by t h e lower c o u r t s o r t h e Governor General. O n the contrary, paternal love and r e s p o n s i b i l i t y were n o t t o be disseminated a r b i t r a r i l y as I c a r d had o b v i o u s l y done by r e c o g n i z i n g h i s progeny b u t a l l o w i n g him t o grow up Indochinese. I n denying the f a t h e r ' s p l e a , sentence was passed b o t h on I c a r d and h i s son; b o t h were g u i l t y o f t r a n s g r e s s i n g t h e boundaries o f r a c e , c u l t u r e , sex and p a t r i e .
I f I c a r d (whose

m i s s p e l l i n g s and p r o f e s s i o n b e l i e d h i s l o w e r - c l a s s o r i g i n s ) was n o t a b l e t o b r i n g h i s son up i n a proper French m i l i e u . t h e n he should have abandonned him a l l t o g e t h e r . What was perhaps most d u p l i c i t o u s i n t h e r e l a t i o n s h i p was t h a t t h e boy c o u l d b o t h be "Nguyen van Thinh" i n c u \ t u r a l s e n s i b i l i t i e s and "Lucien" t o h i s f a t h e r . O r from a somewhat d i f f e r e n t p e r s p e c t i v e t h a t Lucien's p h y s i c a l and c u l t u r a l otherness d i d not s t a n d i n t h e way o f t h e f a t h e r ' s l o v e . L i k e t h e r e l a t i o n s h i p w i t h t h e boy's mother which

was e a s i l y a t t r i b u t e d t o c a r n a l l u s t , I c a r d ' s c h o i c e t o stand up f o r h i s son was reduced t o a m o t i v e o f base d e s i r e s , sexual o r o t h e r w i s e . N e i t h e r f a t h e r nor son had on which r a c i s t

demonstrated a p r o p e r committment t o a French ' c u l t u r a l genealogy' pedigrees and c o l o n i a l power were c o n t e s t e d and maintained.

N D T H E QUESTION OF A B A N D O N M E N T O N M E T I S CHILDREN A

29 George Mosse. N a t i o n a l i s m and S e x u a l i t y . (1985). ~ a d i s o n : U n i v e r s i t y o f Wisconsin Press.

The story invokes the multiple tensions of colonial cultures in Southeast Asia and would be of interest for that alone. But it is all the more startling because it so boldly contradicts the dominant formulation Of the "metis question" at the turn of the century as a problem of "abandonment", of children.culturally on the loose. sexually abused, economically impoverished, morally neglected, and politically dangerous. The

consequences of mixed unions were collapsed into a singular moral trajectory, one which. without state intervention, would led to a future of Eurasian paupers and -an affront to European prestige and contribute to national decay. prostitutes-

I f we look more closely at what was identified as "abandonmenY"--and by whom--the

cultural and historical pecularities of this definition became more apparent. "Abandonment" had several distinct meanings that diverged significantly from its European usage in the pre-modern period and at the time. In John Boswell's comprehensive history of child abandonment in western Europe, he defines the term as "the voluntary relinquishing of control over children by their natal parents or guardians", commonly used for children who were exposed at the doors of churches or in other public spaces. and less frequently intentional 1 y exposed to death. 30 Boswel 1 argues that ancient as well as contemporary commentators have conflated abandonment with infanticide far more than the evidence suggests. Nevertheless, perceptions and policies to do with abandonment were integrally tied to issues of child mortality. Jacques Donzelot argues that in 19th century France, abandonment often led to high rates of child mortality. and that the intensified policing of families was morally justified in those, among other, terms.31 This is not to suggest that abandonment always led to death, or that this.was always Its intent. The point is that in the colonial context, in contrast, discussions of "abandonment" rarely raise a similar concern for infanticide, or even obliquely address this eventuality.

30 John Boswell 's The Kindness of Stranaers: The Abandonment of Chi lden in Western EuroDe from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance. New York: Pantheon (1988): 24. According to Boswell, this relinquishment might occur by "leaving them somwhere, selling them, or legally consigning authority to some other person or institution" ibid. As we shall see. abandonment in colonial practice did not fit this definition at all.
3 1 See Jacques Donzelot's The Pol icina of Famil ies. New York:Pantheon, p. 29.

What t h e abandon'ment o f m e t i s c h i l d r e n invoked, a b i o l o g i c a l b u t a s o c i a l death--a

i n the c o l o n i a l context,

was n o t

l o s s t o European s o c i e t y , a f o r c e d banishment f r o m

t h e European c u l t u r a l m i l i e u i n which these m e t i s c h i l d r e n c o u l d p o t e n t i a l l y t h r i v e .

32

"Exposure" i n t h e c o l o n i a l c o n t e x t was n o t t o t h e n a t u r a l elements, b u t t o t h e n a t i v e m i l i e u , and t o those k i n d o f n a t i v e women whose debased c h a r a c t e r would have i n c l i n e d them t o succumb t o a concubinary r e l a t i o n s h i p i n t h e f i r s t p l a c e . Moreover, abandonment. as w e s h a l l see, was n o t n e c e s s a r i l y v o l u n t a r y , nor p a r t i c i p a t e d i n by

both p a r e n t s

as

B o s w e l l ' s d e f i n i t i o n i m p l i e s . The S t a t u t e s o f t h e S o c i e t y f o r t h e P r o t e c t i o n and Education o f Young French M e t i s o f Cochinchine and Cambodia d e f i n e d t h e i s s u e o f abandonment i n t h e f o l l o w i n g way: L e f t t o themselves, h a v i n g no o t h e r g u i d e t h a n t h e i r i n s t i n c t s and t h e i r passions, these u n f o r t u n a t e s w i l l always g i v e f r e e r e i n t o t h e i r bad i n c l i n a t i o n s ; t h e boys w i l l i n c r e a s e t h e rangs o f vagabonds, t h e g i r l s those o f p r o s t i t u t i o n . L e f t t o t h e i r mothers and l o s t i n t h e m i l i e u o f Annamites, they w i l l n o t become l e s s depraved. I t must n o t be f o r g o t t e n t h a t i n most cases, t h e indigenous woman who consents t o l i v e w i t h a European i s a v e r i t a b l e p r o s t i t u t e and t h a t she w i l l never r e f o r m . When, a f t e r s e v e r a l years o f f r e e u n i o n w i t h Frenchmen, t h e l a t t e r disappear o r abandon h e r , she f a t a l l y r e t u r n s t o t h e v i c e f r o m which she came and she n e a r l y always s e t s an example o f debauchery, s l o t h and i m m o r a l i t y f o r her c h i l d r e n . She takes c a r e o f them w i t h t h e s o l e purpose o f l a t e r p r o f i t i n g from t h e i r l a b o r and e s p e c i a l l y from t h e i r vices. ' F o r her m e t i s sons, she seeks o u t a s c h o l a r s h i p i n a school w i t h t h e c e r t a i n t y t h a t when her c h i l d o b t a i n s an minor a d m i n i s t r a t i v e p o s t , she w i l l p r o f i t from i t . B u t , i n many cases, t h e c h i l d , i l l - a d v i s e d and i l l - d i r e c t e d , does n o t work and when he leaves school, abandons h i m s e l f t o i d l e n e s s and t h e n t o vagabondage; he p r o c u r s h i s means o f e x i s t e n c e by e x t o r t i o n and t h e f t . Abandonned m e t i s g i r l s a r e no b e t t e r o f f ; from t h e c r a d l e . t h e i r mothers adorn them w ~ t h b r a c e l e t s and necklaces and m a i n t a i n i n them a l o v e o f l u x u r y i n n a t e i n t h e Annamites. A r r i v i n g a t t h e age o f p u b e r t y , d e p r i v e d o f any s k i l l s which would h e l p them s u r v i v e , and pushed i n t o a l i f e by t h e i r mothers they, they have a n a t u r a l tendency t o i m i t a t e , they w i l l take t o p r o s t i t u t i o n i n i t s d i v e r s e fggms t o p r o c u r e t h e means necessary t o keep themselves i n l u x u r y . "abandonment" has s p e c i f i c race, c l a s s and gender c o o r d i n a t e s . I t r e f e r s p r i m a r i l y

Here.

32 1 do n o t use t h i s term i n t h e sense employed by Orlando P a t t e r s o n w i t h r e g a r d t o s l a v e r y , b u t t o suggest t h e d e f i n i t i v e e x i l e from European s o c i e t y which abandonment imp1 i e d .
33 AOM, Amiraux 7701, ' s t a t u t e o f t h e " S o c i b t 6 de p r o t e c t i o n e t d l e d u c a t i o n des Jeunes MBtis F r a n c a i s de l a Cohcinchine e t du Cambodget'.

15

t o t h e abandonment o f m e t i s c h i l d r e n by European men, by way of abandoning t h e c h i l d ' s n a t i v e mother w i t h whom t h e man had c o - h a b i t e d o u t s i d e o f m a r r i a g e . Secondly, t h e gaze .of t h e c o l o n i a l s t a t e was not d i r e c t e d a t t h e abandonment o f c h i l d r e n by n a t i v e men. but o n l y w i t h t h e progeny o f mixed u n i o n s . T h i r d , and most s i g n i f i c a n t l y , t h e c h i l d was considered "abandonned" whether o r n o t s/he remained cared f o r by t h e mother and was' most f r e q u e n t l y c l a s s i f i e d as ''abandonned" p r e c i s e l y . b e c a u s e s/he was l e f t t o t h e Annamite mother and t o t h e c u l t u r a l surroundings i n which she l i v e d . encoded several messages: prolonged c o n t a c t and/or "Abandonment" those

t h a t a proper French f a t h e r would never a l l o w h i s o f f s p r i n g i d e n t i f i c a t i o n w i t h such a m i l i e u ; and t h a t t h e n a t i v e mother

o f lower c l a s s o r i g i n s would o n l y choose t o keep her own c h i l d r e n f o r mercenary purposes.

I f abandonment o f m 6 t i s o f f s p r i n g by European men was c o n s i d e r e d m o r a l l y

r e p r e h e n s i b l e , what was worse were t h e depraved motives o f c o l o n i z e d women who c a t e g o r i c a l l y refused t o give t h e i r c h i l d r e n t o t h e s u p e r i o r environment o f s t a t e

i n s t i t u t i o n s a t a l l . Thus t h e p r e s i d e n t o f The Hanoi S o c i e t y f o r t h e P r o t e c t i o n o f M Q t i s Youths i n 1904 noted t h a t "numerous mothers r e f u s e t o c o n f e r t h e i r c h i l d r e n t o us .

. .under

t h e p r e t e x t o f n o t wanting t o be a p a r t from them, d e s p i t e t h e f a c t t h a t they But i f maternal l o v e obscured more mercenary

may p e r i o d i c a l l y v i s i t them a t

quests t o e x p l o i t t h e i r young f o r p r o f i t s and p l e a s u r e , as was oftem claimed, why d i d so many women not o n l y r e f u s e t o g i v e up t h e i r c h i l d r e n b u t r e j e c t any form o f f i n a n c i a l a s s i s t a n c e f o r them? Cases o f such r e f u s a l were n o t uncommon. I n 1903 t h e Haiphong c o u r t admonished a metisse mother who was h e r s e l f " r a i s e d w i t h a l l t h e e x t e r i o r s i g n s o f a European e d u c a t i o n " f o r w i t h d r a w i n g her daughter from a government school " f o r motives which c o u l d n o t be ba.se g i v e n t h e mother's c h a r a c t e r " . 3 5 Resistance a l s o came from t h e c h i l d r e n themselves: i n 1904, Thi-Ba. the 17 year o l d mbtisse daughter o f an Annamite

woman and French man who h e r s e l f was c o h a b i t i n g w i t h a n a t i v e man, d e c l a r e d t h a t she u v o l o n t a i r e m e n t " accepted and p r e f e r r e d her own s i t u a t i o n over what t h e S o c i e t y f o r t h e P r o t e c t i o n o f M e t i s Youths, c o u l d o f f e r h e r . Numerous r e p o r t s a r e c i t e d o f metisse

34 AOM.#164 1 1 May 1904, m y emphasis.

35 AOM.

November 13. 1903.

girls forced into prostitution by "concubin", i.e., by native men who were the subsequent lovers of the girls' native mothers. These cases expressed another sexual and cultural trangression.that colonial authorities feared: namely, that there was a "traffic in filles francaises" for the Chinese and Annamite market', not for. Europeans.
36

'

The portrait of abandonment and charitable rescue is seriously flawed; it misses the fact that the channeling of abandonned metis children tnto special state
.

institutions was part of a larger,(but failed) imperial vision. These children were to be molded and shaped into very special colonial citizens; by one scenario. the bulward of a future white settler population. acclimatized to the tropics but loyal to the state.37 As proposed in the 1931 French Feminist National Assembly, metisse young women cou 1 d "marry with Frenchmen, would accept to live in the bush where young women from the metropole would be hesitant to follow their husbands, . . . [would form] the foundation of a bourgeoisie, attached at one and the same time to their native land and to the France of (Etats-Generaux du Feminisme. 1931: 139).

Europeu

This perspective on mixed-marriages was more optimistic than some. but echoes a commonly held view that if m6tisse girls were rescued in time. they could be educated in special institutions to become "bonnes menageres" (good housekeepers) of a settled Indochina, wives or domestics in the service of France. As we shall see, a similar proposal was put in the Indies in the same period. While, neither proposal was realized, the question they entertained was as fundamental to colonial thinking as those proposals which met with more success: what to do with this mixed population whose ambiguous positioning and identifications could make them either dangerous adversaries or effective partisans of the colonial state?

"FRAUDULENT RECOGNITIONS1' AND OTHER DANGERS OF METISSAGE

The question prompted a number of different responses, each of which hinged on

36 Archives d t O u t r e - ~ e r . Letter (No.151) to the Governor-General in Hanoi from Monsieur Paris, the President of the ~ o c i B t 6de Protection and dlEducation des Jeunes Mbtis Francais abandonnbs. 29 February 1904.

37 See Brou, Gossard. Douchet, Mazet for such recommendations

whether m e t i s s h o u l d be c l a s s i f i e d as a d i s t i n c t l e g a l c a t e g o r y s u b j e c t t o s p e c i a l education. tnreat. o r so t h o r o u g h l y a s s i m i l a t e d i n t o French c u l t u r e t h a t they would pose no

I n French Indochina, t h e model treatment o f m b t i s ' i n t h e Netherlands I n d i e s was I n 1901. Joseph C h a i l l e y - B e r t , d i r e c t o r o f t h e Union C o l o n i a l

invoked a t e v e r y t u r n .

Francaise, was sent t o Java as a government emissary t o r e p o r t on t h e s t a t u s o f m b t i s i n t h e I n d i e s a n d . o n t h e e f f i c a c y ' o f Dutch p o l i c y towards them. C h a i l l e y - B e r t came away immensely impressed and convinced t h a t s e g r e g a t i o n was n o t t h e answer. He was overwhelmed by t h e sheer numbers o f persons of mixed-descent who occupied h i g h s t a t i o n i n t h e I n d i e s , w i t h w e a l t h and c u l t i v a t i o n r i v a l l i n g those o f many Europeans. He argued t h a t t h e Dutch p o l i c y o f n o t s e g r e g a t i n g those o f mixed-descent, nor d i s t i n g u i s h i n g

between i l l e g i m a t e and l e g i t i m a t e c h i l d r e n was t h e o n l y humane and p o l i t i c a l l y s a f e course t o pursue. He urged t h e government t o adopt s e v e r a l Dutch p r a c t i c e s : (1) that

abandonned m e t i s y o u t h be assigned European s t a t u s u n t i l p r o o f o f f i l i a t i o n was made.

( 2 ) t h a t p r i v a t e o r g a n i z a t i o n s i n each l e g a l g r o u p i n g ( i . e . European and n a t i v e ) be

charged w i t h poor r e l i e f ,

r a t h e r t h a n t h e government and 3 ) t h a t European s t a n d i n g

not
-

be c o n f i n e d t o those w i t h t h e p r o p e r "dosage o f b l o o d " a l o n e . I n t h e I n d i e s he noted

t h a t s u c h ' a r u l i n g would be impossible s i n c e t h e e n t i r e s o c i e t y was i n l a r g e p a r t m e t i s and such a d i s t i n c t i o n "would a l l o w a d i s t a n c e between t h e a r y a n w i t h o u t mix and t h e asiastic hybrids".

38
w r i t i n g from Hanoi i n 1905 s i m i l a r l y applauded " t h e remarkably

Monsieur A . J u l y .

successful r e s u l t s ' o f t h e I n d i e s government p o l i c y which r e j e c t e d t h e l e g a l d e s i g n a t i o n o f m e t i s as a c a s t e a p a r t . He argued t h a t France's a b o l i t i o n o f s l a v e r y and c a l l f o r u n i v e r s a l s u f f r a g e had made a t a b l a rasa o f r a c i a l p r e j u d i c e ; however. he was f a r l e s s sanguine t h a t France's p o l i t i c a l system c o u l d p e r m i t a s i m i l a r s c a l e o f n a t u r a l i s a t i o n as t h a t p r a c t i c e d by t h e Dutch, s i n c e not a l l young m e t r s c o u l d be recognized as " c i t o y e n f r a n c a i s " f o r reasons he thought b e t t e r n o t t o d i s c u s s . F i r m i n Jacques

Montagne, a head conductor i n t h e Department o f Roads and B r i d g e s a l s o urged t h a t French Indochina f o l l o w t h e I n d i e s p a t h , where t h e Dutch had n o t o n l y "safeguarded t h e i r p r e s t i g e , b u t a l s o p r o f i t e d from a f o r c e t h a t i f b a d l y d i r e c t e d , c o u l d t u r n a g a i n s t

38 AOM.

Amiraux 7701. Report on Met i s i n t h e Dutch East I n d i e s (1901 ) .

on the account of a friend who administrated a plantation on Dutch d ~ m i n a t i o n " . Based ~~ Java, he urged that metis boys in Indochina, as in the Indies, should be educated in "special institutions'' to prepare them to be soldiers, and later for modest employment . . in commerce or on the estates. What is so curious about these appeals to Dutch wisdom. is how little these descriptions reflected what administrative quandries were actually facing the Dutch administration on the ground. At precisely the moment.of Chailley-Bert's visit to

~ a t a v i a ,a massive government investigation of the recent proliferation of European pauperism and its causes was underway. Between 1901 and 1903 several thousands of pages

of government reports out 1 ined the precarious economic condi t ions and pol it ical dangers of a legally classified "European" population that was riddled with impoverished widows, beggars, vagrants, and abandonned children who largely were made up of Indo-Europeans. The pauperism commission identified an "alarming increase" of poor Europeans, born in the Indies or of mixed parentage, who could neither compete for civil service positions with the influx of "full-blooded" Dutch educated in Europe nor with members of the native population who were willing to work for lower pay in more menial jobs.40 While the investigation was in part about Indo-European adult life and labor, the principal object of the commissions' consideration was children and their " o p v o e d i n ~ in de ouderlijke woninq" ("upbringing in the parental home").

41

The causes of the situation were found in the continued prevalence of concubinage, not only among subaltern European military barred from legal marriage, but among civil servants and European plantation supervisors for whom marriage to European women was made an economically difficult option. While government and private company policies significantly relaxed the restrictions they had imposed on the entry of women

39 "Courte notice sur les metis dlExtreme Orient et en particulier sur ceux de llIndochine". Firmin Jacques Montagne. AOM. 1896-1909.

40 Rapport der Pauper i sme-Commi ss ie ( 1902) Batavia: Landsdrukker i j ; Ui tkomsten der Pauperisme-Enquete: Algemeen Verslaq (1902): Batavia: Landsdrukkerij; Het Pauperisme onder de Europeanen in Nederlandsch-Indie (1901) Parts 3, 5. Batavia: Landsdrukkerij; Uitkomsten der Pauperisme-Enquete: Gewestelijke Verslaaen (1901) Batavia: Landsdrukkerij; De Staatsarmenzorg voor Europeanen in Nederlansch-Indie (19OI)Batavia: Landsdrukkerij.

41 See Petrus Blumberger's De Indo-Europeesche Beweginq in Nederlandsch-Indie (1939) Haarlem: Tjeenk Willink. p. 26.

from Europe after the turn of the century. mixed-unions, and the gendered and racist assumptions on which they were based, were not about t o disappear by government fiat alone. In Indochina, French officials had to issue repeated warnings against concubinage from 1893 t o 1911 (precisely the period in which t h e societies for protection of metis youth were most active), suggesting that there was a future generation in the making who threatened not to know where they belonged. 42 T h e commission condemned the moral environment of the Indies at large. with concubinage targeted as the source of a transient "rough" and "dangerous pauper element" w h o lived off the native population when they could, who disgraced European prestige, and w e r e a financial burder t o the state. 43

But Indo-European pauperism in the Indies could not be accounted for by concubinage alone. The commission's enquiry starkly revealed a local educational system that categorically barred Indies-educated European youths from high-level administrative posts and middling Indo-Europeans from even a passable knowledge of Dutch. a basic requi.site for any white col lar job.44 A1 though concubinage and poor education could be.

and were responded to, with a concrete set of reforms, -European pauperism was also attri.buted to a more unsettling problem: a surreptious penetration of inlanders into the legal category of ~ u r o p e a n . Because ~~ European legal standing both exempted men from .labor service and from the harsher penal code applied t o those of native status. officials argued that a n underclass of European soldiers and civilians were allegedly engaged in a profitable.racket: "falsely recognizing" native children who were not their o w n for a n attractive fee. Thus, it was argued that European impoverishment was far more limited than the statistics indicated; the European civil registers were inflated by lowlife mercenaries and, as in Indochina, by "des sans-travail", who might register as

42 Archives d l O u t r e Mer. Archives Centrales d e llIndochine. nos. 9147. 9 2 7 3 , 7770.

4680.
43 Encvclopedie van Neder landsch-Indie 19 1 9 : 367.

44 In 1900, a n educational survey carried out in Dutch elementary schools in the Indies among 1500 students found that only 29% of those with European legal standing knew some Dutch and more than 40% knew none at all (Paul van der Veur. "Cultural Aspects of the Eurasian Community in Indonesian Colonial Society" Indonesia (1968) 6:45. 45 See J. F .Kohlbrugge "Prost i tut ie in Nederlandsch-Indie" Indisch Genootschap. 1 9 February 1901. p . 26-28.

many as thirty to forty children as their own without the latter having proper rights to Dutch or French citizenship at all. 46

The issue of ''fraudulent recognition". like that of concubinage, hinged on children who ambiguously or falsely crossed the cultural and racial divide, on a nefarious class of European men who were willing to facilitate the efforts of native mothers who sought such arrangements. Whether there were as many "fraudulent recognitions" of metis children in Indochina, or "kunstmatiq gefabriceerde Europeanen" ("artifically fabricated Europeans") in the Indies as authorities claimed, is really not the point. The repeated reference to "fictitious". "fraudulent", and "fabricated" Europeans expressed an underlying preoccupation of colonial authorities, one shared by many in the European community at large; that there were illicit incursions into the Dutch and French citizenry that were far more pervasive than those cases labelled it by name. We should remember thatMNguyen van Thinh dltLucienl"s condemnation was never explicitly argued on the basis of his suspicious parentage, but on the more general contention that his behavior had to be understood as that of a indiuene in disguise, not as a citizen of France. Annamite women who had lived in concubinage were accused of clothing their mbttsse daughters in European attire, while assuring that their souls and sentiments remained firmly entrenched in native culture. Colonial officials thus expressed a profound fear that the Europeanness of metis children could never be assured, despite a rhetoric affirming that education and upbringing were transformative processes. Authorities spoke of abandonned metisse daughters as "les filles francaises" when arguing for their redemption. but when supporting segregated education, as "the fruits of a regrettable weakness", youths physically marked and morally marred with "the faults and mediocre qualities of their [net ive] mothers .47 Thus, abandonned mbt is chi ldren not on1 y represented the sexual

46 See 'Ons Pauper i sme" Mededeel ingen der Vereeniaing "Soer ia Soemi rat" ( 1892) No. 2: 8. One proof of the falsity of the claim, was that these "fathers" often conferred upon these children "repulsive and obscene" names, frequently enough that a government ruling stipulated that no family name could be given that "could humiliate the child". G.H. Koster "Aangenomen Kinderen en Staatsblad Europeanen" De Amsterdammer, 15 July 1922.

47 See Jacques Mazet ( 1932) La Condition Juridique de ~Qtis et conaaies dlIndochine. Hanoi.

M B is ~

and Douchet (1928)

excesses and indiscretions of European men, but signified the "degenerate" (verwilderen) dangers of the "absence of paternal discipline" ("gemis aan vaderlijke tucht"), of a world in which mothers took charge .48 upon which national all =shared ~ 6 is t chi ldren undermined the inherent principles

identity thrived--those "liens invisibles" (invisible bonds) that

and that so clearly and comfortably marked off pur sang French and Dutch.

from those of the generic colonized. The option of making metis a legal category, seriously entertained and debated in international colonial fora through the 1930s. was rejected on explicitly political grounds; French jurists argued most persuasively that such a legal classification would infest the colonies with a "destructive virus", with a "class of d6racin6, d6class6, . . . "nos ennemis le plus danqereux . . . des r6voltes. ennemis irr6conciliables de notre domination8'(Mazet 1932:37.42). The legal rejection of difference in no way diminFshed the concern about them; on the contrary, it produced an intensified discourse in which racical thinking remained the bedrock on which cultural markers of difference were &re finely honed and carefully defined.

This was nowhere clezrer than in the legal discussion about whether "children of unknown parents" should be assigned French or native nationality, and if so, by what

riter ria.^'

Under a 1928 decret, a1 1 persons born in Indochina ( i .e. on French soil) of

'

unknown parents. of which one was "presumed to be French" could obtain recognition of "la qua1 i t6 de francais" 50. "Presumed" Frenchness rested on two sorts of "certainty" : (1) the child's "physical features" or "race", to be evaluated by a "medico-legal

48 Kohlbrugge. 1901 . op.ci t. . p. 23. To what extent the concern over neglect of metis children was not only about the "negative influence" of the native milieu, but about the dangers of single-mother families as in Europe and America during the same period is difficult to discern. What is clear is that the absence of patriarchal authority in households of widows and abandonned concubines was seen as a threat to the proper moral upbringing of children and therefore demanded the intervention of the colonial state.See Linda Gordon's discussion of this issue for early 20th century America in Heroes of their own 1ives:the politics and history of family violence. 1988: New York:Vintage.

49 Questions about the legal status of met is and the pol itlcal consequences of that decision were not confined to the French alone. The International Colonial Institute in Brussels created by doseph Chailley-Bert in 1893, engaged this question in at least three of its international meetings in 1911, 1920 and 1924. See Comptes Rendus de l'lnstitut Colonial International. Bruxe1les:Bibliotheque Coloniale Internationale.

50 Mazet 1932: 114

22 expert"; and (2) a "moral certainty" derived from the fact t h a t - t h e child "has a French name, lived in a European milieu and was considered by all a s being of French de~cent".~' Thus, French citizenship was not open t o all metis, but heavily restricted by a n "interior frontierD based o n the "scientific' and moral judgement that the child was decide1 y "non-indigene".52 As we have seen in the case of "Nyugen van Thinh di t Lucien", the name "Lucien", the acknowledged paternity by Icard, and the patriotic ambiance of the household were only sufficient for the child to be legally classified as French, not for him t o b e treated a s French by a court of law. Inclusionary laws had written into them a n implementation based o n exclusionary principles and practices. The moral outrage and crusade against abandonment, however, attended t o another underlying dilemma for those who ruled: it was not only that metis youth had to be protected from the "demoralisation of the special milieu" in which they were raised. but, as importantly, educated in a way that would not produce unreasonable expectations or harbor desires for privilege above their station simply because French or Dutch blood flowed in their veins. The aim of the Hanoi society for the protection of metis youths was "to inculcate them with our sense of honor a n d 53 integrity, while only suggesting t o them modest tastes and humble aspirations" Similarly, in the Indies, Indo-European pauperism was commonly attributed to the "false sense of pr'ide" of Indos who refused to d o manual labor or take o n menial jobs, who did

not know that "real Dutchmen" in the Netherlands worked with their hands. T h e assault was doubled-edged: it obviously blamed those impoverished for their condition, but also suggested more subtlely that if they were really Dutch in spirit and drive, pauperism would not be a n issue at all

THE CULTURAL FRONTIERS OF THE NATIONAL COMMUNITY:

Concern over white impoverishment was tied to a more general fear; that European men living in concubinary relations with native women would themselves lose their Dutch

5 1 Mazet 1932:80..
52 Mazet 1932:90.

53 Statute of the "Societb d e protection des enfants m6tisU. 18 May. 1904. ~ r t i c l e

37.

23

or French identity, would become degenerate and dbcivilis6. Internal to. this logic, was a notion of cultural, physical and moral contamination. the fear that those Europeans who did not subscribe to Dutch middle-class conventions of respectability, would not only compromise the cultural distinctions of colonial rule but waver in their allegiances t o t h e metropolitan state. Such fears were centered o n "mixed-bloodsn, but
'

not o n them alone. In the Indies, at the height of the liberal ethical policy a prominent doctor warned that those Europeans born and bred in the colonies, the blijvers ("those w h o remained"). lived in surroundings which stripped them of their "zuivere" (pure) European sensibilities. which "could easily lead them t o metamorphize into Javanese". 54 The discourse o n "degeneracy" in which Kohl brugge shared had specific colonial coordinates; it was directed at poor whites living o n the cultural borderlands
..
-.

of the "echte" European community, at

some

European men who married native women, at

European women who chose to marry native men, and at both European and Indo-European women who co-resided with men of other nationalities and chose not t o marry at all. Kolbrugge's specific fears may have had bearing in the new social movement at

-w -->

..
-,.
rA

the turn of the century, coalescing around a n Indisch population of mixed-bloods and "pure-blood" Dutch of Indies origin. Their distinct economic interests, cultural style and legal positioning produced equivocal and sometimes inimical loyalties to the colonial state. The Indische voice, manifest at the turn of the century in newspapers

-.-. . ,"-

#.'

and organizations. identified itself in two ways: by its cultural rooting in the Indies rather than the Netherlands, and by a n ambiguous appeal t o the notion of race. At a time when the native nationalist project was not yet underway, this Indische press articulated a new notion of a "fatherland"; loyal to, but distinct from the Dutch fatherland, and firmly opposed to the Dutch-born elite who managed the state. Between 1898 and 1903 various Indisch groups rose, fell and reassembled a s they each sought viable programs that would embrace the "uplifting" of the Indo-European poor, without linking their o w n fate t o them. T o d o so, they resorted t o principles of racial hierarchy (what Foucault might have called a "symbolics of blood" subsumed by a n "analytics of sexualityu), that accorded those of a certain upbringing, sexual morality

54 J . Kohlbrugge (1907) "Het Indische kind e n t i jne karaktervorming" Bl ikken in het zielenleven van den Javaan e n zijner overheerschers. Leiden:Brill.

and cultural sensibility a right to privilege and to rule. 55 What underwrites this common discourse is a new tension between race and culture: as race dropped out of certain legal discriminations, it re-emerged. marked out by specific cultural criteria. in other domains. The contemporary discourse on the new racism in Europe situates vcultural racism' as a relatively recent and nuanced phenomenon, replacing the physiological distinctions on which earlier racisms had so strongly relied.56 But what Is striking from this period is.how critical the concept of cultural "surroundings" ("milieu" in French, omcaeving in Dutch) was to the new legal stipulations on which racial distinctions and national identity.were derived. Paul Rabinow makes a strong case that the concern about "milieu" that permeated French colonial thinking in the late 19th century can only be understood in terms of the scientific episteme on which it relied.57 Questions of "milieu" permeated the colonial field with respect to education, health. labor and sex. Medical guides to the acclimitization of Europeans in tropical regions frequently warned that Europeans would lose their physical health and cultural bearings if they stayed in the tropics too long. Debates over whether European'children should be schooled in France or the Netherlands equally attended to, what Bourdieu refers to in other contexts, as this "habitus"

55 Foucault's notion that a "symbolics of blood" was superceded but not fully replaced by a "analytics of sexuality" in the mid- and late-19th century is problematic and has never been carefully explored in its colonial context where racial perceptions and policies dominated the configuration of power (see The History of Sexuality. Volume 1:An Introduction, esp.pp.147-50). While a discussion of race and sexuality is notably absent from all but the very end of The History of Sexuality, Foucault once remarked in an interview that the end was "the fundamental part of the book" (see M.Foucault. Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and other writings, 1972-1977. New York:Pantheon, p. 222. While a proper "colonial reading" of The History of Sexuality is the subject of another paper, here I would only note that he was probably correct in suggesting that power based on a "symbolics of bloodoBcould not be sustained where issues of mbtissaqe confounded the principles of European citizenship in ways I have already discussed and will elaborate more fully below.

56 See, for example, the contributions of those in British cultural studies by Stuart Hall and Paul Gilroy; cf. the discussion of nationaltsm and racism in France by Etienne Balibar who, whlle not marking cultural racism a s a recent phenomenon argues for a new intensification of the force of cultural difference In marking the "interior frontiers' of the modern nation-state (1988. forthcoming). 57 See Paul Rabinow's French Modern. Cambridge: MIT Press, esp. pp. 126-67 where he traces the effects of Neo-Lamarckian thinking on colonial pacification policies. 1 am more concerned here with how this attention to "milieu" fixed the boundaries of the European community and identified threats to it. On the contaminating influences of "milieu" see my "Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power", pp.51-101.

theme.58 They drew not s o much o n Darwin a s o n . a popular neo-Lamarckian understanding of environment in which racial and national essences could be secured or altered by the

physical, psychological, climatic and moral surroundings in which o n e lived. It was. however, in the colonial legal discourse o n the criteria for European status, where the issue of " o m g e v i n ~ " ,and the linkages between national, racial and cultural identity were most thoroughly thought out and inscribed; not in the laws themselves which selfconsciously disclaimed racial difference. but in the cultural logic and racist assumptions underpinning the legal arguments.

JUS SOL, JUS SANGUINIS. AND NATIONALITY "In t h e civilized world, no one may be with a relationship t o the state" (Beyen, 1890)

!3bt
writing

in

-. 1898, engaged
of

J . A . Nederburgh, one of the principal architects of Indies colonial law

the question of national identity and membership more directly than

many

his contemporaries. He argued that in destroying racial purity, colonialism had

made obsolete the criteria of j u s soli (place of birth) and j u s sanauinis (blood descent) f o r determining nationality. Co1.onial "vermenqinp" (mixing/blending), he contended, had produced a new category of "wavering classes", large groups of people whose place of birth and mixed genealogies called into the question the earlier criteria by which rights to rnetropolitian citizenship and designations of "colonial subject" had once been assigned. Taking the nation to be those who shared "morals, culture, and

preceptions", "feelings that unite us without one being able t o say what they are", Nederburgh concluded that one could not differentiate who had these sensibilities by knowing birthplace and kinship alone. H e pointed to those of "pure European blood" who

58 Pierre Bourdieu (1984) Distinction. Cambridge: Harvard. It was very much the "stylization of life", not economic impoverishment alone, that discussions of European degeneracy at t h e t u r n of the century directly addressed. 59 "In d e beschaafd wereld, niemand zonder staatsverband mag zi j n " (K.H. Beyen. Het Nederlanderschap in verband met het international recht. Utrecht (1890). quoted in J. A. Nederburgh. Wet e n Adat (1898) Batavia: Kolff & Co.. p.83). The word "staatsverband". which appears in no contemporary or colonial Dutch dictionary, literally means "relationship t o the state". Nederburgh distinguishes it from "nationality' and defines it a s "the tie that exists between the state and each of its members, the membership of the state". ibid.. p. 9 1 . Native Dutch speakers. including scholars of colonial history. say the term is rarely used, but connotes citizenship.

"for years remained almost entirely in native surroundings [omgevinql and became so entirely nattvized (verinlandschen) that they n o longer felt at ease among their own kind (rasaenooten) and found it difficult to defe gg t hemse 1 ves against Indische ,morals and points of view". H e concluded that "surroundings" had a n "overwhelming influence" with "the power t o almost ent ire1 y neutral ise the effects of descent and blood". it. Nederburgh's 61 While o n t h e face of

claim may seem t o suggest a ftrm dismissal of the principle of racial

supermacy, we should note that he was among the most staunchly conservative legalists of
62 his time, who firmly defended the superiority of Western logic and law. By

Nederburgh's cultural account. Europeans who remained too long in the Indies "could only remain echte-Europeesch (real 1 y European) in thought and deed with much exert ion". particularly children "who because of their a g e a r e most susceptible and often the most exposed" to native influence in school and at home where they a r e cared for by native servants.63 while Nederburgh insisted that he was in no way "against Indische influence per se", in a footnote to this legal tract, he 'recommends that the state provide support for a1 1 European chi ldren to be brought u$ in Hol land 64. Some eight years later at t h e height of the Indies ethical policy, another prominent member of the colonial elite made a similar but more radical recommendation; that all schools of htgher education be closed in Batavia, replaced with state-subsidized education in Holland to improve the qua1 ity of the "colored" (kleurinqen) in the civil servant ranks.65 Both proposals were based o n the same premise; namely, that it was "imposstble for persons raised and

Nederburgh. i b i d. p. 87-88.
6 1 J . Nederburgh. Wet e n Adat (1898). p.87.

6 2 See Willem Wertheim's incisive review of Prof. Mr. R . D. Kollewijn's 9 (1956): 169-73. Nederburgh's name comes up in this Intergentiel Recht in Indonesie 1 critique of Kollewijn whose liberal rhetoric and opposition to such conservatives a s Nederburgh belied that fact that h e praised the vlrtues of the Indies mixed-marriage legtslation of 1898, despite the racist principles o n which it relied.

63 Nederburgh. ibid:88. 64 Nederburgh, ibid: 90. 65 Kooreman '1 9 0 6

educated in the Indies t o be bearers [dragers] of Western culture and civilization". Attention to upbringing, surroundings and milieu did not disengage personal

66

potential from the physiological fixities o f race. Appeals to difference o n the basis of "opvoeding" (upbringing), coded race distinctions concretely and decisively in legal, educational and medical domains. T h e focus o n "milieu" naturalized cultural difference, sexual essence and moral fiber of Europeanness in new kinds of ways. I have discussed elsewhere how the turn of the century shift in the colonies to white endogamy and away from concubinage, a n intensified surveillance of native servants, a sharper delineation of the social space in which European children could b e brought up and where and with whom they might play, marked out not only the cultural borders of the European community, but indicated the extent to which the private lives of its members were invested with the fate of the colonial body politic at large. Personal prescriptions for
Te
F-

inclusion a s citizens of the Dutch state were a s stringent and intimate a s those which defined the exclusion of its subjects.67 The wide gap between prescription and practice suggests why the prescriptions were so insistently reiterated, updated and reapplied-precisely because they could not b e agreed upon by those classed a s "European", among whom they were contested if not openly defied. a legal

W
?'.'

32:'

5
pil.

In 1884, access to European equivalent status in the Indies included as

+.

requirement "complete suitability [geschiktheid] for European society" defined by ( 1 ) a . belief in Christianity, (2) fluency in spoken and written Dutch, (3)training in European morals and ideas.68 In the absence of a n upbringing in Europe, district authorities were charged with evaluating whether the concerned party was "brought up in European surroundings

as

a European" .69 But European equivalence was not granted simply o n the

display of a competence and comfort in European norms; it required that the candidate

66 Kooreman. ibid. 67 See my "Rethinking Colonial Categories: European communi t ies and the Boundaries of Rule" Comparative Studies in Society and Historv 13(1):134-61 and "Carnal Knowledge". op.cit.
(W.E.van Mastenbroek. D e Historische Ontwikkel inq van de Staatsrechtel i jke Indeeling der Bevolking van Nederlandsch-Indie. (1934) Wageningen: Veenam, p.70.
69 See W. F . Pr ins, "De Bevol ki ngsgroepen in het Neder 1 andsch-Indi sche Recht " Koloniale Studien 17 (1933):652-688. p. 6 7 7 .

68

28

"no longer feel at home" in native society, and have already "distanced" himself from his "native beingt1.(Inlander-zijn)--inshort that s/he neither identify n6r retain inappropriate senses'of belonging or longings for the milieu fromwhich -s/he came. It Is the mental states of potential citizens that are at issue. not their material assets alone. How could such evaluations be made? Who were to be its arbitrators? "Suitability" to which European society and to which Europeans? The questions are disingenous because the coding is clear; cultural competence, cultural literacy, family form and a middleclass morality became the salient new criteria for marking subjects, nationals, citizens, and differents kinds of citizens in the nation-state. As European legal status and its equivalence became accessible to an ever broader population, the cultural criteria of privilege was more carefully defined.

Some

European women were made the

custodians of a new'morality. those who subscribed to the social prescriptions which included white endogamy--not, as we shall see, those "fictive" European women who rejected those norms. Colonial practice undercut the moral highground of European national and racial identity in blatant ways: which European morality was to be iconized? That embraced by those European men who cohabited with na,tive women, became "nativized" and supported their offspring, or the morality of European men who retained their cultural bearings. lived with native women, bore metis children and.departed for Europe unencumbered when their tours were done? Was it the morality of colonial officials who categorically barred the filing of paternity suits against European men by native women, or those such as Kohlbrugge who argued for it, on the grounds that it would-hinder "fraudulent acknowledgements" by other European men? What can we make of the ruling on European equivalence for non-native residents which stipulated that one's place of origin had to fol low a fami 1 y law based on monogamy?70 How did this speak to the thousands of Indisch Dutch for whom concubinage was the most frequently chosen option? And finally, if national identity was as often stated. ''an indescribable set of invisible bonds", what did it mean that a European woman upon marriage to a native man was legally reclassified to follow his nationality? As we shall see, these "invisible bonds" were those of men,

70 See Wi 1 1 iam Mastenbroek (1934) De Historische Ontwikkel ing van de Staatsrechteljike ~ndeelinq der Bevolking van Nederlandsch-Indie, p.87.

bonds in which women had a conjugal share, by proxy t o their husbands. The paradox is that native women married to European men were charged with the "opvoeding" ("upbringing") of children. with the formative making of Dutch citizens and with culturally encoding the markers of race. Colonial cultures created problematic contexts in which patriarchal principles and criteria for citizenship seemed to be at fundamental odds.

THE MIXED MARRIAGE LAW OF 1898

The mixed-marriage law of 1898 and the legal arguments which surrounded are a extraodinary set of documents o n several counts: nowhere in the Dutch colonial record is the re1 at ionship between gender prescript ion, class membership, and racial category so

conteniously debated and s o clear1 y def ined.7i Nowhere is the danger of certain kinds of mixing s o linked t o national image while references t o race a r e so carefully denied.

~y: .,-.
+ -4 =.?&

This is a liberal discourse ostensibly about the protection of native (men's) rights. and later viewed as the paragon of ethical intent t o equalize and synchronize colonial

and metropolitan law. However, a s Willem Wertheim pointed out nearly 40 years ago, it did far more t o buttress the distinctions of difference than t o break them down.72
:

3:-

k :
I

The term "mixed marriages" (qemenqde huwelijken) had two distinct but overlapping

meanings in the Indies at the turn of the century. In common usage. "mixed marriages" referred to contracts between a man and woman of different racial origin;73 by the state. it was "a marriage between persons who were subject t o different

laws

in the

7 1 The fol lowing discussion is based o n several documents that I will abbreviate in referring to in the section below as follows: Verslao van het Verhandelde in d e Bijeenkomsten der Nederlandsch-Indische J u r i s t e n - V e r e e n i g i n ~ o n 25.27.and 29 June 1887 in Batavia [JV]: "Voldoet d e wetgeving betreffende huwelijken tusschen personen behoorende tot d e beide staatkundige categorien der Nederlandsch Indische bevolking (die der Europeanen e n met hen, en d i e der Inlanders e n met hen gelijkgestelden) a a n de maatschappelijke behoefte? Zoo neen, welke wijzigingen z i j n noodig? (1887) [VW]; Mr. J.A. Nederburgh.Gemenade Huwelijken.Staatsb1ad 1898, No. 158: Officiele Bescheiden met Eenige Aanteekeninaen [GH].
72 Wertheim, op.cit
73 That is, between European men and Javanese women, between European women and inlander (native) men; between Chinese men and Javanese women.

Netherlands I n d i e s " w i t h no r e f e r e n c e t o r a c e . 7 4 l e a s t two reasons:

The d i s t i n c t i o n i s s i g n i f i c a n t f o r a t

( 1 ) because t h e d e s i g n a t i o n s o f l e g a l s t a n d i n g as " i n l a n d e r " v s . w i t h g e n e r a t i o n s o f "mixed b l o o d s " f a l l i n g on

"European" c u t across t h e r a c i a l spectrum, d i f f e r e n t s i d e s of

t h i s d i v i d e and ( 2 ) because

sdat (customary)

and Dutch law f o l l o w e d inheritance, and c h i l d

d i f f e r e n t r u l i n g s w i t h r e s p e c t t o t h e marriage c o n t r a c t , d i v o r c e . custody

Legal a t t e n t i o n t o mixed marriages was n o t new i n t h e I n d i e s , b u t had never been f o r m a l i z e d as i t was t o be now. Mixed marriages had been r e g u l a t e d b y government decree

and church c o u n c i l soon a f t e r t h e VOC company merchants began s e t t l i n g i n Java i n t h e e a r l y 1 7 t h c e n t u r y . The decree o f 1617. f o r b i d d i n g marriages between C h r i s t i a n and nonChristian, remained e n t a c t f o r over 200 years. With t h e new C i v i l Code o f 1848. t h e

r e l i g i o u s c r i t e r i u m was r e p l a c e d w i t h t h e r u l i n g t h a t marriage p a r t n e r s o f European and n a t i v e s t a n d i n g would

both

be s u b j e c t t o European law.

The l e g i s l a t i o n on mixed-marriages p r i o r t o 1898 was designed t o address one k i n d o f u n i o n , b u t n o t o t h e r s . The 1848 r u l i n g allowed European men a l r e a d y . l i v i n g i n concubinary arrangements w i t h %-Christian n a t i v e women, t o l e g a l i z e those unions and

t h e c h i l d r e n borne from them. Although t h e c i v i l law o f 1848 d e r i v e d from t h e Napleonic c i v i l code, a dominant p r i n c i p l e o f i t had been c u r i o u s l y ignored; namely t h a t , upon marriage a woman's l e g a l s t a t u s was made t h a t o f her husband's. R e t r o s p e c t i v e e x p l a n a t i o n o f t h e o m i s s i o n h e l d t h a t mixed-marriages were predominantly between European men and n a t i v e women, and t h e r e f o r e who was t o f o l l o w whom c o u l d be e a s i l y assumed. T h i s , however. was no longer the case i n t h e 1880s. C o l o n i a l o f f i c i a l s were

i n c r e a s i n g l y c o n f r o n t e d w i t h two dilemmas: f i r s t ,

t h a t more women c l a s s i f i e d as European diverse

were choosing t o marry non-European men; and second, t h a t concubinage--for groups o f people and f o r d i v e r s e reasons--continued

t o remain t h e domestic arrangement

o f c h o i c e over l e g a l m a r r i a g e . Legal s p e c i a l i s t s argued t h a t concubinage was a p r i m a r y cause o f Indo-European impoverishment and had t o be discouraged; however t h e mixed-

marriage r u l i n g s , as t h e y stood, were so complicated and c o s t l y t h a t people continued t o chose c o h a b i t a t i o n over l e g a l marriage. What was perhaps more d i s t u r b i n g s t i l l was t h a t
,

some European, Indo-European and n a t i v e women opted t o r e t a i n t h e i r own l e g a l s t a n d i n g

(thereby protecting their o w n material assets and those they could bestow o n their children). and thus rejected marriage altogether.

75

Colonial lawyers were thus faced with a conundrum: how to implement a ruling that would allow c e r t a i n kinds of mixed-marriage and not others. Two basic premises were accepted o n all sides: ( 1 ) that, the family was bulwark of state authority, and (2) that

the unity of the family could only be assured by its unity in law.76 Thus.'legitimate c h i l d r e n . c o u l d not be subject to o n e law and their father's t o another. nor could women

retain "nativeoos t a t u s whi le their husbands had that of ~ u r o p e a n s . 77 Given this agreement there were two possible solutions: either that superior European standing of either spouse determine the legal status of both, o r alternately. that the patriarchal princple that a woman follows the legal status of her husband (regardless of race) be applied. Principles of cultural superiority and patriarchy seem to be opposed: let's look at why they were not.

&.
em-

Those who argued that a European woman should not lose her European standing upon marriage t o a native man did s o o n several grounds: one, and most importantly that

.
*a. . -

*. European prestige would be seriously compromised. T h e liberal lawyer Abendanon cogently

-? " .

argued that European women would be placed in a "highly unfavorable and insecure position"; in being subject to adat,she risked becoming no more than a concubine should

*.

her native husband take a second wife, since divorce under Islamic law was not justified for reasons of polygamy. Others contended that s h e would be subject to the penal code

applied t o those of native status; should s h e commit a crime, s h e would be treated t o "humiliating physical and psychological punishment", for which her "physical

75 W. F . P r i n s "De bevol kingsgroepen in het ~ e d e r l a n d s c h - l n d i s c h e recht" Koloniale Studien 17, p.665. That some women chose cohabitation over legal mixed-marriages is rarely addressed in the colonial or secondary literature which categorically assumes that all forms of "cohabitation" a r e concubinary arrangements, with all the moral assessments of a woman "being kept" that the latter term implies. Obviously this issue needs further investigation.
76 Nederburgh, @: 17.

77 AS the chairman of the commission poignantly illustrated, a woman with native legal standing could be arrested for wearing European attire at the very moment s h e emerged from the building in which s h e had just married a European. Nor could a European man and his wife of native standing take the short boat trip from Soerabaya to Madura without prior permission of the authorities since s e a passage for natives was forbidden by law. JV, pp.29-30.

32
c o n s t i t u t i o n " was u n s u i t e d . Her n a t i v e l e g a l standing would do no l e s s t h a n cause an "outrageous scandal" i n t h e European community a t l a r g e . 78

The argument above r e s t e d on an important and contested assumption: t h a t m w o m e n c l a s s i f i e d as European deserved t h e p r o t e c t i o n and p r i v i l e g e o f European law. However, those who made the countercase t h a t t h e p a t r i a r c h a l p r i n c i p l e be a p p l i e d r e g a r d l e s s o f o r i g i n , argued t h a t t h e q u a l i t y o f women w i t h European s t a n d i n g was n o t t h e same. Although t h e S t a t e commission noted t h a t mixed marriages between European women and n a t i v e men were r e l a t i v e l y few,
i t u n d e r l i n e d t h e i r marked and "steady increase among

c e r t a i n classes o f t h e i n h a b i t a n t s 1 ' .

''

Such mixed marriages "which were a l l b u t

u n t h i n k a b l e i n 1848" were now on t h e r i s e among "Indo-European and even f u l l - b l o o d e d European women w i t h n a t i v e men", a t t r i b u t e d t o " t h e i n c r e a s i n g impoverishment" and " d e c l i n i n g w e l f a r e " o f these women on t h e one hand, and o f " i n t e l l e c t u a l and s o c i a l development" among c e r t a i n c l a s s e s o f n a t i v e men on the o t h e r . "'O The l a t t e r issue.

however. was r a r e l y addressed s i n c e t h e gender h i e r a r c h y o f t h e argument was c o n t i n g e n t on assuming t h a t women who made such conjugal choices were, for a l l i n t e n t s and

purposes, n e i t h e r w e l l - b r e d n o r deserving o f European s t a n d i n g a t a l l . One lawyer, Taco Henny, argued t h a t t h e category European was a " l e g a l f i c t i o n " t h a t had l i t t l e r a p p o r t w i t h who a c t u a l l y p a r t i c i p a t e d i n t h e c u l t u r a l and moral l i f e o f t h e European community; t h a t t h e m a j o r i t y o f women who made such choices were outwardly and inwardlv i n d i s t i n g u i s h a b l e from i n l a n d e r s ( n a t i v e s ) . Since these women tended t o be b o t h o f lower-class o r i g i n and/or mixed r a c i a l descent. he h e l d t h a t they were a l r e a d y
5 .

n a t i v e i n c u l t u r e and i n c l i n a t i o n and needed no p r o t e c t i o n from t h e c u l t u r a l m i l i e u i n which they r i g h t l y belonged. S i m i l a r l y , t h e a p p l i c a t i o n o f n a t i v e penal code t o such women would cause no scandal, s i n c e i t was a p p r o p r t a t e t o t h e i r a c t u a l s t a t i o n ; they

were a l r e a d y so f a r removed from Dutch s o c i e t y proper t h a t i t would cause no alarm. IfTaco Henny's argument was n o t c o n v i n c i n g enough. Pastor van Santen made t h e case i n even b o l d e r terms:

78 Nederburgh.
79 Nederburgh.

m: 20. m:13. m:
13

80 Nederburgh

T h e European woman who wants t o enter into such a marriage has already sank s o deep socially and morally that it does not result in ruin, either in her o w n eyes or thos8,of society. It merely serves to consolidate her situation. Such arguments rested o n a n interior distinction within the category European, between "real8' Dutch women and those in whom "very little European blood actually flowed in their v e i n s n . Pastor van Santen's claim that this latter group had already fallen from

cultural and racial grace had its "proof" in yet another observation: "that if s h e was still European in thought and feeling, s h e would never take a step that was so clearly humilating and debasing in the e y e s of "actual" (werkelijk) European women". This reasoning (which won in t.he end) marshalled the patriarchal tenets of the civil code to justify the exclusion of a certain class and

race of

women from Dutch citizenship

rights, without invoking the underlying tenets of racial hierarchy in the legal argument. But this gendered prrnciple drd more work still and could be justrfied o n wrder
a+

grounds. First. such legislation defrned a " r e a l u European woman in appropriate cultural
Y.

terms: not by her o w n character but by her choice of (non-native) husband, and by the extent t o which she, as a mother, took the fate of her children in mind since they would n o longer be accorded automatic European standing under the new legislation. Second, it

F.
strongly dissuaded "real" European women from choosing to marry native men. This was its
$ ; .'

implicit and, according to some advocates, its explicit intent. Third, it spoke o n the behalf of native men of standing, arguing that they would otherwise lose their access to agricultural land and other privileges, passed from fathers to sons under

adat

law.

Fourth, it claimed t o discourage concubinage. since native men would not have to relinquish their customary rights and would not b e tempted to live with Indo-European and ufull-blooded" European women outside of marriage. And finally, and perhaps, most importantly, this appeal to patriarchy prevented the infiltration of jncreasing numbers of native men into the Dutch citizenry, particularly those of the middling classes, with little t o lose and much to gain by acquiring a Dutch nationality. Those who supported the "uplifting" of native man to European through marriage would in effect encourage

JV, -

p.39.

34 marriages o f convenience, t o t h e detriment of European women and Europeans a t l a r g e . 82

Here again, as i n t h e " f r a u d e l e n t r e c o g n i t i o n s " of m e t i s c h i l d r e n , what was a t i s s u e was t h e u n d e s i r a b i l i t y o f - a n i n c r e a s e i n " t h e number of persons who would o n l y be European i n name". 83

I n t h e end. t h e mixed-marriage r u l i n g and t h e debates which surrounded i t were more an index t h a n a cause o f profound changes i n t h i n k i n g about sexual p r a c t i c e . n a t i o n a l i d e n t i t y and c o l o n i a l m o r a l i t y . Mixed-marriages increased between n a t i v e women and European men between 1900 and 1920. evinced i n a d e c l i n i n g number b o t h o f acknowledgements o f c h i l d r e n b o r n o u t o f wedlock, and o f s i n g l e European men who now m a r r i e d the1 r "hu i s h o u d s t e r " ( "householders' , domest ic/companion) . 8 4 However, t h e impetus away from concubinage stem;ned from broader s h i f t s t h a n l e g i s l a t i o n a l o n e ; Pauperisme Commission had g i v e n added weight t o t h e argument t h a t concubinage was producing an underclass o f Indos t h a t had t o be curbed. Also, t h e n a t i v e n a t i o n a l i s t movement. p a r t i c u l a r l y t h e Sarekat Islam, had mounted a s t r o n g campaign a g a i n s t the

concubinage on r e l i g i o u s p r i n c i p l e s which may have prompted more n a t i v e women t o r e j e c t such unions.85 S t i l l . i n 1920 h a l f t h e m e t i s c h i l d r e n o f a European f a t h e r and n a t i v e

mother were b o r n o u t s i d e o f marriage. A f t e r 1925 t h e number o f mixed-marriages f e l l o f f a g a i n as t h e number o f Dutch-born women coming t o t h e I n d i e s increased f o u r - f o l d . H a i l e d as exemplary l i b e r a l l e g i s l a t i o n . t h e mixed-marriage r u l i n g was c l a s s .

82 JV, p.40. The arguments presented over t h e mixed marriage r u l i n g a r e much more numerous and e l a b o r a t e t h a n t h i s s h o r t account suggests. There were indeed those such as Abendannon ( t h e lawyer f r i e n d o f K a r t i n i ) , whose p r o p r o s a l s r a i s e d y e t a whole d i f f e r e n t s e t o f o p t i o n s t h a n those o f f e r e d i n these accounts. He argued t h a t b o t h man and woman s h o u l d be g i v e n European s t a t u s , except i n those cases where a n a t i v e man p r e f e r r e d t o r e t a i n h i s r i g h t s under adat law. Abendannon a l s o singlehandedly countered t h e c l a i m t h a t any European woman who chose t o marry a n a t i v e man was a l r e a d y debased, a r g u i n g t h a t t h e r e were many Dutch g i r l s i n t h e Netherlands f o r whom t h i s was n o t t h e case. But these arguments were i n c i d e n t a l t o t h e main t h r u s t o f t h e debate and had l i t t l e sway i n the f i n a l analysis.

83 Nederburgh G b J .

p.64.

84 See A . van M a r l e t s "De Groep der Europeanen i n Nederlands-Indie, l e t s o v e r o n t s t a a n en g r o e i u I n d o n e s i e (1950). p.322.328. Van Marle suggests t h a t t h e much l a r g e number o f i l l i t e r a t e women o f European s t a n d i n g i n c e n t r a l Java and t h e Moluccas as compared t o t h e r e s t o f t h e I n d i e s , i n d i c a t e s t h a t t h e number o f mixed-marriages i n these r e g i o n s were p a r t i c u l a r l y h i g h . p.330. But t h i s was n o t t h e case everywhere; i n East Java, European men acknowledged more o f t h e i r rnetis c h i l d r e n b u t c o n t i n u e d t o c o h a b i t w i t h t h e n a t i v e mothers o f t h e i r c h i l d r e n o u t s i d e o f marriage.p.495.

85 S.S.J. Ratu-Langie (1913) S e r i k a t I s l a m . B a a r n : H o l l a n d i a D r u k k e r i j , p . 2 1 .

gender and r a c e - s p e c i f i c ;

by =invoking

the Napleonic c i v i l code.

European men were

assured t h a t t h e i r " i n v i s i b l e bonds" o f n a t i o n a l i t y remained e n t a c t r e g a r d l e s s o f t h e i r l e g a l p a r t n e r . European women, on t h e o t h e r hand, were summarily ( b u t t e m p o r a r i l y ) d i s e n f r a n c h i z e d from t h e i r national.community on t h e b a s i s o f c o n j u g a l c h o i c e alone.86. Those mixed marriages.which d e r i v e d from e a r l i e r c o h a b i t a t i o n s between European men and n a t i v e women were n o t t h e unions most i n question. and j u r i s t s o f d i f f e r e n t persuasion

s t a t e d as much throughout t h e debate. These were discussed as "unproblematic" unions on t h e assumption t h a t a n a t i v e women would be beholden and proud o f her " e l e v a t e d " European s t a t u s and c o m f o r t a b l e w i t h her l e g a l dependence on a European man. Could n a t i v e women, t h e r e f o r e , be g r a n t e d European l e g a l s t a n d i n g and Dutch c i t i z e n s h i p The p o i n t

because t h e r e was no danger they c o u l d o r would f u l l y e x e r c i s e t h e i r r i g h t s ? i s never discussed because European supremacy and male p r i v i l e g e were i n l i n e .

but wnat about t h e next g e n e r a t i o n o f m e t i s ? While t h e new r u l i n g e f f e c t i v e l y

blocked t h e n a t u r a l i s a t i o n o f n a t i v e a d u l t men through marriage.
i t g r a n t e d a new

g e n e r a t i o n o f m e t i s c h i l d r e n a European s t a n d i n g b y a f f i x i n g t h e i r n a t i o n a l i t y t o t h a t o f t h e i r f a t h e r s . Would t h i s g e n e r a t i o n be so a s s u r e d l y c u t from t h e i r mother's r o o t s as w e l l ? The p e r s i s t e n t v i g i l a n c e w i t h which concern f o r omqevinq, u p b r i n g i n g , c l a s s and education were discussed i n t h e 1920s and 1930s suggests t h a t t h e r e were resounding doubts. W h y e l s e would the Netherlands I n d i e s eugenics s o c i e t y c o n t i n u e t o conduct medical s t u d i e s designed t o t e s t whether c h i l d r e n o f Europeans b o r n i n t h e I n d i e s might d i s p l a y d i f f e r e n t " r a c i a l markers" than t h e i r parents?87 Eugenici s t l o g i c consol i d a t e d discussions about n a t i o n a l i d e n t i t y and c u l t u r a l d i f f e r e n c e i n a d i s c o u r s e o f "fitness"

t h a t s p e c i f i e d the " i n t e r i o r f r o n t i e r s " o f the nation, r e a f f i r m i n g yet again t h a t f a m i l y , u p b r i n g i n g and p a r e n t i n g were c r i t i c a l i n shaping who would be European o n l y i n name and who would be a t r u e " c i t o v e n " Although t h e race c r i t e r i u m was f i n a l l y removed from t h e I n d i e s c o n s t i t u t i o n i n

86 A woman who had c o n t r a c t e d a mixed-marriage could, upon d i v o r c e o r death o f her husband, d e c l a r e her d e s i r e t o r e i n s t a t e her o r i g i n a l n a t i o n a l i t y as l o n g as she d i d so w i t h i n a c e r t a i n t i m e . However, a n a t i v e woman who m a r r i e d a European man and subsequently m a r r i e d and d i v o r c e d a man o f non-European s t a t u s c o u l d n o t recoup her European s t a t u s .
87 Ernest Rodenwal t (1928). p.1-8.

"Eugenet ische Probl emen i n Nederl andsch- I n d i e u Ons Naqesl acht

36 1918 under native nationalist pressure, debates over the pychological. physical and moral make-up of Indo-Europeans intensified more than they had before. A 1936 doctoral dissertation at the University of Amsterdam could still "explain the lack of energy" of Indo-Europeans by ( 1 ) the influence of a sapping and warm, dank climate (2) by the bad

influence of the "energyless Javanese race" on Indo-Europeans and (3) by the fact that "halfbloods" were not descended from the "average European" and the "average Javaneseu In the 1920s. the totok Dutch population were visibly closing Its ranks,

creating new cultural boundaries while Shoring up its old ones. 'Racial hate" (rassenhaat ) and representat ion were watchwords of the times. A renewed disdain for "Indos" permeated a discourse which heightened in the Depression as the nationalist movement grew stronger and as unemployed wfull-blooded" Europeans were found in native villages "roaming around", joining the ranks of the Indo poor. How the colonial state distinguished these two groups from one another and from "natives" on issues of unemployment insurance and poor relief underscored how crucial these "interior frontiers" were to the strategies of the emerging welfare state.89

INDO-EUROPEANS AND THE QUEST FOR A FATHERLAND

The slippage between race and culture. as well the intensified discussions of racial membership and national identity were not invoked by the "echte Europeesche" population alone. We have seen that the moral geography of the colonies defined certain social segments of those of mixed descent as a class apart with the word "Indo" reserved for those who were "verindischet1(indianized) and poor. But what is less Clear is the cultural, political and racial criteria by which those of mixed descent identified themselves. The contradictory and changing criteria that were used by the various segments of the Indo-European movement at the turn of the century highlight how contentious and politically contingent these deliberations were.

88 Johan Winsernius (1936) Nieuw-Guinee als kolonisatie-qebied voor Europeanen en van Indo-Europeanen. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Amsterdam, p.227.

'

89 Jacques van ~ o o r n emphasizes the dual istic pol icy on poverty in the 1930s in "Armoede en Dualistisch Beleid" (unpublished); I would refer to it as a three-tiered policy, not a dualistic one.

It is not accidental that the term "Indo-European" is difficult to define. It applied to those of "mengbloeden" ("mixed blood") of European and native origin. to
.

Europeans born in the Indies of Dutch nationality, not o f native origin, and thirdly to those "pur san_gW Europeans born elsewhere for whom the Indies was a "tweede vaderl and".
.

The semant ics of "mixing" thus related t o blood, place and belonging to

different degrees and at different times. Soeria Soemirat, one of the earliest publications of the Indo-European constituency in the late 1890s included among its members all Indies-born Europeans and took as its central goal. the uplifting of the (Indo)-European poor. T h e Indisch Bond, formed in 1898, was led by a n Indies-born European constituency that spoke for the Indo poor, but whose numbers were never represented in their ranks. At the heart of both organizations was the push for an Indisch vaderland, contesting both the popular terms of Indonesian nationalism and the exclusi6nary practices of the Dutch-born. totok, society 9I

:2.
*

What is striking is that the Indisch movement often made its bids for political and economic empowerment by invoking Eurasian racial superiority to inlanders, while
.
-

...

denying a racial criteria for judging their status vis-a-vis European-born Dutch at the same time. The subsequent effort in 1912 to form a n Indische P a r t i i (with the motto

& ,

"Indies for the Indiers") was stridently anti-government, addressing native as well as
:

poor Indo welfare in its platform. Despite a n inclusionary rhetoric. its native and poor Indo constituency were categorically marginalized and could find n o common polltical ground.92 By 1919 when native natibnalist mobilization was gaining strength, the need

for a specifically "Indo-Bond" took on new urgency and meaning; as its founder argued. it would be a "class-verbond" (class-based association) to support the interests of the

J . Th. Petrus Bl umberger ( 1939). D e Indo-Europeesche Bewegi ng i n Nederl andschIndie. Haarlem: Tjeenk Willink, p.5. S e e Paul van der Veur's "The Eurasians of Indonesian: A Problem and Chal lenge in Colonial History' and his "Cultural Aspects of the Eurasian Community in Indonesian Colonial Society" Indonesia 6:38-53.

92 On the various currents of Eurasian political activity s e e Paul W. van der Veur's "The Eurasians of Indonesia: a problem and challenge in colonial history". On the importance of Indo individuals in the early Malay press and nationalist movement see Takashi Shiraishi's An Aqe in Motion: Popular Radicalims in Java, 1912-1926. Ithaca:Cornell.esp.pp.37,58-59. Neither account, however, addresses the crucial class differences among Indos and where their distinct allegiances lied.

larger Indo-groups1 .g3 It was this organizat ion, eventual 1 y cal led the "Indo-Europeesch Verbond" (IEV). with more than 10,000 members in 1924. that continued to plead the cause of the Indo poor ihile remaining unequivocally loyal to the Dutch colonial state. While this is a very truncated version of a much more complicated story, it does illustrate an unsettling point; namely, that the poor Indo constituency, however large its numbers, could only articulate demands that were part contingent on their claims to a cultural and racial alliance with those who supported Dutch rule. Questions of cultural, racial and national identity came together most starkly in proposals for Indo-European agricultural settlements. For various reasons these schemes rarely got off the ground, and when they were attempted, failed t o work. But political currents of all persuasions and for different reasbns took part in the campaign. In 1902 the Pauperisme Commission had already recommended exploring the agricultural possibilities for the Indo poor. Their proposals focused on "beggar-colonies", rural confinements where (1ndo)European paupers would be housed, fed, self-sufficient and out of sight. Other schemes were more ambitious, advocating intensive horticultural and small-scale estates which would neither be competitive with native peasant-production or the agribusiness industry. This utopian project, entertained in both the Indies and Indochina. for a white settler colonies peopled with loyal mktis, joined pyschology to political economy in curious ways: it was argued that native blood ties would make them more easily acclimatised to tropical agriculture while their European heritage would provide them with the reason and drive for success. Thus brawn and brains, tropical know-how and European science, government assistance and private intiative were to come together to produce an economically self-sustaining, morally principled and loyal The Indische Bond first, and the IEV later. made land rights and agricultural settlements for needy Indos one of its principle platforms. Conservative and fascistlinked organizations concerned with European unemployment in Holland and European prestige in the colonies also envisioned a New Guinea of white settlers but in the context of an imperial plan. New Guinea was to be made a province of a "Groter Nederland" (Greater Netherlands) that might absorb and alleviate the political danger of an economically weak underclass from the metropole and help secure the Indies for Dutch

= .

93 Blumberger, ibid. .p.50.

r u l e a t t h e same t i m e .

94

The v i s i o n o f t u r n i n g p o t e n t i a l p a t r i c i d e s i n t o p a s t o r a l p a t r i o t s never worked, b u t i t s d i s c u s s i o n r a i s e d c r i t i c a l n a t i o n a l .issues f o r d i f f e r e n t c o n s t i t u e n c i e s : from t h e s t a t e ' s p e r s p e c t i v e , t h e poor Indo p o p u l a t i o n was dbracinb. dangerous; from t h e p e r s p e c t i v e o f t h e I n d i s c h movement. r o o t l e s s and t h e r e f o r e

i t was c l e a r t h a t they c o u l d

n o t c l a i m a f a t h e r l a n d w i t h o u t t e r r i t o r i a l r i g h t s and r o o t s w i t h i n i t ( s i n c e many IndoEuropeans had European s t a n d i n g they c o u l d n o t own l a n d ) ; t h e i r appeal t o an I n d i s c h n a t i o n a l i s m was l a c k i n g a proper mass-based c o n s t i t u e n c y , makes i t c l a i m s . For t h e c o n s e r v a t i v e Vaderlandse Club, a and a homeland--to

r u r a l s e t t l e r c o l o n i e s i n the

1930s were p a r t o f a wider p r o j e c t : t o c r e a t e a Dutch w a l l a g a i n s t Japanese i n v a s i o n i n the Indies, alliance, w h i l e a l l e v i a t i n g o v e r p o p u l a t i o n " a t home". I n an u n l i k e l y and s h o r t - l i v e d t o support

t h e F a t h e r l a n d s ' Club and t h e I E V j o i n e d e f f o r t s on several f r o n t s :

t h e s e , t t l e r schemes,

t o oppose t h e " o n t b l a n k i n q " ( " u n w h i t e n i n g " ) o f t h e I n d i e s , and t o

a t t a c k an e t h i c a l p o l i c y t h a t had f o s t e r e d t h e i n c r e a s e d e n t r y o f educated Javanese i n t o s u b a l t e r n c i v i l s e r v i c e j o b s . However, as t h e I E V became i n c r e a s i n g a n t i - T o t o k t h e i r c o n f l i c t i n g images o f t h e f u t u r e f a t h e r l a n d became d i f f i c u l t t o deny. 95

For t h e Indo-European movement, t h e i r v a d e r l a n d was an I n d i s c h f a t h e r l a n d , independent o f H o l l a n d . For t h e I n d i e s f a s c i s t s , who d e f i n e d t h e i r task as t h e " s e l f

p u r i f i c a t i o n o f t h e n a t i o n " ( " z e l f z u i v e r i n q der n a t i e " ) , t h e i r n o t i o n o f t h e vaderland juxtaposed landscaped images o f I n d i e s as a s i n g l e s t a t e . 96 "a t r o p i c a l N e t h e r l a n d s " . u n i t i n g t h e Netherlands and

N e i t h e r o f these imaginings concurred w i t h t h a t o f t h e n a t i v e n a t i o n a l i s t s who were t o oppose them b o t h .

ROOTLESSNESS A N D CULTURAL R A C I S M With "rootedness" a t t h e c e n t e r stage o f n a t i o n a l i s t d i s c o u r s e , t h e n o t i o n o f

94 See ~ . J . ~ r o b ~ l e v e r d'i s c u s s i o n o f t h i s f a i l e d e f f o r t i n De Vaderlandse Club (1980). pp.193-208.

95 P. J. D r o o g l e v e r . De Vaderlandse Club. ( 1 9 8 0 ) . Franeker: T . Wever, p . 285.

1929-1942: Totoks en de I n d i s c h e Pol i t iek

96 Verbond Nederland en 1 n d i e , ~ o . 3 . September 1926, p . 3 . p u b l i c a t i o n appended t o t h e name above: " A F a s c i s t M o n t h l y " .

I n t h e l a t e 1920s t h i s

" r o o t l e s s n e s s l ~captured a range o f dangers about' mbt issaae. 97 Abandonned rnbt i s youths were g e n e r i c a l l y viewed as v a g r a n t s i n Indochina, as c h i l d d e l i n q u e n t s i n t h e I n d i e s , as de f a c t o -s t a t e l e s s s u b v e r s i v e s w i t h o u t a - p a t r i e (Braconnier 1917). I n times o f economic in

c r i s i s "free-roaming European b a s t a r d s " were rounded up f o r c h a r i t y and g o o d w i l l

e f f o r t s t o a v e r t a r a c i a l d i s g r a c e . L i b e r a l c o l o n i a l p r o j e c t s spent decades c r e a t i n g a barrage of i n s t i t u t i o n s t o incorporate, i n c u l c a t e and i n s u l a t e abandonned m b t i s youths.

b u t t h e image o f r o o t l e s s n e s s was n o t a p p l i e d t o those abandonned alone I n 1938, government o f f i c i a l s i n Hanoi conducted a colony-wide e n q u i r y t o m o n i t o r t h e p h y s i c a l and p o l i t i c a l movements o f m 6 t i s . The Resident o f Tonkin recommended a massive state-sponsored s o c i a l r e h a b i l i t a t i o n t h a t would g i v e m 6 t i s youths t h e means t o f u n c t i o n as r e a l c i t o y e n on t h e argument t h a t w i t h "French b l o o d p r e v a i l i n g i n t h e i r veins", they a l r e a d y " m a n i f e s t e d an i n s t i n c t i v e attachment t o ~ r a n c e " But . ~ ~ many French

i n Indochina must have been more equivocal about t h e i r " i n s t i n c t i v e " p a t r i o t i c attachments. The f e a r t h a t m 6 t i s might r e v e r t t o t h e i r " n a t u r a l i n c l i n a t i o n s " p e r s i s t e d . as d i d a c o n t i n u i n g d i s c o u r s e on t h e i r c u l t u r a l l a b i l i t y a n d ' s u s c e p t i b l i t y t o t h e " n a t i v e m i l i e u " where t h e y m i g h t r e l a p s e t o t h e immoral and s u b v e r s i v e s t a t e s o f t h e i r mothers. Fears o f m b t i s s a ~ ewere n o t c o n f i n e d t o c o l o n i a l 1942 t r e a t i s e . locales. W e need o n l y read t h e

Les M b t i s , o f Renb M a r t i a l who combined h i s appointment on t h e f a c u l t y o f

medicine i n P a r i s w i t h eugenic research on t h e a n t h r o - b i o l o g i e des r a c e s . For M a r t i a l . m b t i s were c a t e g o r i c a l l y persons o f p h y s i c a l and mental d e f o r m i t y . He saw m b t i s descent as t h e f r e q u e n t cause b o t h o f b i r t h d e f e c t s i n i n d i v i d u a l s and o f t h e contaminated body p o l i t i c o f France. As he p u t i-t. I n s t a b i l i t y , t h e dominant c h a r a c t e r i s t i c o f m b t i s , . . . i s c o n t a g i o u s , i t stands i n o p p o s i t i o n t o t h e indeterminable s p i r i t o f o r d e r and method, i t generates and f u t i l e d i s c u s s i o n and p a r a l y s e s action. I t i s t h i s s t a t e o f mind t h a t makes democracies f a i l t h a t l i v e w i t h

97 T h i s i s s u e o f " r o o t l e s s n e s s " i s most s u b t l e 1 y anal ysed i n contemporary c o n t e x t s . L i i s a Malkki.exp1ore.s t h e meanings a t t a c h e d t o displacement and ''uprootedness" i n t h e n a t i o n a l o r d e r o f t h i n g s ( " N a t i o n a l Geographic:The ~ o o t i n g o f Peoples and t h e Territorialization o f N a t i o n a l I d e n t i t y among Scholars and Refugees", m s . ) . While ~ n d r b P i e r r e T a g u i e f f examines LePen's n a t i o n l i s t r h e t o r i c on t h e dangers o f t h e ' o r o o t l e s s n e s s " o f immigrants workers i n France.

'*

Enquete sur ~ 6issage. t Archives dlOutre Mer, A m i raux 5 3 . 5 0 . 6 .

this chimera of racial equality. one of the most dangerous errors of our times, defended with piety by psuedoFrench who have found in it a convenient means to insinuate themselves everywhere (1938:58).

That Renb Martial's spirit continues to thrive in contemporary France in the rhetoric of Le Pen is not coincidental. The discourses on metissaqe in the early 20th century and

that of LePen on immigrant foreigners today are both about external boundaries and interior frontiers. Both discourses are permeated with images of purity. contamination. infiltration and national decay. For both Martial and LePen. cultural identities refer to human natures and pyschological propensities, inimical to the identity of the-French 99 nation and a drain on the welfare state. What is striking in these historically disparate discourses is how similarly they encode metissage as a political danger, predicated on the psychological
.s:

liminality, But

- menta1l:instability and economic vulnerability of culturally hybrid minorities.100

k '
7-i . :

could we not re-present these discourses by turning them on their heads, by unpacking what the "weakness" of metissaae was suppose to entail? Recast, these discourses may be more about the fear of empowerment--and not about marginality at all; about groups who straddled and disrupted cleanly marked social divides and who, in their very persons, exposed the arbitrary logic by which the categories of control were made. lo' These

2-1'

discourses are not unlike those about Indische women that, in disparaging their

99 See Pierre-Andre Taguief f Is excel lent anal sysis of Le?enls rhetoric in "The Doctrine of the National Front in France (1972-1989)" in New Political Science No.16/17:29-70. loo On the recent British discourse on 'Britishness" and the cultural threat of Islam to that identity, see Tala1 Asad's rich analysis in "Multiculturalism and British Identity in the Wake of the Rushdie Affair" Politics and Society (December 1990)18(4) :455-80.

Hazel Carby ("Lynching, Empire and Sexual i ty" Critical Enquiry 12(1 ) : 262-77) argues that Afro-American women intellectuals at the turn of the century focused on the mbt is figure because i t both "enabled an exploration" and Uexpressed" the relations between the races, because it "demythologized concepts of 'pure blood' and 'pure race'" while debunking "any proposition of degeneracy through amalgamation". Such black women writers as Pauline Hopkins embraced the mulatto to counter the official script that miscegenation was not the "inmost desire of the nonwhite peoples" but "the result of white rape", p.274. In both the Indies and the U.S. at the same time, the figure of the Indo/mulatto looms large in both dominant and subaltern literary production, serving to convey strategic social dilemmas and political messages. It is not surprising. therefore, that the portrayal of the Indo in fiction was widely discussed in the Indies and metropolitan press by many more than those who were interested in literary style alone.

42 impoverished and hybrid Dutch and non-European tastes. eclipsed the more compelling reality that they could "sometimes pass between ethnic communities, cross lines drawn by color and caste and enter slots for which they had no birthright, depending on their alliance with men".'02 The final clause is critical because it is through these varied

"sexual contracts" that citizenship rights were accorded and that mbtis identities were The management of sexual i ty and the attendant moral i ties that contested and remade. lo3 were prescribed were at the heart of the late imperial project. Cohabitation.

prostitution and legally recognized mixed-marriages slotted women, men and their progeny differently on the social and moral landscape of colonial society. These varied sexual contracts were buttressed by pedagogic, medical and legal evaluations that together shaped the boundaries of European membership and the "interior frontiers" of the colonial state. Metissage was first a name and made a thing. It was so heavily politicized because it threatened both to de-stabilize national identity and the Manichean

categories of ruler and ruled. The "sexual affront" that it represented to family order and racial frontiers has specific historical bearings that I have tried to unpack. The turn of the century represents one major break point in the nature of colonial morality and in national projects. In both the Indies and Indochina, a new humanitarian liberal concern for mass education and representation was coupled with newly recast social prescriptions for maintaining separatist and exclusionary cultural conventions regarding whom European colonials should live. Virtually all of these how, where and w ~ t h differentiating practices were worked through a pyschologizing and naturalizing impulse that embedded gender inequalities, sexual privilege, class priorities and racial superiority in a tangled political field; one in which there were both contending visions and conflicting strategies of rule. Colonial liberalism opened up the

possibilities of representation for some while it carefully stipulated a finely delimited moral posture which partially closed those posstbilities down. It should not

lo2 Taylor, 0p.ci.t.,p.155.

' 0 3 Carole Pateman argues that the "sexual contract" is fundamental to the functioning of European civil society in that the principle of patriarchal right defines the social contract between men, and the individual and citizen as male. The Sexual Contract. Stanford: Stanford University Press.

be surprising then that some of the most carefully formulated constructions of France's and the Netherlands' "interior frontiers" were honed in the.ir "laboratories" of modernity--the colonies--not at home. 104
. .

'04 See Gwendolyn Wright's "Tradition in the Service of Modernity: Architecture and Urbanism in French Colonial Policy. 1900-1930" in Journal of Modern History 5 9 (June 1987):291-316, where she discusses the ways in which Indochina. Madagascar and Morocco were discussed as champs d'experience, or experimental terrains, p.297.

PROGRAM ON THE . COMPARATIVE STUDY OF SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN WORKING PAPER SERIES The Program on the Comparative Study of Social Transformations is an interdisciplinary research program at the university of Michigan. Its faculty associates are drawn primarily from the departments of Anthropology, History, and Sociology, but also include members of several other programs in the humanities and social sciences. Its mission is to stimulate new interdisciplinary thinking and research about all kinds of social transformations in a wide range of present and past societies. CSST Working Papers report current research by faculty and graduate student associates of the program. Many will be published elsewhere after revision. Working Papers are available for a fee of $2.00 for papers under 40 pages and for $3.00 for longer papers. To request copies of Working Papers, write to The Program on the Comparative Study of Social Transformations (CSST), 4010 LSA Building, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1382 or call (313) 936-1595. The CSST working paper series is a part of the Center for Research on Social Organizations' working paper series. CRSO numbers are noted.
1.

"Program in Comparative Study of Social Transformations," William Sewell, Terrence McDonald, Sherry Ortner, and Jeffery Paige, May 87, 15 pp. (CRSO #344) "Labor History, Uneven Development, and the Autonomy of Politics: The Dockworkers of Nineteenth-Century Marseille," William Sewell, Jul 87, 45 pp. (CRSO #346) (Now in print as "Uneven Development, the Autonomy of Politics and the Dockworkers of . Nineteenth-Century Marseille," American Historical Review 9 3 : 3 (Jun 88) , pp. 604-37. ) "Coffee, Copper, and Class Conflict in Central America and Chile: A Critique of Zeitlin's Civil Wars in Chile and Zeitlin and Ratcliff's Landlords and Capitalists," Jeffery Paige, Sep 87, 10 pp. (CRSO #347) "In Search of the Bourgeois Revolution: The Particularities,of German History," Geoffrey Eley, Sep 87, 61 pp. (CRSO #350) "The Burdens of Urban History: The Theory of the State in Recent American Social History," Terrence McDonald, May 88, 50 pp. (CRSO 8355) "History, Sociology, and Theories of Organization," Mayer Zald, May 88, 42 pp. (CRSO #357) . "Have Social Historians Lost the Civil War? Some Preliminary Demographic Speculations," Maris Vinovskis, May 88, 55 pp. (CRSO #358)

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7.

8.

"Revolution and the Agrarian Bourgeoisie in Nicaragua," Jeffery Paige, 42 pp. (CRSO 8 3 6 3 ) "Nationalism and Class as Factors in the Revolution o f ' 1 9 1 7 , " Suny, Oct 8 8 , 42 pp. (CRSO #365) Ronald

9.

10.

"The Original Caste: Power, History, and Hierarchy in South Asia," Nicholas Dirks, Oct 8 8 , 3 0 pp. (CRSO W367) "The Invention of Caste: Civil Society in Colonial India," Nicholas Dirks, Oct 8 8 , 24 pp. (CRSO #368) "Sociology as a Discipline: Quasi-Science and Quasi-Humanities." Mayer Zald, Oct 8 8 , 43 pp. (CRSO #369) "Constraints on Professional Power in Soviet-Type Society: Insights from the Solidarity Period in Poland," Michael Kennedy and Konrad Sadkowski, Nov 8 8 , 37 pp. (CRSO # 3 7 1 ) "Evolutionary Changes in Chinese Culture," Martin Whyte, Nov 8 8 , 20 pp. (CRSO 8 3 7 2 ) "World Market, Class Conflict, and Rural Coercion in Post-Colonial Buenos Aires," Karl Wonsma, Nov 8 8 , 22 pp. (CRSO #373) "Ritual and Resistance: Subversion as a Social Fact," Nicholas Dirks, Dec 8 8 , 39 pp. (CRSO #375) "Social Transformations of Gender in Andean South America: A Working Annotated Bibliography," Janise Hurtig, Dec 8 8 , 24 pp. (CRSO
#376)

11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.

18.

"Labour History--Social History--Alltagsneschichte: Experience, Culture, and the Politics of the Everyday. A New Direction for German Social History?" Geoff Eley, Jan 8 9 , 85 pp. (CRSO #378. (Now in print in Journal of Modern History 6 1 (Jun 8 9 ) . ppp. 2 9 7 - 3 4 3 . ) "Notes on the Sociology of Medical Discourse: The Language of Case Presentation," Renee Anspach, Jan 8 9 , 32 pp. (CRSO #379) ."World War Two and the Deradicalization of American Labor: A 'Deviant Case' Study," Howard Kimeldorf, Feb 8 9 , 45 pp. (CRSO t 3 8 3 ) "Taking Stock: The First Year of CSST," Geoff Eley, Feb 8 9 , 7 pp. (CRSO # 3 8 4 ) "Immigration Research : A conceptual Map," 8 9 , 15 pp. (CRSO 8 3 8 5 )
'

19.

20.

21.

22.

Silvia ~edraza-~ailey, Feb

23.

"Culture/Power/History. Series Prospectus," Sherry Ortner, Nicholas Dirks, and Geoff Eley, Mar 8 9 , 4 pp. (CRSO # 3 8 6 )

"A Feminist Perspective on Christopher Lasch. 'The' Social 1nvasio; of the Sel-f'," Sherry Ortner, Apr 8 9 , 6 pp. (CRSO #387) "Does Rational Choice Ha\i.e Utility on the Margins?" 8 9 , 3 1 pp. (CRSO #388) Akos Rona-Tas,'Apr

Research Fellows Conference Panel on "The Politics of Social Transformation," Seong Nae Kim, Joanne Goodwin, Kathleen Canning, Jun 8 9 . (CRSO # 3 8 9 ) Research Fellows Conference Panel on "Struggle, Conflict, and Constraints on Social Change," Anne Gorsuch and Sharon Reitman, Jun 8 9 . (CRSO X390) Research Fellows Conference Panel on "Subordinate Actors and their Marginalization in Social Theory," Nilufer Isvan, Akos RonaTas, Cynthia Buckley, Theresa Deussen, and Mayfair Yang, Jun 89. (CRSO #391) "Toward a Theory of Structure: Duality, Agency, and Transformation," William Sewell, Jun 8 9 , 56 pp. (CRSO 6392) "The Power of Individual Subjectivity and the Subjectivity of Power in Education," Peter Appelbaum, Jul 8 9 , 40 pp. (CRSO #396) "Family Ideology, Class Reproduction, and the Suppression of Obscenity in Nineteenth Century New York," Nicola Beisel, Jul 8 9 , 29 pp. (CRSO # 3 9 7 ) '"Author Meets Critics: Reactions to "Theory and Anthropology since the Sixties," Sherry Ortner, ed., Aug 8 9 . (CRSO #398) "Does Social Theory Need History? Reflections on Epistemological Encounters in the Social Sciences," Margaret Somers, Aug 23 pp. (CRSO #399)
89,

"Gender, History and Deconstruction: Joan Wallach Scott's Gender And The Politics Of History," William Sewell, Aug 8 9 , 20 pp. (CRSO $ 4 0 0 ) "The Social Origins Of Dictatorship, Democracy and Socialist Revolution in Central America," Jeffery Paige, Sep 8 9 , 12 pp. (CRSO
#405)

"Max Weber Meets Feminism: A Reconstruction of Charisma," Cheryl Hyde, Sep 8 9 , 24 pp. (CRSO 8 4 0 7 ) "Understanding Strikes In Revolutinary Russia," William Rosenberg, Sep 8 9 , 36 pp. (CRSO #408) "Child Labor Laws: A Historical Case Of Public Policy Implementation," Marjorie PlcCall-Sarbaugh and Mayer Zald, Oct 8 9 , 41 pp. (CRSO
%409)

"Putting German (and Britian) Liberalism into Context: Liberalism, Europe, and the Burgeoisie, 1840-1914," Geoff Eley, Nov 89, 39 pp. (CRSO #411) "Bringing Unions Back In (Or, Why We ~ e e d A New Old Labor History), " Howard Kimeldorf, Feb 90, 13 pp. ( c R s o # ~ ~ ~ ) "In Flight From politics: social History And Its Discontents," David Mayfield and Susan Thorne, Feb 90, 32 pp. (CRSO #415) "Nations, Politics, and Political Cultures: Placing Habermas in the Nineteenth Century," Geoff Eley, Apr 90, 34 pp. (CRSO 8417) "Reviewing The Socialist Tradition," Geoff Eley, Apr 90, 29 pp. #418) "Rethinking Labor History: Toward a Post-Materialist Rhetoric," William Sewell, May 90, 20 pp. (CRSO #421) "The Intelligentsia in the Constitution of Civil Societies and Post Communist Regimes in Hungary and Poland," Michael Kennedy, Jul 90, 51 pp. (CRSO #425) "The Constitution of Critical Intellectuals: Polish Physicians, Peace Activists and Democratic Civil Society," Michael Kennedy, Apr 90, 38 pp. (CRSO 8419) "Dominant Class and Statemaking in a Peripheral Area: Independence," Karl Monsma, Aug 90, 50 pp. Argentina after (CRSO #429)

(CRSO

"Eastern Europe's Lessons for Critical Intellectuals," Michael Kennedy, Aug 90, 26 pp. (CRSO #430) "The Alternative in Eastern Europe at Century's Start: Brzozowski and Machajski on Intellectuals and Socialism,'" Michael Kennedy, Aug.90, 21 pp. (CRSO #431) "Collective Violence and Collective Loyalties in France: Why the French evolution Made a Difference," William Sewell, Aug 90, 37 pp. (CRSO #432) "Transformations of Normative Foundations and Empirical Sociologies: Class, Stratification and Democracy in Poland," Michael Kennedy, Sep 90, 39 pp. (CRSO #433) "What We Talk About When We Talk About History: The Conversations of History and Sociology,"' Terrence McDonald, Oct 90, 27 pp. (CRSO 8442) "Is Vice Versa? Historical Anthropologies and Anthropological Histories," Nicholas Dirks, O c t 90, 27 pp. (CRSO #443)

"Narrativity, Culture, and Causality: Toward a New Historical Epistemology or Where is Sociology After the Historic Turn?" Margaret Somers, Oct 9 0 , 26 pp. (CRSO #444) "Is All the World a '~ext? From Sociology History to the History of' Society Two Decades Later," Geoff Eley, Oct 9 0 , 23 pp. (CRSO
#445)

"Who Shapes the Text?: Sherpas and Sahibs on Mount Everest," Sherry Ortner, Oct 9 0 , 19 pp. (CRSO #446) "What Social Theory Needs from History Now: Culture and Action as Problems for Historical Sociology," Craig Calhoun, Oct 9 0 , 19 pp. (CRSO #447) . "Three Temporalities: Toward a Sociology of the Event," William Sewell, Oct 90, 24 pp. (CRSO #448) "The New Non-Science of Politics: On Turns to History in Political Science," Rogers Smith, Oct 9 0 , 28 pp. (CRSO #449) "Feeling History: Reflections on the Western Culture Controversy," Renato Rosaldo, Oct 9 0 , 7 pp. (CRSO # 4 5 0 ) "Historicizing 'Experience'," Joan Scott, Oct 90, 19 pp. (CRSO # 4 5 1 )

"The Past as Authority and as Social Critic: Stabilizing and Destabilizing Functions of History in Legal Argument," Robert Gordon. Oct 9 0 , 26 pp. (CRSO #452) "Discursive F o r u m , Cultural Practices: History and Anthropology in Literary Studies," Steven Hullaney, Oct 90, 17 pp. (CRSO
8453)

"Sexual Affronts and Racial Frontiers: National Identity, 'Mixed Bloods' and the Cultural Genealogies of Europeans in Colonial Southeast Asia," Ann Stoler, Hay 9 1 , 60 pp. (CRSO # 4 5 4 ) "Cracking the Code Allegory and Political Mobilization in the Greek Resistance," Janet Hart. June 9 1 , 48 pp. (CRSO X455)