Framing justice in struggles over cultural heritage: the case of Black Pete in the ‘postcolonial’ Netherlands

ABSTRACT

Anchored in Nancy Fraser’s theorizing of justice, the current study seeks to scrutinise the entwinement of contemporary struggles over justice with controversies over the meaning and the role of heritage. Through a discourse-analytic exploration of Dutch political debates about the racialised figure of Black Pete, the study demonstrates how a debate over heritage might encapsulate a struggle over economic, cultural and political justice, and in particular the right to (re-)define social relations and to (co-)determine societal norms and values. Four visions/discourses of justice are identified and classified along two distinctive axes – one related to the definition of whose moral reasoning and well-being is prioritised in controversies over the meaning and role of heritage (majority vs. minority); and the other pertaining to the delineation of how a specific vision of justice and imagined common good is to be realised (through reconciliation vs. struggle).

KEYWORDS:

• Justice
• Cultural heritage
• counter publics
• political discourse
• postcolonial

Introduction

The murder of George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, by a Minneapolis police officer in May 2020 sparked worldwide protests against racial violence. During the protests, a number of monuments and memorials associated with colonialism, slavery and racial injustice, including the statues of Christopher Columbus, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington (the USA), Edward Colston and Winston Churchill (the UK), or Pim Fortuyn and of Piet Hein (the Netherlands) were splattered, destroyed or removed. Such spontaneous acts of political iconoclasm and its subsequent condemnation by mainstream public, highlight the important role of historical or cultural heritage in struggles over contemporary justice. Nonetheless, the concept of ‘justice’ is rarely evoked in scholarship on heritage. Exceptional in this regard are studies on ‘transitional justice’ (cf. Light and Young 2015) and ‘restorative justice’ (cf. Blustein 2010) that focus on processes of transition and reconciliation in the aftermath of violent conflicts. Some attention is also occasionally offered to ‘spatial justice’ (O'Hara 2018), ‘heritage justice’ (Fortenberry 2021) and justice understood as ‘non-violation of human rights’ (Baird 2014). Most of these studies, however, fail to establish a definite link between heritage, understood as a particular selection of artefacts, traditions and memories that together provide a specific vision of the past (Graham and Howard 2008), and contemporary struggles over a ‘just’ society (but see Baird 2014). Studies that propose to explore heritage through the lens of ‘social justice’ are rare. Moreover, most of them do not conceptualise nor operationalise the notion (e.g. Rose-Redwood 2016; Moreeng and Twala 2014; Berlin 2004). Exceptional here are studies by Fortenberry (2021), Johnston and Marwood (2017) and Waterton and Smith (2010) which apply the social justice framework as developed by Nancy Fraser (Fraser 2000, 2001).

This contribution adds to this line of research by exploring the relevance of justice and justice related concepts in public controversies around heritage in the Netherlands. The study focuses specifically on political debates about the figure of Black Pete (Zwarte Piet) that until recently has constituted an obligatory element of traditional Dutch Saint Nicolas (Sinterklaas) festivity yet has become increasingly challenged as an expression of racism (Weiner 2015). Through a discourse-analytic exploration of speeches, statements by judicial and executive bodies, transcripts of parliamentary debates, social media communication by civil society actors, the study seeks to map and synthesise a variety of perspectives on (in)justice in heritage practices, exposing not only the (sources) of conflict between them, but also similarities and overlaps. The exploration serves two purposes. First, it scrutinises empirically the entwinement of contemporary struggles over economic, cultural and political justice with controversies over the meaning and the role of heritage. Second, it allows evaluating the relevance of various conceptions of justice in the context of heritage discourses that invigorate public debate. Conceptually, the study is anchored in Nancy Fraser’s tripartite account of justice as redistribution, recognition and representation. It also builds on Fraser’s ideas on the nature of contemporary contests over justice. These, according to Fraser (2007, 2009), are not limited to the ‘what’ of justice, that is questions about the shape of justice or ‘what counts as a bona fide matter of justice’, such as redistribution or recognition, but encompass as well the ‘who’ and the ‘how’ of justice, that is, questions about ‘who counts as a bona fide subject of justice’ and the rules according to which the ‘who’ is determined.

The case of Black Pete

The Dutch tradition of Saint Nicolas (Sinterklaas) constitutes one of the most controversial heritage issues in the contemporary Netherlands (Keuchenius, Törnberg and Uitermark 2021). The celebration has a national and a local character: the official parade of Saint Nicolas accompanied by his black-faced helpers – Black Petes, is broadcast on national TV, yet each municipality, (pre-)school and local library organise additional festivities. Until recently the figure of Black Pete with his black face, thick red lips, frizzy hair and colourful attire of a pageboy has been a universal element of any Saint Nicolas celebration. For years, it has also constituted a source of serious contention: while to some, Black Pete is an innocent yet indispensable component of a cheerful festivity, to others it is a clown-like caricature that symbolises racial oppression, and an expression of prejudice and stigmatisation that strengthens the stereotypes of black people as subservient, not particularly clever but cheerful and physically strong (Hayes, Joosen, and Smiley 2018; Hilhorst and Hermes 2016; Weiner 2015). Whereas the opponents of the Black Pete figure demand its adaptation by the removal of racist elements (especially the black face), the Black Pete defenders see any such change as a threat to its primordial tradition, Dutch cultural heritage and identity (Hilhorst and Hermes 2016; Rodenberg and Wagenaar 2016).

Although controversies about the meaning of the figure of Black Pete and its role in the Saint Nicolas celebration are not new, since 2011 a heavy contestation of the tradition has been taking place. The debate takes place predominantly on (social) media, yet it has also been taken to court (2013), involved official reactions by the Council of State (Raad van State), the Netherlands Institute of Human Rights (College voor de rechten van mens), the Netherlands Ombudsman for Children (Kinderombudsman) and the United Nations; it has been an object of parliamentary and local council debates.

The controversy has attracted considerable academic interest, too. Researchers explored, amongst other matters, the construction of Black Pete and the Saint Nicholas celebration in popular discourse and key (media) events (e.g. Hayes, Joosen, and Smiley 2018); sought an explanation for the continued popularity of the seemingly racist festivity in the particularities of the Dutch postcolonial context and the self-image of the Dutch as tolerant and open to difference (Schor 2020; Weiner 2015); drew attention to the importance of identity, recognition and belonging in understanding the heated debates (Balkenhol and Van den Hemel 2019; Rodenberg and Wagenaar 2016; Hilhorst and Hermes 2016); pointed to the right of different groups to (co-)determine or influence the dominant (national) heritage narrative (Catala 2015); and/or discussed how open protests and acts of civil disobedience by the Black Pete opponents pressure the meaning and the boundaries of civil rights and freedoms (Rodenberg and Wagenaar 2016). However, despite the richness of these studies, an explicit focus on justice, and – in particular – on the relevance of justice and justice-related concerns in public controversies around heritage in the Netherlands, is missing (but see Catala 2015).

Nancy Fraser’s framework of justice

To explore how the questions of justice infuse public debates on heritage and to shed light on the intimate connection between heritage-focused practices and present-day injustices, the current study draws on the comprehensive, non-ideal and ‘context-sensitive’ framework of justice as participatory parity offered by Nancy Fraser (2007, 2009). Fraser defines participatory parity as ‘the condition of being a peer, of being on a par with others, of interacting with them on an equal footing’ (Fraser 2007, 28), and argues for a multi-dimensional approach that treats redistribution, recognition and representation as three primary, mutually irreducible (albeit in real life inextricably interwoven) facets of justice (Fraser 2009). While redistribution, claims Fraser, concerns injustices rooted in the economic structure of society, resulting in class differentials, exploitation, economic marginalisation and deprivation, injustice understood in recognitive terms takes place when institutionalised patterns of cultural value constitute some actors as ‘inferior, excluded, wholly other, or simply invisible, and hence as less than full partners in social interaction’ (Fraser 2000, 113; cf. Fraser 2007, 2009). Emphasising the mutual irreducibility of status and class and the causal relations between them, Fraser (2007) makes a clear distinction between recognition claims that aim to overcome status subordination, which she endorses, and identitarian claims focused on valorising group-specific attributes or identities, of which she is highly skeptical as ‘liable to devolve into repressive communitarianism’ and likely to displace, rather than strengthen, struggles for redistribution (307). Finally, representative justice, which concerns being put on an equal footing in political participation, involves being included in a political community as well as being granted an equal democratic voice in matters that have impact on one’s life (Fraser 2009). Fraser distinguishes between two different forms, or levels, of representative injustice: ordinary political misrepresentation, which concerns deficiencies in the formal democratic processes, such as procedures that fail to accord an equal voice to all members of the community, or established forms of deliberation that exclude some from on a par participation in democratic debates (cf. Young 1990; Asen 2000; Squires 2002); and mis-framing, which concerns how the boundaries of justice are set and who counts as a member of a political community, entitled to participate in ‘authorized contests over justice’ (Fraser 2009, 62). Fraser’s theorising of political justice predominantly concerns macro-politics by drawing attention to the importance of processes that establish ‘the criteria of social belonging’ and affect who ‘counts as a subject of justice’ (22). However, according to Keddie (2012), it also sheds light on the processes of mis-framing at a more micro-political level, for example, when minority voices are ignored or missed out on the basis of their assumed otherness and alleged non-belonging, or when certain issues are construed as unworthy of political debate and decision (cf. Urbinati and Warren 2008). Representative justice is thus closely related to, and in many cases contingent upon, recognition (cf. Spivak 1988).

Importantly, while viewing exclusions from the public sphere as a form of injustice, Fraser does not see the marginalised groups as powerless victims. Such exclusions are conducive, according to her, to the constitution of ‘subaltern counterpublics’, that is ‘parallel discursive arenas where members of subordinated social groups invent and circulate counterdiscourses (…) to formulate oppositional interpretations of their identities, interests, and needs’ (Fraser 1990, 67). By inventing new terms to describe social reality, the subaltern counterpublics extend the field of discursive contestation by bringing into the debate issues that might have been overlooked, purposely ignored, or suppressed by dominant publics. As a result, claims Fraser, ‘assumptions that were previously exempt from contestation will now have to be publicly argued out’ (67). Although the idea of ‘subaltern counterpublics’ highlights the emancipatory potential of counterdiscourses produced by groups historically oppressed, such as racial or ethnic groups, Fraser also draws attention to how exclusions within the dominant public may facilitate the emergence of ‘explicitly anti-democratic and anti-egalitarian’ counterpublics (67). This suggests the possibility of counterpublics formed amongst those members of the wider public who position themselves in opposition to the dominant public despite their non-subaltern status (cf. Törnberg and Wahlström 2018; Squires 2002) and the possibility of ‘hybrid’ (counter)discourses that unite elements from competing narratives (cf. Asen 2000; Mădroane, Ciocea, and Cârlan 2020).

The multifaceted framework of justice proposed by Fraser, supplemented with her theorising on counterpublics, seems particularly suited to analyse the discursive construction of ‘justice’ in debates on heritage. First, the idea of multiple counterpublics that together express the spectrum of difference that characterises a multicultural society allows to map multiple and often overlapping discourses as well as attend to the fact that people can participate in more than one public and/or draw from multiple discourses. Second, the notion of mis-framing helps to capture how the arbitrarily set boundaries of social belonging affect the imagined legitimacy of certain voices and their in/exclusion in/from a democratic debate on heritage practices and, more broadly, debates on the way society’s basic norms are being set. Third, the concept of participatory parity with its focus on equality of status in economic, cultural and political terms, helps to analytically disentangle the multi-layeredness of grievances expressed in debates on heritage.

Fraser’s concepts have been applied in heritage and commemoration scholarship, for example to propose a normative frame for heritage celebrations, such as the abolition of slavery and the restoration and recognition of monuments (Waterton and Smith 2010; Baird 2014), or to emphasise the importance of the inclusion of local and marginalised communities in the reproduction of heritage knowledges (Johnston and Marwood 2017). However, few studies have used the Fraserian tripartite conception of justice as an analytic lens that could shed light on the nature of conflicts over heritage and, above all, the entwinement of contemporary controversies over the meaning and the role of heritage with the present day struggles over economic, cultural and political justice.

The primary objective of this study is thus to investigate the relevance of the notion of ‘justice’ to public debates on heritage by mapping the discourses of justice that emerge in Dutch political debates on Black Pete. The basic question addressed is how ‘justice’ is constructed in the political debates on the heritage of Black Pete. An auxiliary question relates to the discursively constructed boundaries of justice. Those questions are not independent. For example, the way the participation of cultural minorities in democratic debates is collectively imagined, the extent to which it is cherished or vice-versa problematised and resisted, rests on the often-implicit definition of the community, and the various roles and forms of participation that are culturally or structurally ascribed or available to different social groups (cf. Spivak 1988; Young 1990). The joint exploration of the ‘what’ and the ‘who’ of justice helps to contextualise the debate on Black Pete as an expression of a wider struggle over the status of racial and ethnic minorities in Dutch society, postcolonial subjects in particular, the role of history, memory and cultural heritage in contemporary struggles over emancipation, but also the collectively imagined frame (or boundaries) of the society (‘the us’) and the meaning of citizenship and belonging.

Data and methodology

The current study is a part of a larger research project on justice in Europe.¹ The analysis presented in this article is based on the scrutiny of 34 publicly available ‘texts’ generated between 2012 and 2018 as part of the Black Pete controversy, and in particular those related to two events: (1) the arrests of anti-Black Pete activists during the Saint Nicolas parade in Rotterdam in 2016² and (2) the legislative proposal by the right-wing Party for Freedom (PVV) – the Black Pete Bill – which postulated measures that would legally protect the traditional appearance of Black Pete during festivities co-organised by the authorities and thus co-financed from the public purse.³ The two events were selected for their political and social resonance. We focused on the analysis of the parliamentary debate on the bill proposal (Tweede Kamer, Handelingen TK 2016-2017) and the debate in the Municipality Council following a controversial police intervention in Rotterdam (Gemeenteraad, Gemeente Rotterdam, Vergadering Actualiteitenraad 17-11-2016). In addition, to contextualise the controversies over the two events, we analysed the official Black-Pete related statements by the Children’s Ombudsman, the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights and Amnesty International as well as a selection of texts/articles published on the websites of anti-Black Pete activists (KOZP, NUC, Nederland Wordt Beter) and pro-Black Pete activists (Sint & Pietengilde). The selection of documents was purposeful – we focused on texts that could shed light on the divergent ideas about justice implicit in the various strands of the Black Pete debate. The document analysis was supplemented with interviews with representatives of pro- and anti-Black Pete movements: Sint en Pietengilde (interview NL4.2.1) and Stichting Nederland wordt beter (interview NL4.2.2), a local-level right-wing politician most recently connected with Leefbaar Rotterdam (interview NL4.2.3), and a representative of a human rights organisation in the Netherlands (interview NL4.2.4). The interviewees were selected for their capacity to shed light on the discourse(s) uncovered in the process of document analysis. A complete list of documents analysed is available in Lepianka (2018).

The data was analysed by the means of qualitative content analysis with elements of discourse analysis, where qualitative content analysis entailed a systematic search for underlying meanings, patterns and processes, and a careful mapping of themes and arguments used to convey a specific vision of justice (cf. Patton 2015, 541–552; Perälylä and Ruusuvuori 2018, 670); and where ‘discourse analysis’ came to the fore in our specific attention to (implicit) meanings conveyed through metaphors, allusions, similes, semantic and syntactic choices, silences or omissions (i.e. absence of specific topics/issues). Strictly speaking, however, while rooted in the tradition of discourse analytical studies, our analytical approach is very much sociologically-oriented with only limited attention paid to the linguistic analysis sensu stricto (Wodak 2008). The analysis was guided by a set of questions related to (1) the grievances, threats, conflicts and polarisations mentioned or indirectly exposed; (2) the framing of justice, representation in particular; (3) the moral grounds of grievances and demands for justice; (3) the vision of the common good, including the questions of inclusion/exclusion and the scope of the assumed community; (4) the rhetorical devices applied. Through repeated re-reading and re-coding of the selected documents, four discourses of justice emerged. The process of qualitative content analysis could be seen as moving from inductive to deductive: the initial reading of the documents allowed discovering patterns in the choice of themes and the application of argumentative and rhetorical structures and led to developing a framework (four discourses of justice) that was subsequently applied to re-code the documents to confirm the appropriateness and cogency of the discourses uncovered (cf. Patton 2015). The discourses identified should be seen as analytical constructs that help to capture the essential characteristics of the various frames of reasoning and the various ways to conceptualise justice and its scope in the context of the Black Pete controversy. All the discourses are given distinctive names that summarise their content and reflect the essence of the debates captured by them.

Discourses of justice

Our analysis of the Black Pete controversy in the Netherlands confirms the relevance of exploring ‘justice’ in public debates on heritage. It shows, in fact, how deeply a controversy over the meaning and the role of heritage is infused with questions of (in)justice embedded in legal, political, social, economic and cultural institutions; and reflected in public attitudes and individual experiences.

In the analysis, four discourses of justice were identified: the two seemingly ‘impartial’ and consensus-seeking discourses – the discourse of Civil rights and the discourse of Conciliation; and two agonistic discourses operating in opposition to each other – the discourse of Structural oppression and the discourse of ‘It’s our story (and identity)’. Interestingly, while unique in the use of argumentative and rhetorical devices, the discourses are not always easily tied to specific social or political actors. In line with the literature on the simultaneity, overlap and permeability of public spheres (cf. Asen 2000; Squires 2002), our findings show that most social actors taking part in the debate draw from various discourses, although not always to the same extent. In the subsequent discussion, we seek to reflect the spirit of each of the discourses and to reconstruct their main argumentative structure with respect to the ‘what’ and the ‘who’ of justice. Each of the discourses is also evaluated in relation to Fraser’s tripartite framework.

Discourse of Civil rights

The Civil Rights discourse revolves around the questions of representation and, in particular, the ability of various sections of the population to take equal part in the Black Pete debate through the exercise of civil freedoms: the freedom of expression and the freedom of demonstration. Repeatedly referred to as ‘human rights’ that protect the individual against the power of the state, the two freedoms are construed as an absolute pre-condition of a democratic society, firmly embedded in the standards of a democratic state, European legal order, and Dutch constitutional order and political tradition. Civil freedoms are seen here as of the utmost, autotelic value that stems from the universality of human dignity, but also – in a more instrumental way – as a means to bring ‘injustice to light and thus to give everyone a chance to get critically involved in the political and societal debates’ (CRM 2016a – emphasis added). Indeed, for anti-Black Pete activists, who recurrently call their followers to make use of their ‘democratic rights’ in order to ‘make a statement’ and to bring attention to race-related injustice in Dutch society, the exercise of civil rights serves the aim of giving ‘voice to the thousands of Dutch people of various backgrounds’ (Action Group Zwarte Piet Niet, n.d.). Unsurprisingly, many political actors, especially those on the left side of the political spectrum, emphasise the primacy of civil rights and freedoms and demand their unconditional protection and facilitation by the authorities. Crucial in those demands is the claim of the universality of civil rights and freedoms that should be accessible in equal measure to all.

At the same time, the various participants in the debate draw attention to how this ideal is violated. The examples provided concern dubious demonstration bans issued by local authorities on the grounds of public safety; and the practices of allocating lawful demonstrations to public spaces located far away from the actual festivities, which deprives the protestors of the possibility to express their standpoint in a meaningful context, where their voice could be heard by the wider public, and especially by their (potential) opponents. Such restrictions are often seen, especially by anti-Black Pete activists and their political allies, as attempts to ‘mute the voice of the Black Pete contesters’ (NUC 2014a) and to limit the space for the discussion of Dutch racism deeply rooted in the colonial history of the Netherlands.

Despite its appeal to the universal norms and a rather inclusive definition of the ‘who’ of (representative) justice, the discourse of civil rights exhibits some internal variations, both in terms of argumentative and rhetorical structure. The language used by state agencies appointed to the protection of human rights seems much more impartial. For example, when the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights (CRM) explains in its statement the general legal framework for the exercise of human rights, their legal ground and scope, it refrains from the unambiguous condemnation of Black Pete as a clearly racialised figure (CRM 2016b) as well as the (moral) evaluation of the events which triggered the issuing of the statement (demonstration ban in Rotterdam and the ensuing arrests of anti-Black Pete activists). The focus is rather placed on the importance of societal debate on the issue of the Saint Nicolas celebration and the role of civil freedoms to facilitate it. However, in the eyes of anti-Black Pete activists, their political allies (politicians of left-wing parties: Socialist Party, Green Left, and minority parties: NIDA and DENK) and Amnesty International, the very same events constituted a clear and brutal violation of the right to freedom of expression and the right to demonstrate. A yet different approach to civil rights is taken by the defenders of the Black Pete tradition, who focus on the right of the ‘indigenous’ Dutch population to their tradition and culture, and who – while not necessarily denying their opponents the freedom of expression and demonstration – express a view that these freedoms should not be exercised at the expense of the majority, and especially not at the expense of the ‘innocent children’ (Sörensen in Rotterdam Municipality Council 2016).

The Civil rights discourse does not fall very neatly into Fraser’s tripartite framework of justice as redistribution, recognition and representation. Focused on the issue of the (non-)realisation of the legally guaranteed rights and liberties, it highlights the importance of legalistic thinking about justice that is allegedly absent from Fraser’s theorising (Scheuerman 2017). At the same time, however, the discourse draws attention to the procedural aspects of justice discussed by Fraser with respect to ‘ordinary political mis-representation’, which relates to deficiencies in formal democratic processes and encompass, amongst other things, the unequal position of members of the community in the practice of democratic deliberation.

Discourse of Structural oppression

Intertwined with the discourse of Civil rights, the discourse of Structural oppression treats civic rights and freedoms as a means to fight against racism ‘subtly … ingrained within the fabric of Dutch society’ (NUC 2014b). By bringing attention to the perspective of the excluded and the oppressed, the Black Pete opponents – an embodiment of the Fraserian ‘subaltern counterpublic’ (Fraser 1990) – aim to make the experiences, feelings and opinions of the people of colour impossible to dismiss and thus to initiate a societal change that would pave the way to a truly equitable, inclusive and non-discriminatory society.

The discourse is filled with grievances about the discriminatory treatment of anti-Black Pete activists by the authorities, law enforcement agencies and other citizens. Examples often concern police brutality (‘He was hit with a fist in his face by an agent, while other cops kicked him’ (NUC 2014a)); the unequal treatment of anti-Black Pete activists by the authorities vis-à-vis other (political) groupings (‘While the Dutch People's Union, known for its extreme right-wing ideology (…) was demonstrating … hundreds of illegally arrested [anti-ZP] demonstrators were detained at the police station’ (KOZP 2016)); intimidation upon arrest and even prosecution. Importantly, the violent treatment of the (black) anti-Black Pete demonstrators and the ‘double standards in equality and freedom of expression’ (NUC 2014a) are not seen as isolated events but interpreted as a visible sign of racism entrenched in the Dutch mentality formed through the history of slavery and colonial domination. Consequently, the harm experienced by the activists is seen as a reflection of the discrimination faced daily by all people of colour; and attributed to the latent racism and xenophobia ‘normalized in daily routines, dominant discourse and traditions, [and] also in/through structures, such as the labour market and the education system’ (NUC 2014c). The symbolic struggle against the figure of Black Pete is thus construed as a part of a broader campaign against institutional racism stemming from cultural misrecognition:

Implicit and explicit stereotypical images of ‘allochthones’ lead to discrimination on the labour market (…) ethnic profiling and structural inequality in education (…). In this form of racism, institutional racism, the culture of the dominant group – (…) is elevated to the norm to which the so-called ‘minorities’ have to conform. Individuals and groups that deviate too much from the norm are systematically excluded. (NUC 2014a)

Grievances of misrecognition resonate as well in complaints about the practices of ignoring the pain, past and present, of people of colour. Essential here is the waving away of the pain inflicted by the figure of Black Pete, the (false) depiction of minority members as ‘oversensitive’, ‘whining’ and ‘trapped in the past’ (NUC 2014c), and, most importantly, the juxtaposing of black pain with the one felt by white Dutch when facing changes in their beloved tradition. The impropriety of such a comparison is felt dearly:

[No one has ever] looked at [the descendants of the enslaved]. There has never been aftercare. Their situation has never been taken into account – where they come from. And that makes those people angry, and that is very understandable. (Interview NL4.2.2)

The dismissal of the feelings and the perspective of black people by the white majority, who also claim the sole authority to decide whether Black Pete is racist or not, is often seen as a consequence of a societal ‘taboo on the colonial history of the Netherlands, the Dutch Caribbean and Africa’ that effectively limits ‘the space to discuss issues related to discrimination, racism and their history and culture’ (NUC 2012). This results, according to the activists, in a (discursive) gap between ‘white innocence’ and ‘black pain’, which reflects ‘the unequal balance of power embedded in the structure of Dutch society’ (NUC 2014c).

The unequal power relations and the structurally disadvantaged position of the Black Pete opponents, or minorities in general, is reflected, according to the activists, in how they are dismissed by the authorities and/or not treated as a real partner to whom one owes accountability and respect and who should have a say in determining the time and form of the debate. The activists and their political allies complain about the authorities violating earlier agreements, imposing arbitrary and unjustified restrictions on their freedom of expression, and engaging in the misrepresentation of the opponents as ‘violent hooligans’ and a threat to public safety. Such grievances touch upon questions of misrepresentation. Indeed, the very interpretation of anti-Black Pete protests by the activists, as ‘a way of claiming citizenship by actively participating in Dutch society in pursuit of true equality and emancipation’ (NUC 2014c – emphasis added), exposes obvious deficiencies in the processes of ordinary political representation as experienced by people of colour. Furthermore, it shows the high relevance of questions concerning the ‘who’ of justice. There is a recurrent emphasis by the anti-Black Pete activists on their Dutch-ness and their belonging to Dutch society: ‘They are Dutch. Period. (…) [They] belong here – for their blood sweat and tears and all’ (Interview NL4.2.2), show how much they are affected by the practices of boundary drawing that relegate them to the position of ‘second class citizens’. The discourse of Structural oppression exposes an intimate connection between heritage practices, such as the Sint Nicolas celebration, and the multifaceted injustices faced by racial minorities in contemporary Dutch society. The black community’s opposition to the Black Pete tradition is construed here as a part of a broader struggle for participatory parity, that is, on par inclusion in all domains of social, economic and political life (Fraser 2007, 2009). With respect to representative justice, the discourse highlights the minorities’ need for equal footing in political participation, for example, in the form of unrestricted exercise of civil rights, an equal voice in matters of relevance to their lives, and a real power to co-determine society’s political agenda with respect to both the timing and the content of societal debates (cf. Fraser 2007, 2009; Urbinati and Warren 2008). In line with Fraser’s theorising, representative justice is conceived here as a form of meta-justice and a means to articulate and defend minorities’ interests with respect to distribution and recognition (cf. Fraser 2009).

Discourse ‘It’s our story (and identity)’

The nativist discourse of It’s our story (and identity) constitutes an agonistic response to the discourse of Structural racism. Permeated by a profound sense of being wronged, it constitutes an example of a counter-discourse used by those who despite their non-subaltern status, like some right-wing political parties or pro-Black Pete civil society organisations, position themselves in opposition to what they consider the ‘dominant’ anti-traditional-Black-Pete discourse (cf. Törnberg and Wahlström 2018; Squires 2002). To all those drawing from the discourse of It’s our story, the defence of the Black Pete tradition constitutes an element of a broader struggle for Dutch identity, culture and nationhood, and against the demands of immigrants and the interests of the (cosmopolitan) elite.⁴

In line with the nativist logic, the critique of the Black-Pete tradition is seen here as a ruthless, ‘orchestrated attack’ on Dutch culture and identity and a part of a ‘much broader offensive’ (Bosma in TK 2017) against Dutch, or more broadly, Western culture rooted in Judaeo-Christian and humanistic values, and interpreted in terms of majoritarian misrecognition. The opponents’ narrative of the Black Pete tradition as inherently racist, embedded in the history of slavery and colonial heritage, is rejected as a fundamental falsehood, fake news and a grave injustice done to the entire Dutch population, including past generations:

If you like Saint Nicolas and Black Pete, you are actually secretly seen as a racist. Together with your parents, and your ancestors, and their parents. And that does something to people, if you know it's not right. And you cannot defend yourself […]. It is not just your own soul, […] it is your whole family, your ancestors are given a blow as well. (Interview NL4.2.1)

The defence of the ‘truth’ takes the form of endorsing a narrative that traces the roots of the Black Pete tradition in the ancient European and Middle East folk festivities; documenting the groundlessness of accusations connecting the figure of Black Pete with the legacy of slavery; and downplaying the relevance of some allegedly racist elements in the present-day appearance of Black Pete. Right-wing politicians generally avoid any reference to slavery, de-emphasise the role of slavery in Dutch history (‘There was no slavery on Dutch soil’) and/or relativise it, for example, by reference to Muslim anti-Semitism and involvement in the slave trade (e.g. Interview NL4.2.3). With respect to contemporary racism, the acknowledgment that Dutch society is not free from institutional and hidden racism is accompanied by scepticism as to its profound nature, doubts about the actual harm the anti-Black Pete activists claim they experience, and accusations of the instrumental use of the ‘racism’ argument. In fact, it is sometimes tentatively suggested that accusations of racism brought about by racial minorities are unjust and exaggerated, in themselves an act of racism directed at the Dutch majority.

With respect to representative justice, grievances of not being heard by the authorities, of being abandoned or even discriminated against by the government that ‘fell on its knees in the face of multiculturalism’ and surrendered to the ‘dictatorship of the minority’ (Bosma in TK 2017), are coupled here with a desire to impinge upon minorities’ right to on par participation in a debate on the meaning of heritage and the nature of heritage practices. Construed, especially by right-wing politicians, as ill-natured ‘new-comers who immediately [upon arrival] form a judgement about [Dutch] society’ (Interview NL4.2.3), ‘ethnic extremists’ and ‘Black Panthers’ ‘hateful towards everything that is white’ (Bosma in TK 2017), the anti-Black Pete activists are seen as trouble makers rather than politically engaged and vocal citizens. Their right to contest the tradition is thus questioned on the grounds of their alleged non-belonging, their numerical minority: ‘96% wants Black Pete’ (Interview NL4.2.1), but also the looming threat they allegedly pose to the very fabric of the Dutch nation.

According to right-wing politicians involved in the debate, this threat is felt as very tangible, especially in the ‘old neighbourhoods, where people suffer from Islam being injected into the fabric of society’ (Interview NL4.2.3), and where the anxiety of change and growing economic insecurity is the greatest. The use of such anti-Muslim rhetoric clearly shows how debates over heritage can be instrumentalised for current political aims. However, through the allusion to the economic aspects of the Muslim presence in the Netherlands – as economic migrants and, especially, as alleged profiteers of the Dutch welfare state – it also points to the role that the redistributive grievances of the less-well-off members of the White majority play in the seemingly symbolic controversy over cultural heritage.

While inherently racist, the discourse of It’s our story is permeated with a strong sense of victimhood and a profound sense of being wronged, not only by the ‘other’ but also by the (cosmopolitan) elite: politically correct authorities, circumspect judicial system, and mainstream media. Justice is about restoration and/or protection of the (autochthonous) majority and their vision of a nation-based heartland community. Migrants and hyphenated-citizens, associated with failed integration, illegality, religious fundamentalism and terrorism, are seen as incompatible with the native culture and as a threat to the native population in social, economic, symbolic or even political terms (cf. Törnberg and Wahlström 2018). Defending the Black Pete tradition, especially for right-wing politicians, constitutes an element of a broader struggle for Dutch identity and ontological security that can only be guaranteed by a sense of (cultural) continuity and steadfastness. It is clearly a struggle for recognition understood not as a status but as a group-specific cultural identity (cf. Fraser 2001). However, it is also a struggle for representation: being heard and listened to, and for the unchallenged right to determine one’s own culture and decide on one’s future. At the same time, the political and civil society actors engaged in this discourse actively participate in the processes of (mis-)framing – setting the boundaries of the community and deciding who is entitled to take part (as a peer) in debates of vital social significance and to co-determine the ‘what’ and the ‘who’ of justice.

Discourse of Conciliation

Within the discourse of Conciliation, justice is about seeking a ‘golden mean’ and finding a balance between the interests and sentiments of various sides. Focused on representative justice, the discourse continues as a plea for a ‘calm and civilised and a respectful dialogue’ free from ‘all forms of threats, violence, polarization and aggression’ (CRM 2016b). Search for consensus implies caution in the prioritisation of civil liberties, freedom of expression and freedom to demonstrate in particular, as means of (seeking) justice. The extent to which authorities are obliged to facilitate the realisation of civil freedoms depends, according to the proponents of this discourse, on the circumstances and the relative weight of the right to freedom of expression and demonstration vis-à-vis public security and the well-being of children victimised by an ‘adult controversy’ (Aboutaleb in Rotterdam Municipality Council 2016).

The realisation of justice is imagined as a (search for) dialogue and conciliation that requires the cooperation, openness and good will of all involved. This is traceable, for example, in the arguments used by the Minister of Social Affairs to account for governmental involvement in societal debates in order to facilitate a respectful dialogue and to create space for the unbiased presentation of various perspectives (Plasterk in TK 2017); calls for a compromise and a sense of proportion in presenting one’s own sentiments: ‘we need to be normal again about the Saint Nicolas celebration and realise it is a children’s festivity and not a battle field for eternal moral rightness’ (A. Rutte in TK 2017); as well as the plea by the Children’s Ombudsman for openness for (cultural) change and/or the uneasy questions about the colonial roots of the Saint Nicolas celebration or contemporary racism in Dutch society (Kinderombudsman 2016).

Often, the search for neutrality and consensus involves symmetrising the blame for societal polarisation around the Black Pete or, alternatively, refraining from the ascription of responsibility. The latter is echoed, for example, in the documents by the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights (CRM) which, while recognising the racialisation in the figure of Black Pete and the harm it inflicts on minority members, attributes it to the operation of implicit and subconscious stereotypes that may lead to inadvertent acts of discrimination:

The Institute for Human Rights knows from its own research that discrimination usually does not take place consciously. Discrimination comes not only from intent, from discriminatory or racist purposes and convictions (…). Often, the [various] forms of exclusion and subordination that can be regarded as discriminatory are [in fact] an unintended (side) effect of certain actions and conduct. Therefore, to call people who celebrate Saint Nicolas with traditional Black Petes ‘racists’ goes too far. (CRM 2016b)

This absolution of the ‘average’ Dutch from direct responsibility for racism does not necessarily tone down the Black Pete antagonism: whereas for the supporters of Black Pete, who reject the colonial heritage of the mythical figure as historically incorrect, it goes too far; for the anti-Black Pete activists, for whom ‘racism is not a matter of compromise’ (NUC 2014d), it does not go far enough. For the latter, conciliation understood as restoration (or, in fact, creation) of a societal bond is conditioned by the majority’s eagerness to engage in critical self-reflection about the present-day legacy of its colonial history and white innocence. Thus, even though both – the pro- and the anti-Black Pete activists – declare their dialogical openness, motivated by the well-being of the broader community and the feeling of responsibility for past and future generations, each side of the controversy conditions reconciliation upon the (unreserved) acceptance of their historical ‘truth’ by the opponent.

At the same time, the role ascribed to the authorities and other public institutions in the reconciliation process seems rather ambiguous. On the one hand, the need for the authorities to facilitate the dialogue is almost uniformly recognised. On the other, the form and scope of their involvement in the process is hotly debated. What for some constitutes welcome facilitation or necessary intervention, for others means unjustified or ill-intended interference. For the authorities, the requirement of impartiality seems rather challenging. Although the representatives of both executive and judiciary powers seem very cautious in their official statements, as if in an attempt not to (further) antagonise the participants in the debate, by prioritising public order and safety (of the majority) over civil freedoms (of the minority), and ‘normality’ over dissonance; and by insisting on the graduality of change in heritage practices, they seem to implicitly prioritise the status quo over social change and the well-being of the majority over minority.

Embedded in a utilitarian vision of maximising the well-being of the greatest number, the discourse of Conciliation seems to fall outside Fraser’s tripartite framework of justice as redistribution, recognition and representation. Still, by engaging with questions around the conditionality of civil freedoms and the role of the state in securing an equitable stage for justice debates amongst all the affected, including the counterpublics, the discourse does resonate with the major tenets of Frasers theorising on representative injustice: the ideas of ordinary mis-representation and mis-framing.

Discussion and conclusion

Anchored in Nancy Fraser’s theorising of justice, the study has explored the relevance of ‘justice’ and ‘justice-related grievances’ in public controversies around heritage in the Netherlands. Through a discourse-analytic exploration of political debates on one of the most controversial pieces of Dutch cultural heritage, the figure of Black Pete, the study sought to map and synthetise a variety of perspectives on (in)justice in heritage practices. The analysis of speeches, statements by judicial and executive bodies, transcripts of parliamentary debates, and social media communication by civil society actors showed that Dutch controversy over the Black Pete heritage is deeply entwined with contemporary struggles over economic, cultural and political justice.

In the analysis, as shown below in Figure 1, four discourses of ‘justice’ have been distinguished: the discourses of Civil rights, Structural oppression, It’s our story (and identity) and Conciliation. While each of the discourses revolves around a distinct conception of the ‘what’ and of the ‘who’ of justice, the four discourses could be construed as falling along two distinctive axes: one related to the definition of whose moral reasoning and well-being is prioritised (majority vs. minority); and the other pertaining to the delineation of how a specific vision of justice and imagined common good is to be realised (through dialogical reconciliation vs. struggle) (cf. Lepianka 2018).

Figure 1. The four discourses of justice along the axes of focus (whose well-being is prioritized) and process (how achieved).

While the discourse of It’s our story clearly prioritises the sentiments of the white Dutch majority, embracing their (self-)positioning as the sole custodian, indeed the owner of the tradition, enjoying exclusive rights over its meaning and content; its parallel discourse, Structural oppression, projects the Black Pete figure as a symbol of racial oppression and claims the right of the oppressed minority to re-define the heritage practices attached to it. Also, the other two discourses, Civil rights and Conciliation, although seemingly conciliatory and focused on balancing the interests of different groups, are in fact biased. Whereas the Civil rights discourse, with its focus on civil rights and freedoms, strengthens the minority claims to co- or re-define the meaning of the Black Pete heritage; the Conciliation discourse, with its emphasis on the conditionality of civil rights and freedoms upon security and well-being of the greatest number, prioritises the majoritarian status quo.

Although heritage is commonly considered a part of the cultural sphere (Smith 2010), which (implicitly) prioritises recognitive claims to justice (Waterton and Smith 2010; Baird 2014), our results demonstrate that what is at stake in the anti-Black Pete debates goes far beyond demands for recognition, and especially recognition understood in purely identitarian terms (cf. Fraser 2007). Recognitive claims raised by minority politicians and anti-Black Pete activists ultimately aim at overcoming status subordination (cf. Fraser 2007). As such they are often entwined with claims for representation and redistribution. This entwinement seems particularly strong in the discourses of Structural oppression and It’s our story, possibly in relation to the strongly polarising rhetoric and sharp boundaries between ‘us’ and ‘them’. Indeed in both discourses, the Black Pete controversy is recognised as a symbol, or a surface, of a much bigger and more prominent struggle over the right to (re-)define social relations and to (co-)determine societal norms and values. When evaluated through the prism of Fraser’s framework, the two discourses clearly revolve around, and clash over, the question of mis-framing and the inclusion/exclusion from the debate of some alleged (non-)members of the community: the people of colour. While anti-Black Pete activists engage in highlighting their belonging to the national Dutch frame, their opponents – especially the right-wing politicians – devalue the legitimacy of their grievances either by stressing their non-belonging or by questioning their mandate to represent the descendants of slaves or to have a say on Dutch history and cultural heritage.

Social actors taking part in the debate tend to draw from various discourses, although not always to the same extent. This tentative eclecticism resonates with scholarship on counterpublics, which draws attention to the multiplicity of public spheres, and the fact that people participate in more than one public and/or draw from multiple discourses (cf. Asen 2000; Mădroane, Ciocea, and Cârlan 2020). Particularly interesting, however, is the antagonistic interdependence between two counter discourses: Structural oppression and It’s our story. Engaged in mutual contestation through rival interpretations of topics, events, actors, political statements and social phenomena, the two discourses serve two adversarial counterpublics constituted around oppositional identities, interests and needs.

Admittedly, while useful as a lens in exploring the complexity of (in)justice claims in debates on heritage, Fraser’s tripartite conceptualisation of justice as redistribution, representation and recognition, leaves room for other conceptions. Particularly interesting in our analysis is the relevance of the discourse of ‘rights’, noted also by other researchers of heritage (Catala 2015; Rodenberg and Wagenaar 2016). While the popularity of rights might be related to the arena and the form in which the opponents of Black Pete express their claims to justice – through protests and demonstrations in public spaces – it also seems to reflect the fact that ‘rights’ have become a primary legal vehicle for formulating and pursuing claims to justice (Douglas-Scott 2017). Another conception of justice often evoked or alluded to by the participants in the Black Pete debate is ‘restorative justice’ (cf. Blustein 2010; Alderman and Inwood 2013).

Future studies on controversies around heritage should further explore a link between heritage and contemporary struggles over a ‘just’ society. Particular attention should be paid to the complexity of the grievances raised, the entwinement of past and present-day injustices, and how the various visions of justice and ‘just’ heritage practices are implicated by the discursively constructed boundaries of justice, the implicit definition of the community (‘the us’), and the meaning of citizenship and belonging.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) disclose receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The research was funded from the EU Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme [grant number 727112].

Notes

1 EU Horizon2020-funded project Towards a European Theory of Justice and Fairness (ETHOS). See https://ethos-europe.eu/

2 On 11 November 2016 – the day of the Saint Nicolas arrival – 198 people, mostly members of Kick-Out Zwarte Piet activist organization (KOZP), were arrested in Rotterdam for wanting to protest against Black Pete. The circumstances under which the arrests took place, including the demonstration ban and emergency order issued by the Mayer of Rotterdam, caused a heated debate.

3 The proposed Black Pete Law required all governmental agencies co-organizing and/or co-financing the Saint Nicolas celebrations to ensure only the traditional looking Black Petes participate in the festivities; it required the Black Pete figure to have ‘completely black or dark-brown face, red painted lips, black curly hair, golden earrings’ and be dressed in a velvet suit and a cap with a coloured feather. The proposal was debated in Parliament on 16 February 2017, in the midst of the electoral campaign; it was overwhelmingly rejected.

4 While in the material analysed, the nativist discourse is applied predominantly by representatives of the Party for Freedom (PVV), Leefbaar Rotterdam (LR) and pro-Black Pete activists, it is important to note that nativist elements are present also in the programmes of the radical-right Forum of Democracy (FvD, in parliament since 2017) and the right-conservative Christian parties, like Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA).