Maternalism and workhouse matrons in nineteenth-century Finland

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article uses the concept of maternalism to discuss workhouse management, which in late nineteenth-century Finland was entrusted to women. The article looks at the ways in which maternalist discourse manifests in the development of a workhouse matron's leadership position, how the said discourse became further manifest in the guidelines given to matrons by the state poor relief officials and how the boundaries of a matron's authority were defined in conflicts with both male agents in poor relief and the paupers themselves. Ultimately, the article illuminates the contemporary understanding of feminine and masculine duties in society, which were inextricably linked to perceptions of social class. In addition, it explores the transfer of ideas from the more central regions of Europe to a Northern periphery by contrasting the Finnish development with that in England. The article suggests that as a workhouse matron's position was built on the ideal of normative womanhood, it was not emancipatory per se. However, the article also shows that only those elements of normative womanhood that were relevant to a matron's mission of converting the paupers to respectable citizenship were to be included in her leadership as a whole. These restrictions marked professionalisation inside the contemporary maternalist discourse and the feminine sphere of society.