Kees Boeke

Cornelis "Kees" Boeke (25 September 1884 – 3 July 1966)[1] was a Dutch reformist educator, Quaker missionary and pacifist.

There, he found inspiration in Bournville, the garden village which the Cadbury family (owners of the chocolate factory) had built for their workers.

Boeke began to speak publicly in England: "The Germans are our brothers; God did not create man that he might kill; the war will find its quickest end when all soldiers lay down their weapons."

Later in the Second World War, Boeke took part in the underground Dutch resistance movement against the same Germans that he called brothers before.

[2] After the First World War, Boeke erected a large conference centre in Bilthoven, which he called "Brotherhood House."

Present at the conference were Leon Revoyne, Mathilda Wrede, Leonard Ragaz, Pierre Ceresole, as well as Hodgkin and Schultze.

Believing he could build a better society through educating children, he started a school called "De werkplaats" (the workshop).

His school, which uses Maria Montessori's methods, extended by Boeke's own educational ideas, became nationally known; even the Dutch queen Juliana sent her daughters there.

Children had to perform tasks such as cleaning the school, growing vegetables and fruits, and helping with lunch cooking.

Boeke's notion of sociocracy was, in effect, a secular implementation of the Quaker ideals applied to education in such a way that children were treated as adults, and were on first-name terms with their teachers.