Abraham Kuyper

1837 – 1920

Abraham Kuyper was a Dutch Neo-Calvinist theologian, journalist, and politician who served as Prime Minister of the Netherlands from 1901 to 1905 and founded the Anti-Revolutionary Party. His doctrine of "sphere sovereignty" and his theological writings on race were drawn upon directly by Afrikaner Reformed theologians in twentieth-century South Africa to provide a religious justification for the racial separation policies that became apartheid. As prime minister he ordered the violent military suppression of the 1903 Dutch railway strike and pursued colonial policies in the Dutch East Indies that deepened forced-labour systems on Java and Sumatra.

Last checked: May 10, 2026, 1:06 PM