Manufacturing and exercising authority in a religious community in the 19th century: The “servant sisters” of the Daughters of Charity

This paper looks at how the “servant sisters” of the Daughters of Charity learned how to lead and then took on leadership within their community. It gives an account of a unique experience of authority, exercised by women in a religious context, in France from the mid-19th century until the eve of the First World War, in an institution that nevertheless manufactured obedience. Situating these intermediary figures of authority within the community, this paper analyses the sources that describe the institution’s progressive efforts to define authority, to train these women and to supervise their practice, thus accumulating knowledge about the exercise of power. Religious excellence and the application of the moral and emotional dispositions associated with women at the time were effective sources of authority in everyday life. This authority enabled hundreds of women to exercise real power, with varying degrees of success, and opened up careers for them.