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Perhaps not just symbolism but also practical policing? In bad times, the last thing you want to have is under-occupied youths. Make 'em work and they get fewer bad ideas. Hungry students are revolutionary; the FDJ (DDR - era youth organization) was a pillar of the state.

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The CCC in the US during the Great Depression as well https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps . "The devil makes work for idle hands" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_American_Bund .

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Great inter-disciplinary research, I don’t know how you come across these gems but thanks for sharing. Perfectly sums up the situation in the US-DC is the circus 🎪 confusing & distracting the herd as the elite take bread from their mouths whilst crushing dissent.

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To be charitable, they could have been public work programmes during times of trouble to give employment to otherwise starving workers/ peasants? For example, a famine relief project in Lucknow from the 18th century

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bara_Imambara

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