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Summary Introduction to Social and Cultural Antropology B
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Summary for part B of the course Introduction to Social an Cultural Anthropology in English
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Introduction to Cultural and Social AnthropologyChapter 8 Political Systems
Power is the ability to exercise one’s will over others. Authority is the formal,
socially approved use of power. The study of political regulation draws our
attention to those who make decisions. Political regulation includes processes as
decision making, dispute management and conflict resolution. Kottak prefers to
speak of sociopolitical organizations. Elman Service listed four types of political
organization:
Band, a small kin-based group. All its members are related by kinship or
marriage and is found among foragers
Tribe, have economies based on nonintensive food production like
horticulture and pastoralism. They have no formal government and no
reliable means of enforcing political decisions, a rudimentary political
structure. People live in villages and are organized into kin groups based
on common descent. There’s no socioeconomic stratification.
Chiefdom, a sociopolitical organization intermediate between tribe and
state. Social relations are also based mainly on kinship, but they have
differential access to resources. Some people have more wealth , prestige
and power than others. Prestige is social esteem, respect or approval.
There’s also a permanent political structure.
State, a form of sociopolitical organization based on a formal government
structure and socioeconomic stratification.
Today none of the first three types can be studied as a self-contained form of
political organization. Because all now exist within nation states and are subject
to state control. But these labels do correlate with adaptive strategies.
Modern foragers live in nation states and an interlinked world. All foragers trade
with food producers. Most of them rely on governments for some part of what
they consume. According to Kent there’s a tendency to stereotype foragers to
treat them all as alike. A new and probably more accurate view of contemporary
foragers sees them as groups forced into marginal environments by states,
colonialism and world events. Foragers live in bands, band leaders were leaders
in name only! They were first among equals they have advice or made
decisions, but they had no way to enforce those decisions. Theft is uncommon
among foragers, each person has access to the resources he or she needed to
sustain life. There was no notion of private ownership of territory or animals.
The Inuit, a group of foragers, provide a good example of conflict resolution
means of settling disputes in stateless societies along with cultural norms. Norms
are cultural standards or guidelines that enable individuals to distinguish
between appropriate and inappropriate behavior. Foragers lack a formal law.
They don’t have a legal code with trial and enforcement, but they do have
methods of social control and dispute settlement. The Inuits have no government
to intervene in a blood feud, a murderous feud between families. A blood feud
emerges because there are less man than women, most man had two or three
wives taking additional wives could enhance a man’s reputation. So most
Inuits disputes were between men caused by wife stealing. One such dispute
could escalate into several deaths as relatives avenged a succession of murders.
With no government available to solve this, the Inuits could challenge a rival to a
song battle. The audience proclaimed the winner at the end of the match. This
song battle is a good way of conflict resolution.
,Tribes have more effective regulatiory mechanisms than foragers do, but tribal
societies have no sure means of enforcing political decisions. Horticultures tend
to be small, with low population density and open access to strategic resources.
But age, gender and personal traits determine how much support and respect
you get from others. This egalitarianism diminishes as village size and
populations density increase. The leaders are village heads, they have limited
authority. A village head can only persuade and try to influence public opinion. He
will give an opinion and advice. The way someone acts as a village leader
depends on his personal traits and the number of supporters he can gather. He
must lead in generosity.
Among the Yanomami, when a village is dissatisfied with its headman its
members can leave and found a new village this is called village fissioning.
The big man is an elaborate version of the village head. The big man had
supporters in several villages! The village head only in one village. A big man is a
generous tribal entrepreneur with multivillage support, he’s a regulator of
regional political organization. This political leader was common among the South
Pacific. He must also lead in generosity.
They key political figure among the Kapauku was the tonowi, a big man who
achieved his status through hard work and amassing wealth in the form of pigs.
Being a tonowi is an achieved status distinguished from others based on
wealth, generosity, physical fitness, bravery and the ability to gain the support
and loyalty of others. Men became big men because they had certain
personalities! They did not inherit their status but created it through hard work
and good judgment. There’s a generalization among Kapauku people about
leadership if someone achieves wealth and widespread respect and support,
he or she must be generous. A big man worked hard not to hoard wealth but to
be able to give away the fruits of his labor, to convert wealth into prestige and
gratitude.
In tribes, nonkin groups are called associations or sodalities and they may serve
as linking functions. They are based on common age or gender. Pantribal
sodalities groups that extend across a whole tribe, spanning several villages.
Pantribal sodalities tend to be found in areas where two or more different cultures
come into regular contact. They draw members from several villages and can
mobilize large numbers of men. For example the Masai in Kenya. Men born during
a four-year period get circumcised together and belong to the same named
group, an age set, throughout their lives. They move through different age grade,
with the warrior grade being the most important.
Age, gender and ritual can link members of different local groups into a single
social collectivity in a tribe and thus create a sense of ethnic identity, of
belonging to the same cultural tradition.
Herders have varied political systems. They have to interact with a variety of
groups and often have powerful chiefs. For example:
The Brasseri, they have a smaller population. The chief is called a khan, he
deals with fewer problems in coordinating its movements than leaders of a
bigger population. The khan’s authority came from his personal traits.
The Qashqai, have multiple levels of authority and more powerful chiefs.
They had a bigger population. The biggest leader was the il-khan,
, managing a complex hierarchy. Allegiance shifted from the person to the
office.
Pastoralism is often just one among many specialized economic activities within a
nation state. Chiefdom was a transitional form of organization that emerged
during the evolution of tribes into states. In reality there’s a continuum:
Tribe Chiefdom State
Carneiro said a state is an autonomous political unit encompassing many
communities within its territory, having a centralized government with the power
to collect taxes, draft men for work or war, and decree and enforce laws.
Chiefdoms and states can fall as well as rise. In chiefdoms social relations are
mainly based on kinship, marriage, descent, age, generation and gender just
as they are in bands and tribes. But states bring nonrelatives together and oblige
them to pledge allegiance to a government. Chiefdoms and states are
permanent. An office is a permanent position, which must be refilled when it is
vacated by death or retirement. Offices outlast individuals and they ensure that
sociopolitical organization endures across generations.
Unlike big men, chiefs were exempt from ordinary work and had rights and
privileges unavailable to the masses. But they also returned a portion of the
wealth they took in. This is called chiefly redistribution a flow of resources to
and from a central place. This offers economic advantages. Chiefs play an
important role in production, distribution, and consumption of resources.
Social status in chiefdoms is based on seniority of descent. People in a chiefdom
are thought to be related to one another, all were descended from a group of
founding ancestors. How close you were related to a leader, how bigger your
status. But everyone descended from a leader. And because everyone had a
slightly different status, it was difficult to draw a line between elites and common
people there’s a lack of a sharp gap between elites and common people. But
these status systems of chiefdoms were associated with differential access to
resources. Rights and duties were allocated. In states this goes even further
states are characterized by much clearer class divisions than chiefdoms.
Stratification is a key feature of states!
According to Max Weber there are three dimensions of social stratification:
Wealth, economic status. This encompasses all a person’s material assets,
including income, land, and other types of property
Power, the ability to exercise one’s will over others. To get what one wants,
the basis of political status
Prestige, refers to esteem, respect or approval for acts, deeds or qualities
considered exemplary. Is the basis of social status, gives people a sense of
worth and respect which they may often convert into economic advantage.
In archaic states there are contrasts in wealth, power and prestige between entire
groups of men and women. Each stratum includes people of both genders and all
ages. There are two levels:
Superordinate, higher or elite. This stratum had privileged access to valued
resources
Subordinate, lower or underprivileged. This stratum was limited by the
privileged group in their access to resources.
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