Title: Political Anthropology
1Political Anthropology
- The Organization of Power
2Power and Authority
- Power
- the ability to exercise ones will over others.
- Authority
- the socially approved use of power.
3Political Anthropology
- How are power and social control
- organized?
- distributed?
- manifested?
- How are group decisions made?
- How is social order enforced?
- How are conflicts dealt with?
Because of the embeddedness it is better to talk
of sociopolitical
4Mechanisms of Control
- Internal (ideological)
- culturally instilled values
- expectation of supernatural harm or reward
- External (behavioral)
- informal
- ridicule and ostracism, gossip
- praise
- formal
- laws and rules
- institutionalized threat of force
5Law and Conflict Resolution
- Formal and informal sanctions
- Conflict mediators
- Often older men
- Nuer leopard skin chief
- Ordeals
- Oaths supernatural source
- Oracles people or things that have
- prophetic abilities
Delphic Oracle, Greece
6Degrees of Organizational Complexity
- Uncentralized
- Band
- Tribe
- Centralized
- Chiefdom
- State
In general, as the economy becomes more
productive, population size increases leading to
greater regulatory problems, which give rise to
more complex social relations and linkages
(greater social and political complexity).
1962, Elman Service
7Bands the political organization of foraging
groups
- Rarely more than 30-40 people
- kin-based
- Flexible extended family units
- No formal political organization
- No socioeconomic stratification
- the political order (polity) is not a distinct
institution, but is embedded in the overall
social order.
8Bands
- How are group decisions made?
- adult consensus
- informal leaders
- egalitarian
- How is social order enforced?
- ridicule and ostracism
- How are conflicts dealt with?
- negotiation/mediation
- mobility
9Tribes
- Multiple autonomous small communities that share
common identity - Usually pastoralists or Horticulturalists
- Several hundred to thousands of people
- No formal political organization
- Little socioeconomic stratification
10Tribes
- How are group decisions made?
- Consensus among descent groups
- How are social norms enforced?
- ridicule and ostracism
- How are conflicts dealt with?
- negotiation/mediation
- semi-official mediation
11Tribes The Village Head
- achieved position comes with very limited
authority. - He cannot force or coerce people to do things.
- He can only persuade, harangue, and try to
influence people to do things. - acts as a mediator in disputes, but has no
authority to back his decision or impose
punishments. - The village head must lead in generosity.
- He must be more generous, which means he must
cultivate more land. - He hosts feasts for other villages.
modern-day Iroquois, New York
12Tribes Big Man
- Big Man -like a village head, except that his
authority is regional in that he may have
influence over more than one village - wisdom
- wealth
- generosity
- charisma.
- unofficial prestige status
- The benefit is greater influence and community
standing.
Nuer, Sudan
13Pantribal Sodalities and Age Grades
- Sodalities are non-kin-based organizations that
may generate cross-societal linkages. - often based on common age or gender.
- Some sodalities are confined to a single village.
- Some sodalities span several villages these are
called pantribal sodalities. they can mobilize a
large number of men for raids.
14Age Sets
- sodalities that include all of the men or women
born during a certain time Similar to a cohort of
class of students - Members of an age set progress through a series
of age grades together (e.g., initiated youth,
warrior, adult, elder, (freshmen, sophomore,
junior, senior, graduate). - Sodalities create nonkin linkages between people
based on age, gender, and ritual and create a
sense of ethnic identity and belonging to the
same cultural tradition
15Chiefdoms
- Agriculturalists or pastoralists
- Multiple communities that share common identity
and tribute system - Thousands to many thousands of people
- Centralized political organization based on
hierarchical lineage system - a political unit of permanently allied tribes and
villages under one recognized leader with
authority - Significant socioeconomic stratification based on
lineage
Old Chief of the Arawa Tribe, Rotorua, New
Zealand.
16Chiefdoms
- How are group decisions made?
- Chief and advisors
- How is social order enforced?
- ridicule and ostracism
- official order
- use of force
- How are conflicts dealt with?
- negotiation/mediation
- centralized arbitration
17Chiefdoms
- Small hierarchical bureaucracy
- Tribute - tax paid to chief to be redistributed
according to community needs - Chiefs Leaders own, manage, and control basic
factors of the economy and have special access to
- crops
- labor
- cash
- goods.
Grand chief Matthew Coon Come
18Chiefdoms
- Formalized leadership functions
- Unrelated to personal qualities
- Rules of succession (primogeniture)
- Office is permanent - it outlasts the individuals
who occupy them - Loyalty, status, coercion but not too much
Zulu Chief
19States
- Agriculturalists
- Multiple cities that share tax and administrative
infrastructure system - Tens of thousands to billions of people
- Centralized political organization possessing
coercive power - Social stratification is one of the key
distinguishing features of states.
Calcutta
20States
- How are group decisions made?
- rulers decide on behalf of populous
- How is social order enforced?
- official enforcement
- threat or use of sanctions
- How are conflicts dealt with?
- negotiation/mediation
- centralized arbitration
Angkor
21States
- Status
- not necessarily kin-based
- class-based
- Codification of laws
- More formalized in industrial societies
- Courts adjudicate and mediate Officials
- Monopoly on use of force
- Police force
- Hammurabis Code (1750 BC)