The Development of the State

1. The Development of the State

2. From Blood to Soil • We looked at primordial theory of ‘bottom-up’ social organisation. We now look at its opposite • Problem: How do we get from small tribes to multi-million member ethnic groups and nations? • We’ve looked at vernacular culture and genealogy • Problem: What about power, economics, military, ideas: the 4 ‘sources of social power’ • Now we focus on power and the state • Evolution of political organisation

4. Key Underlying Dynamics • Functional: ‘makes sense’ to pool resources and power. Either evolution selects, or people see this and cooperate • Internal Stratification: Group within the society seeks to exploit producers • External War: people brought into the state through conquest. Or need for military coordination (also a functional argument)

5. 1. Functionalism • Key figure is Talcott Parsons • Society an evolving organism, increasingly interdependent and widening sphere of human relations • General pattern: shift from ascription to meritocracy, from particularity to universality, from collective to the individual

6. Parsons’ 6 Evolutionary Steps • Social stratification • Cultural legitimation • Bureaucratic administration • Money and Markets • Generalised Legal System • Democratic Association • Parsons’ work reflected evolutionary assumptions of both Marxist and non-Marxist scholars

7. 2.Marxism • Evolution from feudal to capitalist and then to socialist society • Driver is the techno-economic ‘base’, namely the mode of production (agriculture, then industry) • Contradictions between classes produce change • Neo-Marxist account sees internal elite seizing power to exploit producers • Legitimating this with ideologies like divine right of kings, and later, nationalism or divide-and-rule ethnic conflict

8. 3. External Warfare • Fight off challengers to land and power • Exploit internal resources to defend or expand • Tribes brought into states as they are conquered • Elites from new acquisitions brought into centralised power structure by force, consensual agreement, wealth or contract • One study of early states (The Early State) found that vast majority formed by conquest or mobilisation against external threat, and NOT by internal class-based dynamics or functional responses

9. Tilly’s ‘State-Making’ • Tilly: • 1) eliminating external rivals outside of a given territory, • 2) neutralizing internal opposition within the territory, and • 3) extraction of resources from the population

10. Mann’s Four Sources of Social Power • Military • Economic • Ideological • Political • Interacting, complex networks and chains of causation

11. From Tribe to State • Structure of the State, as opposed to underlying dynamics • Idealised hunter-gatherer society is egalitarian • But quasi-elite within clan and lineage systems (how effective were instruments of coercion?) • Loose aggregations of clans and lineages • Mutual protection a key motivating factor (how important was common culture/descent in who allied?)

12. The Barbarian Sackers of Rome • External conquest: Merovingians created when Clovis kills off leaders of other war bands, attaching their groups to self. Same with Vandals and, over 1000 yrs later, with Zulus • Banding together: Visigoths created out of unification of three groups. Also, many conquest groups had to unify to defeat Rome • 3 castes in most agglomerations: free, freed, slave. only first two were militarised • Culture: in most cases, all groups that unite (ie ostrogoth, visigoth) were already called 'goth' before uniting. Shared visions of past, values, ways of operating • One major exception: alliance between Persian-speaking Aluns and Germanic Vandals attacked N. Africa

13. Centralisation • Chiefdoms an intermediate stage between band and state • Complex chiefdoms, tribal confederations (Irish, Zulu, Swiss) • Centralisation and stratification • State gradually adds more functions • I.e. local notables at first arrest criminals and provide social services for state because state cannot

14. Ideology and the Masses • Both Key to Nations • Largely absent in Pre-Modern Era, say many • Divine Right of Kings: some say these were genuine beliefs, others that these instumental (as with national myths later) • Masses only participated in local politics, could not organise centrally. Were thus not a factor • Peasants not needed for internal/external defence. Had specialised professional tiers for this (one view)

15. Imperial States Imperial State - Centralized, Hierarchical, Cosmopolitan, Some mass participation, slavery (i.e. Roman Empire, Mughal Empire, Sassanids)

16. Feudal Monarchy Feudal Monarchy - Decentralized, Hierarchical, Cosmopolitan, little mass participation, serfdom (i.e. Holy Roman Empire, Islamic Empires)

17. Mann’s Argument • Patrimonial (ie Imperial) vs Feudal • Wealthy states were targeted by invaders • Forced to adopt patrimonial organisation rather than the decentralised structure of feudalism

18. patrimonial states more interventionist in economy: • Infrastructure • roads and communication • Weights, coinage and measures • Armed forces centralised, needed mobility through territory

19. City-States • Athens, early Republican Rome, Germanic trading cities and others • Positioned between agricultural states and so were exceptions and not the rule • Patrician elite highly interdependent, so supported patrimonialism and centralisation • Norms of sovereignty penetrate deeper into the population due to their interdependence • Thus democracy and citizenship

20. Trading Cities Standestaat - Decentralized, Hierarchical - but with a growing urban bourgeoisie, Cosmopolitan, little mass participation (Hanseatic League)

21. Balance of Power Dynamics • Local nobles might seek to band against the King and resist centralisation (ie England) • But might distrust each other and seek King’s protection • International invasions might promote cooperation and centralisation • Functional issues: • Need to compete: ie Hansa lack standardised weights/measures, can’t agree • Technology of War can favour larger over smaller states

22. The Age of Absolutism • Absolutist - Centralized, less cosmopolitan, growing mass participation (France of Louis XIV)

23. Absolutist France: Louis XIV at Versailles, c. 1700

27. Modern Nation-State • Centralized, national, mass participation (USA, France, late 1700s)

28. Nations and National Boundaries • Nations represent the 'high-water mark of dynastic expansionism' • Map of Eurasia, 1000-2000 A.D.