Segmentary society

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In political ethnology and ethnosociology, a segmentary society is an ethnic or indigenous society that is not shaped by central political institutions , but by groups of the same kind and equal to each other ( lineages or clans ). Those with classes , castes , stands or strata differ from segmentary societies .

features

The term segmentary society was coined by the French ethnologist Émile Durkheim in De la division du travail social in 1893 and adopted in 1940 by the British social anthropologists Edward E. Evans-Pritchard and Meyer Fortes to describe African societies. At Durkheim it says:

“As a clan, we refer to a horde that is no longer independent in order to instead become an element of an expanded group, and we refer to segmentary society based on clans as those peoples formed from the association between clans. We call these societies segmentary to show that they are formed from the repetition of similar aggregates, analogous to the rings of the annelid worm, and we refer to that elementary aggregate as a clan because this word very well has a mixture of its family and political nature Expresses. "

Such societies consist of a number of similar and equal-ranking segments, which are organized via so-called lineages ( single-line family associations) and can be further subdivided into sub-segments; In addition to these segments based on ancestry and kinship , groups of different sizes can also exist on a religious, cultic or territorial basis (villages). The nesting of these segments ensures the extensive self-regulation of cooperation and conflict relationships without a permanent central political authority. This enables the greatest possible flexibility and decentralization of the political organization. In this way, even larger societies can function acephalously , contrary to the earlier assumption that only small groups could be “without power”.

Typically, in segmented societies, older people are superior to younger people ( seniority ). Such societies are also mostly egalitarian (without major social differences), since the permanent accumulation of personal wealth is hardly possible for individual members. The role of women is only seemingly subordinate.

In the 1930s the interest of colonial powers in researching societies organized in this way grew . One of the most important works based on the theory of segmentary society is African Political Systems by Edward Evans-Pritchard and Meyer Fortes. Above all, they examined the lineage structures, which are the basis for the political structure. They emphasized the equality of the segments and the lack of a central authority. The ethnographies about the Nuer and Tallensi have become known . Other societies whose systems have been studied in this regard are the African Dinka , Somali and Tiv . Elizabeth E. Bacon, who began field research with the Afghan Hazara in the late 1930s , introduced the Mongolian term obok for the segmental groups she discussed in southern central Asia .

The German sociologist Niklas Luhmann used the term segmentary society to differentiate between societies. As an example, he cites simple, small, spatially separated and equal societies with face-to-face communication (tribes, villages and others).

In his work Regulated Anarchy , the German ethnologist Christian Sigrist took up the topic of domination-free societies in 1967 and developed the theory further (see acephaly : freedom of domination).

Examples of segmental indigenous cultures

Indian women from the Mapuche people (postcard from Chile 1899)

The South African San ethnic groups are among the acephalous segmental societies that have so far organized themselves without a higher-level political leadership system. There is also no formal jurisprudence. In the worst case, violations of the moral principles of the San are punished with expulsion from the community. The hunting groups, often from 40 to a maximum of 200 San, are made up - in addition to family relationships - flexibly according to personal preferences. Group issues such as hunting or relocation are decided jointly by consensus ; Women are equal. Until the 1960s, the primary economy of the San was the extractive economy of egalitarian hunters and gatherers . Accordingly, the supply of goods carried out depending on the ethnic group through various forms of reciprocity such as the gift economy or prestige goods exchange network of !Kung that primarily on a gratuitous distribution of the goods rather than on trade and market economy was based. This principle only works today with the very few, largely fully nomadic , San. With the sedentary groups, the changed modes of subsistence lead to different, not yet traditional, mixed forms between egalitarianism and the market, which often lead to conflicts.

According to some authors, the South American people of the Reche- Mapuche had developed a social organization without central rule or fixed borders between social classes and territories until the appearance of the Spanish colonizers. Order was primarily regulated by social structures, relationships and alliances . The definition of the group did not depend on ancestry , but on the ability to express themselves as a group. In political mostly had Anthropology (now policy Ethnology ), who could not imagine a society without domination, the domination-free societies of the American double continent only in view of the " chiefs ", the Ionco peace-called simple and groups mediators , as well as additionally present temporary Warchief and examined the shaman standing on the fringes of society . These certainly had power, but not the coercive staff and coercive force necessary to rule. The Spanish conquistadors judged the Reche-Mapuche in an antagonistic way to their own strict hierarchical system: "They have no head, they know no authorities, they have no language, they have no law, they lack faith and reputation."

The ethnocentric - in this sense the Eurocentric - view of the indigenous population as a society of shortages without a state, without history, without writing and without a market ignores the fact that these societies control the natural environment according to their needs without the conventional development discourse of the parallelism of economic development and developing political power. In addition, there was no universal figure of God among the Reche-Mapuche. In contrast to the Maya and Aztecs , there were no deities and no central representative bodies in the religious sphere. The Mapuche still manage their land in common ownership .

literature

Web links

  • Gabriele Rasuly-Paleczek: Excursus Segmentary Theory. (PDF; 1.9 MB) In: Introduction to the forms of social organization. Lecture materials part 2/5, Institute for Cultural and Social Anthropology, University of Vienna, 2011, pp. 77–78 , archived from the original on October 21, 2013 ; accessed on March 31, 2014 (58 pages).
  • Gabriele Rasuly-Paleczek: Excursus ad. segmental lineage model as the basis of the tribal organization. (PDF; 221 kB) In: Introduction to the forms of social organization. Lecture materials part 5/5, Institute for Cultural and Social Anthropology, University of Vienna, 2011, pp. 192–193 , archived from the original on October 4, 2013 ; accessed on March 31, 2014 (39 pages).
  • Brian Schwimmer: Segmentary Lineages. In: Tutorial: Kinship and Social Organization. Department of Anthropology, University of Manitoba, Canada, 1995, accessed March 31, 2014 (part of an extensive kinship tutorial).

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Émile Durkheim : On social division of labor . Study of the organization of higher societies. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt 1996, ISBN 3-518-28605-6 , p. 230 (original 1893: De la division du travail social ).
  2. ^ Hannelore Vonier: Segmentary Society. In: matriarchat.info. Own website, Florida, accessed on March 31, 2014 (the hobby researcher refers to Makilam: Signs and Magic of Kabyle Women. Eroticism in the Art of Berber Women. Lit, Münster et al. 2003, ISBN 3-8258-6921 -0 ).
  3. ↑ Elizabeth E. Bacon: Obok. A Study of Social Structure in Eurasia. Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, New York 1958
  4. ↑ Bernd Andreae: The epochal succession of agricultural forms of operation in steppes and dry savannas (= publications of the Society for Economic and Social Sciences of Agriculture, Volume 14). Landwirtschaftsverlag, Münster-Hiltrup 1977, pp. 349–352.
  5. ↑ Marion Benz: The Neolithization in the Middle East . 2nd, hardly changed edition. Ex oriente, Berlin 2008, ISBN 3-9804241-6-2 , pp. 207-219: Appendix III ( PDF: 9.6 MB, 274 pages on exoriente.org ).
  6. ↑ a b Olaf Kaltmeier: In search of anarchy. In: Jürgen Mümken (Ed.): Anarchism in Postmodernism. Contributions to anarchist theory and practice. Edition AV, Frankfurt 2005, ISBN 3-936049-37-8 .
  7. ↑ Holdenis Casanova Guarda: La Araucania Colonial. Discursos y Esteriotipos (1550-1800). 1998 (Spanish); quoted from Olaf Kaltmeier: In search of anarchy. In Jürgen Mümken (Ed.): Anarchism in Postmodernism. Contributions to anarchist theory and practice. Edition AV, Frankfurt 2005, ISBN 3-936049-37-8 , pp. 99-100.
  8. ↑ Spiegel-Redaktion: Chile: The smoke signals of the Indians. In: Der Spiegel . No. 4, Hamburg January 21, 2008, p. 91 ( online at spiegel.de).