Editing Chiefdom

{{Short description|Form of hierarchical political organization in non-industrial societies}}
{{More citations needed|date=April 2013}}
[[File:La chefferie d’Afareïtu à Mooréa.jpg|thumb|The chiefdom of Afareïtu in [[Moʻorea]], [[French Polynesia]], {{Circa|1890}}]]
{{Political anthropology|expanded=Basic concepts}}
{{Forms of government}}
A '''chiefdom''' is a political organization of people [[representation (politics)|represented]] or [[government|governed]] by a [[tribal chief|chief]]. Chiefdoms have been discussed, depending on their scope, as a [[stateless society|stateless]], [[state (polity)|state]] analogue or early state system or institution.<ref name="Social studies n823">{{cite journal | first=Henri J. M.| journal=Social Evolution & History | volume=21 | number=2 | date=September 2022| last=Claessen | title=Before the early state and after | url=https://www.sociostudies.org/journal/articles/3342409/ | access-date=2024-02-26}}</ref><ref name="African Studies Centre Leiden 2002 e786">{{cite web | title=Chiefdoms and kingdoms in Africa: Why they are neither states nor empires | website=African Studies Centre Leiden | date=2002-02-21 | url=https://www.ascleiden.nl/news/chiefdoms-and-kingdoms-africa-why-they-are-neither-states-nor-empires | access-date=2024-02-26}}</ref><ref name="Grinin">{{cite web | last=Grinin | first=Leonid | title=Complex Chiefdoms vs Early States: The Evolutionary Perspective | series=Evolution: Trajectories of Social Evolution | year=2022 | pages=96–129 | url=https://www.sociostudies.org/almanac/articles/complex_chiefdoms_vs_early_states-_the_evolutionary_perspective/ | access-date=2024-02-26}}</ref>

Usually a chief's position is based on [[kinship]], which is often monopolized by the legitimate senior members of select families or 'houses'. These elites can form a political-ideological [[aristocracy]] relative to the general group.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Helm|first1=Mary|title=Access to Origins: Affines, Ancestors, and Aristocrats|date=2010|oclc=640095710|publisher=Univ Of Texas Press|location=Austin, TX|isbn=9780292723740|page=4}}</ref>

Chiefdoms and chiefs are sometimes identified as the same as kingdoms and [[king]]s, and therefore understood as [[monarchy|monarchies]], particularly when they are understood as not necessarily states, but having [[monarch]]ic representation or government.<ref name="African Studies Centre Leiden 2002 e786"/>

==Concept==
In [[anthropology|anthropological theory]], one model of human social development rooted in ideas of [[cultural evolution]] describes a chiefdom as a form of social organization more complex than a [[tribe]] or a [[band society]], and less complex than a [[State (polity)|state]] or a [[civilization]].

Within general theories of cultural evolution, chiefdoms are characterized by permanent and institutionalized forms of political leadership (the [[Tribal chief|chief]]), centralized decision-making, economic interdependence, and social hierarchy.

Chiefdoms are described as intermediate between tribes and states in the progressive scheme of sociopolitical development formulated by [[Elman Service]]: ''band - tribe - chiefdom - state''.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Service|first1=Elman R|title=Primitive Social Organization: An Evolutionary Perspective|date=1976|publisher=Random House|location=Chicago, IL|isbn=0394316355|language=en|oclc=974107713|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/primitivesocialo0000serv}}</ref> A chief's status is based on [[kinship]], so it is inherited or [[ascribed status|ascribed]], in contrast to the [[achieved status]] of [[Big man (anthropology)|Big Man]] leaders of tribes.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Sahlins|first1=Marshall D.|title=Poor Man, Rich Man, Big-man, Chief: Political Types in Melanesia and Polynesia|journal=Comparative Studies in Society and History|date=1963|volume=5|issue=3|pages=285–303|doi=10.1017/S0010417500001729|s2cid=145254059 |issn=1475-2999|doi-access=free}}</ref> Another feature of chiefdoms is therefore pervasive social inequality. They are ranked societies, according to the scheme of progressive sociopolitical development formulated by [[Morton Fried]]: ''egalitarian - ranked - stratified - state''.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Fried|first1=Morton Herbert|title=The Evolution of Political Society: An Essay in Political Anthropology|date=1976|publisher=McGraw-Hill|isbn=0075535793|language=en|oclc=748982203}}</ref>

The most succinct definition of a chiefdom in anthropology is by [[Robert L. Carneiro]]: "An autonomous political unit comprising a number of villages or communities under the permanent control of a paramount chief" (Carneiro 1981: 45).

=== Chiefdoms in archaeological theory ===
In [[archaeological theory]], Service's definition of chiefdoms as “redistribution societies with a permanent central agency of coordination” (Service 1962: 134) has been most influential. Many archaeologists, however, dispute Service's reliance upon redistribution as central to chiefdom societies, and point to differences in the basis of finance ([[staple finance]] v. [[wealth finance]]).<ref>{{cite book|editor1-last=Earle|editor1-first=Timothy|title=Chiefdoms: Power, Economy, and Ideology|date=2004|publisher=Cambridge Univ. Press|isbn=0521448018|language=en|oclc=611267761}}</ref> Service argued that chief rose to assume a managerial status to redistribute agricultural surplus to ecologically specialized communities within this territory (staple finance). Yet in re-studying the Hawaiian chiefdoms used as his case study, Timothy Earle observed that communities were rather self-sufficient. What the chief redistributed was not staple goods, but prestige goods to his followers that helped him to maintain his authority (wealth finance).<ref>{{cite web | title=Timothy Earle: Department of Anthropology | website=Northwestern University | date=2017-03-30 | url=http://www.anthropology.northwestern.edu/people/faculty/earle.html | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170330122906/http://www.anthropology.northwestern.edu/people/faculty/earle.html | archive-date=2017-03-30 | url-status=dead}}</ref>

Some scholars contest the utility of the chiefdom model for archaeological inquiry. The most forceful critique comes from [[Timothy Pauketat]], whose ''Chiefdom and Other Archaeological Delusions''<ref>{{cite book|last1=Pauketat|first1=Timothy R|title=Chiefdoms and Other Archaeological Delusions|date=2011|publisher=AltaMira Press|isbn=9780759108295|language=en|oclc=768479880}}</ref> outlines how chiefdoms fail to account for the high variability of the archaeological evidence for middle-range societies. Pauketat argues that the evolutionary underpinnings of the chiefdom model are weighed down by racist and outdated theoretical baggage that can be traced back to [[Lewis H. Morgan|Lewis Morgan]]'s 19th-century cultural evolution. From this perspective, pre-state societies are treated as underdeveloped, the savage and barbaric phases that preceded civilization. Pauketat argues that the chiefdom type is a limiting category that should be abandoned, and takes as his main case study [[Cahokia]], a central place for the [[Mississippian culture]] of North America.

Pauketat's provocation, however, has been accused of not offering a sound alternative to the chiefdom type. For while he claims that chiefdoms are a delusion, he describes Cahokia as a civilization. This has been debated to uphold rather than challenge the evolutionary scheme he contests.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Beck|first=Robin|year=2009|title=On Delusions|journal=Native South|volume=2|pages=111–120|doi=10.1353/nso.0.0011|s2cid=201784072}}</ref>{{Explain|date=August 2020|reason=Civilization can just mean living in cities without any evolutionary implication.}}

===Simple category===
Chiefdoms are characterized by the centralization of authority and pervasive inequality. At least two inherited [[social class]]es ([[elite]] and [[commoner]]) are present. (The [[Ancient Hawaii#Caste system|ancient Hawaiian chiefdoms]] had as many as four social classes.) An individual might change social class during a lifetime by extraordinary behavior.  A single lineage/family of the elite class becomes the ruling elite of the chiefdom, with the greatest influence, power, and prestige.  [[Kinship]] is typically an organizing principle, while marriage, age, and sex can affect one's social status and role.

A single simple chiefdom is generally composed of a central community surrounded by or near a number of smaller subsidiary communities.  All of the communities recognize the authority of a single kin group or individual with hereditary centralized power, dwelling in the primary community.  Each community will have its own leaders, which are usually in a [[tribute|tributary]] and/or subservient relationship to the ruling elite of the primary community.

===Complex category===
A complex chiefdom is a group of simple chiefdoms controlled by a single paramount center and ruled by a [[paramount chief]].  Complex chiefdoms have two or even three tiers of political [[hierarchy]].  Nobles are clearly distinct from commoners and do not usually engage in any form of agricultural production.  The higher members of society consume most of the goods that are passed up the hierarchy as a tribute.

Reciprocal obligations are fulfilled by the nobles carrying out rituals that only they can perform. They may also make token, symbolic redistributions of food and other goods. In two- or three-tiered chiefdoms, higher-ranking chiefs have control over a number of lesser ranking individuals, each of whom controls specific territory or social units. Political control rests on the chief's ability to maintain access to a sufficiently large body of tribute, passed up the line by lesser chiefs.  These lesser chiefs in turn collect from those below them, from communities close to their own center.  At the apex of the status hierarchy sits the [[paramount chief|paramount]].

Anthropologists and [[archaeology|archaeologists]] have demonstrated through research that chiefdoms are a relatively unstable form of social organization. They are prone to [[Social cycle theory|cycles]] of collapse and renewal, in which tribal units band together, expand in power, fragment through some form of social stress, and band together again.  An example of this kind of social organization were the [[Germanic Peoples]] who conquered the western [[Roman Empire]] in the 5th century [[Common Era|CE]].  Although commonly referred to as tribes, anthropologists classified their society as chiefdoms.  They had a complex social hierarchy consisting of kings, a warrior aristocracy, common freemen, [[serfs]], and [[slaves]].

The Native American tribes sometimes had ruling kings or satraps (governors) in some areas and regions. The Cherokee, for example, had an imperial-family ruling system over a long period of history. The early Spanish explorers in the Americas reported on the Indian kings and kept extensive notes during what is now called the conquest. Some of the native tribes in the Americas had princes, nobles, and various classes and castes. The "[[Natchez people|Great Sun]]" was somewhat like the Great Khans of Asia and eastern Europe. Much like an emperor, the Great Sun of North America is the best example of chiefdoms and imperial kings in North American Indian history. The Aztecs of Mexico had a similar culture.

==Chiefdoms on the Indian subcontinent==

The [[Indus Valley Civilisation]] (3300 BCE - 1700 BCE) was a hegemony of chiefdoms with supreme chiefs in each and a system of subsidiary chiefs. The ranks of the chiefs included ordinary chiefs, elders, priests or cattle-owners and head chiefs.<ref>{{cite book | last=Fairservis | first=W.A. | title=The Harappan Civilization and Its Writing: A Model for the Decipherment of the Indus Script | publisher=E.J. Brill | year=1992 | isbn=978-81-204-0491-5 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ckmzIlTQBh4C | page=133|author-link=Walter Fairservis}}</ref>

The ''[[Arthashastra]]'', a work on politics written some time between the 4th century BC and 2nd century AD by Indian author [[Chanakya]], similarly describes the [[Rajamandala]] (or "Raja-mandala,")  as circles of friendly and enemy states surrounding the state of a king (''[[raja]]'').<ref name="avari-2007">{{cite book|first=Burjor|last=Avari|year=2007|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Y1e2V_4Um10C|title=India, the Ancient Past: A History of the Indian Sub-continent from C. 7000 BC to AD 1200|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-0415356152|pages=188–189|access-date=2015-11-20|archive-date=2022-10-12|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221012012559/https://books.google.com/books?id=Y1e2V_4Um10C|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|first=Prof. Mahendra Prasad|last=Singh|year=2011|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=80q_hd7ASdEC|title=Indian Political Thought: Themes and Thinkers|publisher=Pearson Education India|isbn=978-8131758519|pages=11–13|access-date=2015-11-20|archive-date=2022-10-12|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221012012601/https://books.google.com/books?id=80q_hd7ASdEC|url-status=live}}</ref> Also see Suhas Chatterjee, ''Mizo Chiefs and the Chiefdom'' (1995).<ref>{{cite book|title=Mizo Chiefs and the Chiefdom|first=Suhas|last=Chatterjee|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YON9iVgsDRUC|publisher=Publications Pvt. Ltd.|year=1995|isbn=8185880727|access-date=2015-11-20|archive-date=2022-10-12|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221012013100/https://books.google.com/books?id=YON9iVgsDRUC|url-status=live}}</ref>

== African chiefdoms ==
Most African traditional societies involved chiefdoms in their political and social structure before [[Colonisation of Africa|European colonisation]]. For an example see the [[Mandinka people#Family and political organisation|political organisation of the Mandinka people]] in West Africa. Each clan, tribe, [[List of kingdoms and empires in African history|kingdom, and empire]] had its traditional leader, king, or queen. [[Ewe people]] call the king or chief ''Togbui Ga'', the [[Fon people]] ''Dah'', the [[Ayizo language|Kotafon people]] ''Ga'', and Ashanti people ''[[Asantehene]]''. Traditional authority is a distinguishing feature in the landscape of contemporary Africa. It remains important in organising the life of people at the local level despite modern state structures.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Traditional authorities in Africa |url=https://library.oapen.org |website=www.library.oapen.org}}</ref>

==Chiefdoms in Hispaniola==
{{main|Chiefdoms of Hispaniola}}

==Native chieftain system in China==
{{main|Tusi}}

''Tusi'' ({{zh|{{linktext|土司}}}}), also known as Headmen or Chieftains, were tribal leaders recognized as imperial officials by the [[Yuan Dynasty|Yuan]], [[Ming Dynasty|Ming]], and [[Qing Dynasty|Qing-era]] Chinese governments, principally in [[Yunnan]]. The arrangement is generally known as the Native Chieftain System ({{Lang-zh|t={{linktext|土司|制度}}|p=''Tǔsī Zhìdù''}}).

== Alternatives to chiefdoms ==

In prehistoric South-West Asia, alternatives to chiefdoms were the non-hierarchical systems of complex [[Acephalous society|acephalous communities]], with a pronounced autonomy of single-family households.  These communities have been analyzed recently by Berezkin, who suggests the ''[[Apa Tanis]]'' as their ethnographic parallel (Berezkin 1995).  Frantsouzoff (2000) finds a more developed example of such type of polities in ancient South [[Arabia]] in the [[Wadi]] [[Hadhramawt]] of the 1st millennium [[BCE]].

In [[History of Southeast Asia|Southeast Asian history]] up to the early 19th century, the metaphysical view of the [[cosmos]] called the [[mandala]] (i.e., circle) is used to describe a [[Mandala (Southeast Asian political model)|Southeast Asian political model]], which in turn describes the diffuse patterns of  political power distributed among [[Mueang]] (principalities) where circles of influence were more important than central power. The concept counteracts modern tendencies to look for unified political power like that of the large European kingdoms and nation states, which one scholar posited were an inadvertent byproduct of 15th-century [[Cartography#Technological changes|advances in map-making technologies]].<ref>{{cite news
 |title=How Maps Made the World 
 |url=http://www.wilsonquarterly.com/article.cfm?AID=1992 
 |newspaper=[[Wilson Quarterly]] 
 |date=Summer 2011 
 |access-date=28 July 2011 
 |quote=Source: 'Mapping the Sovereign State: Technology, Authority, and Systemic Change' by Jordan Branch, in ''[[International Organization]]'', Volume 65, Issue 1, Winter 2011 
 |url-status=dead 
 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110811005805/http://www.wilsonquarterly.com/article.cfm?AID=1992 
 |archive-date=11 August 2011 
}}</ref><ref>{{cite thesis |url=http://gradworks.umi.com/34/69/3469226.html |title=Mapping the Sovereign State: Cartographic Technology, Political Authority, and Systemic Change |last=Branch |first=Jordan Nathaniel |year=2011 |degree=Ph.D. |id=3469226 |publisher=[[University of California, Berkeley]] |pages=1–36 |doi=10.1017/S0020818310000299 |access-date=March 5, 2012 |quote='''Abstract''': How did modern territorial states come to replace earlier forms of organization, defined by a wide variety of territorial and non-territorial forms of authority? Answering this question can help to explain both where our international political system came from and where it might be going.... |doi-access=free |archive-date=June 29, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170629055332/http://gradworks.umi.com/34/69/3469226.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

[[Nikolay Kradin]] has demonstrated that an alternative to the state seems to be represented by the supercomplex chiefdoms created by some nomads of [[Eurasia]].  The number of structural levels within such chiefdoms appears to be equal, or even to exceed those within the average state, but they have a different type of political organization and political leadership.  Such types of political entities do not appear to have been created by the agriculturists (e.g., Kradin 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004).

== See also ==
{{portal|politics}}
*[[Cacicazgo]]
*[[Chief of the Name]]
*[[Band society]]
*[[Mandala (Southeast Asian political model)]]
*[[Tanistry]]
*[[Tribe]]

==Bibliography==
*Berezkin, Yu. E. 1995. "Alternative Models of Middle Range Society" and " 'Individualistic' Asia vs. 'Collectivistic' America?", in ''Alternative Pathways to Early State'', Ed. N. N. Kradin & V. A. Lynsha. Vladivostok: Dal'nauka: 75–83.
*Carneiro, R. L. 1981. "The Chiefdom: Precursor of the State", ''The Transition to Statehood in the New World'' / Ed. by G. D. Jones and R. R. Kautz, pp.&nbsp;37–79. Cambridge, UK – New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
*Carneiro, R. L. 1991. "The Nature of the Chiefdom as Revealed by Evidence from the Cauca Valley of Colombia", ''Profiles in Cultural Evolution'' / Ed. by A.T. Rambo and K. Gillogly, pp.&nbsp;167–90. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.
*Carneiro, R. L. 1998 [https://archive.org/details/chiefdomschiefta0000unse/page/18/mode/2up?q=Flashpoint ''"What Happened at Flashpoint? Conjectures on Chiefdom Formation at the Very Moment of Conception."''] In: ''Chiefdoms and Chieftaincy in the Americas.'' University Press of Florida, Gainesville, p.&nbsp;19-42.
*Earle, T. K. 1997. ''How Chiefs Came to Power: The Political Economy of Prehistory''. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
*Frantsouzoff S. A. 2000. "The Society of Raybūn", in ''Alternatives of Social Evolution''. Ed. by N.N. Kradin, [[Andrey Korotayev|A.V. Korotayev]], [[Dmitri Bondarenko]], V. de Munck, and P.K. Wason (p.&nbsp;258-265). [[Vladivostok]]: Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
*[[Andrey Korotayev|Korotayev, Andrey V.]] 2000. [https://www.academia.edu/3116532/The_Chiefdom_Precursor_of_the_Tribe_Some_Trends_of_Political_Evolution_in_North-East_Yemeni_Highlands_ Chiefdom: Precursor of the Tribe?], in ''Alternatives of Social Evolution''. Ed. by N.N. Kradin, [[Andrey Korotayev|A.V. Korotayev]], [[Dmitri Bondarenko]], V. de Munck, and P.K. Wason (p.&nbsp;242-257). [[Vladivostok]]: Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences; reprinted in: [http://www.socionauki.ru/book/early_state_en/ ''The Early State, its Alternatives and Analogues'']. Ed. by [[Leonid Grinin]] et al. (р. 300–324). Volgograd: Uchitel', 2004.
*Kradin, Nikolay N. 2000. "Nomadic Empires in Evolutionary Perspective", in ''Alternatives of Social Evolution''. Ed. by N.N. Kradin, [[Andrey Korotayev|A.V. Korotayev]], [[Dmitri Bondarenko]], V. de Munck, and P.K. Wason (p.&nbsp;274-288). [[Vladivostok]]: Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences; reprinted in: ''The Early State, its Alternatives and Analogues''. Ed. by [[Leonid Grinin]] et al. (р. 501–524). Volgograd: Uchitel', 2004.
*Kradin, Nikolay N. 2002. "Nomadism, Evolution, and World-Systems: Pastoral Societies in Theories of Historical Development", ''Journal of World-System Research'' 8: 368–388.
*Kradin, Nikolay N. 2003. "Nomadic Empires: Origins, Rise, Decline", ''Nomadic Pathways in Social Evolution''. Ed. by N.N. Kradin, [[Dmitri Bondarenko]], and T. Barfield (p.&nbsp;73-87). Moscow: Center for Civilizational Studies, [[Russian Academy of Sciences]].

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

== External links ==
*[http://www.socionauki.ru/book/early_state_en/ Was the Chiefdom a Congelation of Ideas?] by Robert L. Carneiro. In [[Leonid Grinin|Grinin L. E.]] et al. Early State, Its Alternatives and Analogues. Volgograd, Uchitel, 2004.

{{Authority control}}

[[Category:Anthropology]]
[[Category:Anthropological categories of peoples]]
[[Category:Ethnology]]
[[Category:Forms of government]]
[[Category:Chieftainships| ]]
[[Category:Tribal chiefs| ]]
[[Category:Political anthropology]]