One can observe obvious reduction in the number of polities in ancient China, with Qin finally conquered all its rivals and united the much of northern China. However, let’s step back and observe how kinship shaped Chinese society in the first place. Same as most tribal society, the consolidation of lineage power on a larger scale comes together with the worship for ancestors. In the the traditional clan culture, having a male offspring was deemed as the most important agenda. The prosperity of a clan pretty much depends on its number of male offsprings, on the contrast, female member was regarded as non-important individuals whose only usage is to give birth to a male child. Rich and large clans were able to provide better public goods and services to its members while weak ones struggle to make a living. Social stratification started to happen in the Yangshao and Longshan period.
Though kinship and connection still plays a large part in modern day Chinese society, it has been and still is one of the biggest obstacle in the country’s struggle to construct an impersonal administrative system. The first empire encountered this issue was the Zhou dynasty. The Zhou king distributed fiefdoms or appanages to his retainers and cowarriors, setting up 61 fiefdoms, of which his kinsmen ruled 53. In contrast to European style of feudal system, the Chinese feudal system was largely kinship based, not constructed as an impersonal administration. A merit-based alternative was yet to be invented. As wars getting intensified in China, a true state is going to appear soon.
War and the rise of the Chinese stateSoon, in the period of warring states, a country named Qin was going to emerge as the first country in Chinese history to unit most parts of China. The reformer of Qin, Shang Yang, even before it got to power, has engaged in large-scale land reform, land redistribution and democratizing army, for the sole reason of creating a more efficient and centralized government for the threat of imminent wars. During the Warring States period, selection of military and civil office holders were merit-based. Besides, there was a boom in technological innovation and civil ideas as well. But, Shang Yang’s reform, which is our primary focus, were deliberately designed to eradicate the influence of kinship and Confucianism, in close association with Legalism:
Abolition of well-field system and redistribution of land to individual families.Using tax as a mean of executive power and resource redistribution.Replace traditional prefecture with rectilinear layouts territory division.Uniform weight and length measure, language and written languagePoliticians in Qin was obviously adopting Legalism policies instead of Confucianism ones. Confucianism placed great moral obligation on someone to his father, and under which the ruler’s legitimacy mainly comes from their own morality. The short-lived reform ended as Shang Yang executed by being pulled apart by four chariots. Kinship continued to coexist with the central government for millennials before the communist party came to power. However, there didn’t seem to be an extinctive distinction besides in terms of kinship between Legalism and Confucianism, as both show the rulers』 love towards an authoritarian elite government. Legalist doctrine has nothing to do with the rule of law in a modern sense. Later dynasties, in light of Qin’s quick demise, chose to make some compromises to the existence of local clans and families, had relatively longer lives. However, when reviewing Chinese history, we can see Chinese’s natural preference for a united nation, and one might wonder why.
Most regions in China was easily traversed by the armies of the day with numerous roads and canals pre-built.Chinese had a relatively uniform culture, language and tradition, making the disseminate of ideology much easier.Chinese leaders historically adopted a divide-and-rule tactics to break up hostile coalitions.Kinship was never established as the game kind of local authority that European lords did, political entrepreneurs therefore were more able to mobilize the peasants into powerful armies. On the other hands, strong hierarchical local political sovereignties that developed based on local aristocratic authorities was fully established in China as well.One might also come to wonder why Chinese’s political modernization didn’t lead to economic and social modernization.
Failure to legalize private property right and thereby a capitalist market economy.The effort to underline kinship in a top-down dictatorial manner was never successful, while on the contrast, this task was complete in Europe by Christianity and churches in a community level.Political decay of Chinese nationsThe backlash from the harsh law and punishment eventually overthrown Qin in 210 B.C.. Han, the successor of Qin, re-advocated Confucianism to legitimized the emperor. Han nonetheless made inroad into aristocratic influence by establishing an impersonal administrative system, but a strong nation similar to Qin was never seem in the rest of Chinese history.
Nearly the demise of all nations begins with the rebellion of peasants and underclass, for unsatisfactory toward disparity in wealth, which greatly contribute to the Malthusian technological constrains and Matthew effect. Nonetheless, politicians like Wang Mang did try to take the peasants』 side, but all of them experience the resistance from local aristocratic families and had never succeeded. Also, all Chinese nations lack the rule of law and the accountability for the government, left with us only an extremely strong state.
Indian and Islamic detourPeculiarities of Indian Democracy and Ottoman’s Military SlaveryIndian’s tribal society started similar to that of Chinese society, with kinship and ancestor worship. Firstly emerged the fourfold division of social classes known as the four varnas: Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Sudras. Secondly emerged was the jatis, which was hundreds of segmentary endogamous occupational groups. The jatis are mutually dependent little societies with monopolistic-like power.
The extreme segmented and separated Indian society divided by Jatis and Varnas seems irrational to someone who studied modern capitalism theory. Any barrier in a free market would cause an inefficient outcome, in this case, the person with the best shoemaking skills and the upmost passion toward it might not be born in a shoemaker family, thus jeopardizing the social mobility. However, to fully understand the rationale behind Indian religious belief and practices, one must recognize their denial of the phenomenal world. Indians believe, through continuous reincarnation, one could eventually outgrow his material existence, which is actually 「unreal」. The mandate suffering is not only inevitably but trivial in one’s path to the immortal. So the Indian notion of social mobility mostly exist 「between lifetimes」
Indian democracy and its detourThus, Indians』 resorting to Democracy wasn’t a social development, but rather an inevitable outcome of its peculiar social structure. State power in India had to delegate its power through numerals layers, the Varnas, the Jatis, and local tribal societies. India never saw a strong state in the way that Chinese did during the Qin dynasty. The ruler wasn’t able to levied much taxes or conscript soldiers to expand its territory. Nonetheless, some characteristics of typical Indian societies were worth studying:
Religion and rule of law: Brahmins was placed on top of Kshatriyas in terms of social status, which impose a regular check on state power. However, there was never an institutionalized religious group, the Brahmins interacted with each other more like independent social actors. The control on state power was more for the good of itself.Communal asset: private right didn’t really exist in India, most assets were held communally. Female has no claim over family asset, not can they remarry whatsoever. Which becomes a close loop, confining family property within a kinship group or at least a caste society.With religious and communal groups layer over one another, an hierarchical authoritative society seems impossible. So Indian’s final resort to Democracy was inevitable. They didn’t have a choice.
Ottoman’s military slavery systemThe system of military slavery was developed in the Abbasid dynasty in the mid-ninth century as means of overcoming the persistent weaknesses of tribal levies as the basis of Muslin military power. Numerals Turkish teens were taken from their parents since young, and they would receive the finest training available in the Islamic world and would later become senior administrators and elite infantry soldiers. Through this system, the Islamic state were able to control a territory containing multiple cultural and language groups, and still continued to conquer peripheral regions in the following centuries. These slaves weren’t allowed to have families or children, thus prohibited family-centered patrimonialism. However, patrimonialism, which is almost for certain a natural human tendency, and hereditary principle reasserted themselves from the late seventeenth century onward.
The political decay of Ottoman system first started in its inability to support a strong army. The Ottomans, in centuries, were obtaining resources and taxes by conquering neighbouring regions. By the end of the 1920s, the Ottomans were fighting at two major fronts almost 2000 miles away from each other, confronting both the Persians in the south and Austrian empire in the north. Instead, the Ottomans responded by levying heave taxes and conscripting Janissaries in larger and larger number. Over-expansion directly caused the patrimonialization of the Janissaries.
However, the Ottoman system did have some advantages over other regimes, or else they wouldn’t be able to maintain a state of this size for centuries:
Maintained low tax rate in the early days of the dynasty. The Ottomans seems to fully understand that by levying less taxes, it would stimulate the economy and eventually produce higher total tax revenues. The later tax raise, corresponding to the Keynesian theory, caused a rapid inflation, and reduced the original producing capacity. However, some historian also argued that the government were force by the constantly and fast growing population in centralized towns and cities and their increasing demand for staple to raise tax rate, which could be inevitable in a agriculture society by the Malthusian trap theory.The religious nature of the state provided some form of rule of law in its justice system. The law of the religion were, by the book, in a higher status than the state and its ruler. Still, the religious institutions were hardly involved in state or judicial matters, nor did they intervene or interrupt the operation of the government.