9. Politics & Power Flashcards
Political organization?
The way a society maintains order internally and managers affairs externally
How does politics relate to a wide range of actions and relationships that has to do with power?
Individuals, parent &kid, teacher & student
Larger groups, communities, nations
What do cultural anthologies look at when examining politics and power?
How power is distributed and used within a society
How societies regulate the power relations between their own and other groups
Power?
The ability to compel another person to do something that he or she would not do otherwise
Threat of punishment
Promise of reward
What does the use or misuse of power lead to?
Unequal social status and distribution of resources
What are the two main ways of power?
Coercively, physical force or threat
Persuasively, changing someone’s behavior through argumentation using religious or cultural beliefs
Authority?
The use of legitimate power
Prestige?
A type of social reward that can only be given to a person bt others, Positive reputation or high regard
Internalized control?
Impulses that guide a person towards the right behavior based on a moral system
Cultural/religious norms
External controls?
Rules that regulate behavior by encouraging conformity to social norms; negative (punishments) or positive (rewards) imposed from outside the social group
Sanctions?
Punishments that results from breaking rules, informal or formal
Gossip?
Effective informal social sanction
Two types of political systems?
Make decisions collectively - uncentralized
Concentrated power - centralized
Uncentralized power + what society?
A political system with no centralized governing body and in which decisions are made by the community
Smaller, more homogeneous societies: Band and tribes
How are rights and responsibilities organized in decentralized political systems?
Along family lines
Centralized system + what society
A political system with a centralized governing body that has the power to use authority
Larger more complex, heterogeneous societies: States and chiefdoms
Cultural materialism?
An anthropological theory-guided by the idea that the external pressures of the environment dictate cultural practices.
And if adaptations are neccessart for the society’s organization to survive in its environment
Four different kinds of societies?
Bands
Tribes
Chiefdom
State
Band?
Small egalitarian society of food foragers who live and travel together
Decentralized power, enforced by social sanctions -> informal community control
Tribes?
Higher population density, living in separate villages spread out over a wide area
Decentralized power, horticulturalists or pastoralists
What is it that ties villages together by real or fictive kinship and language?
Clan membership to a common ancestor, real or mythical
Who has the power in a decentralized system?
Can be egalitarian or have a ranked system
Leaders based on skills, experience or being born in a high-status clan
Ranked system?
Hereditary positions of status and prestige are passed down family lines.
Equal access to resources but more effort = elevated social position
Age sets?
Groups that bring people together based on age and common concerns
Chiefdoms?
Type of political organization with centralized power, complex social structure, and large population
Ranked society
Intensive agriculturalists, pre-industrial societies with villages linked by districts
Chiefdoms what kind of power?
Centralized government and formalized leadership is required to the population size
Ranked society: The chief is generally hereditary office and not elected
States?
Type of political organization in a highly populated, industrialized society with a strong centralized government with authority to control by force
Heterogeneous society
Stratified society/social stratification?
A social system in which one’s position in the social hierarchy equals one status results in an uneven distribution of power and resources.
Social mobility - May arise due to specialization of roles and more complex tasks
Euphemisms?
A polite or socially acceptable word or phrase that is used in place of one that is unpleasant or offensive
Social mobility?
The ability for members of society to rise or fall in social class
Class vs Caste?
Class:
Archived status determined by wealth & status
Social mobility
Influences occupation & marriage
Caste:
Ascribed status, determined by birth
No social mobility
Determines occupation & marriage
What has the small percentage of freshwater access led to?
Unequal distribution. Around 1 billion people do not have access to clean drinking water
Clean water is a human need but how is it not treated like one?
Privatization of water makes it difficult for marginalized and rural people to access it
What is usually the reason behind violence within or between groups?
Power inequalities
Raid?
Violence in which members of one group aim to steel or recover items, animals or people from another group in the same society
Short-term incursions with a specific goal
Freud?
Ongoing violent relations between two groups in the same society
A long-term hostile relationship with the goals or revenge
Warfare?
An extended violent conflict in which one side attempts to kill as many people or destroy as much property as possible until one side surrenders
Endo- and exo-canibalism?
Endo: eating the flesh of people within one’s society especially family
Exo: outside one’s society
Sectarian violence?
When groups divided by ethnicity or religion explode with tension that has built for decades or even centuries
What are some reasons for war?
Growing populations and demand for resources, fight over them
When other methods such as diplomacy or economic sanctions have failed
Why can’t large-scale warfare exist without large-scale societies?
Centralized states? surplus of food and resources
Example of cultural norms that lessen social tension?
Small groups such as foragers or small-scale farmers value cooperation for survival more than aggression
