Office Hours: Weds. 8:45-9:45 (Milledoler Hall 124, CAC)

Thurs. 3:00-4:00 (LSH A336, Livingston)

Phone: 445-3705 (w) / 514-0435 (h)

E-mail: pmclean@rci.rutgers.edu

Few terms in sociological analysis can mean more to more people than the term "structure." [Demographers use the term "structure" in part to denote distributions of attributes within a society, considering population density, sex ratios, degree of stratification, and the like, 'structural' factors. Network analysts use "structure" to denote patterns of relations in a network, as do contemporary exchange theorists. Marxian analysts use "structure" to talk about relations between roles in the organization of production.] For the purposes of this course, structure has most to do with the broad idea of 'forms of social organization.' By this, I mean the focus will be more on patterns of role relationships than is the case in demography. Further, the focus will be more macro, and in a way, less quantitative, than is the case in a good deal of network analysis. And naturally the focus will be, not so much on the organization of production per se and the reduction of other modalities of life to the economic one, but more on applying general types of stable organizational structure across a variety of different modes of life.

The course will touch on some general questions about the emergence of social structure understood in the abstract, but mostly it will focus on a taxonomy of particular organizational forms and demonstrate their instantiation through empirical, often historical, examples. Because of my background, the structure of political systems will be a major focus, but I also want to integrate examples of social, religious, and economic organizational patterns into the course as much as possible.

I am most interested in identifying comparisons across disparate cases, and in drawing out the cognitive consequences of particular forms of social organization. The emergence of organizational structure is simultaneously a process of emergent cognitive classification. The operative assumption throughout the course, therefore, is that the preponderant form of social organization constrains individuals' choices, and more strongly, constructs their identities and interests. Even though cultural forms may be loosely coupled to social structural forms, and even though action shaped by culturally preponderant practices may belie or obscure the underlying organization of a given society or group, the perspective we will adopt here is that organizational structure constructs identities. More specifically, the implication is that patterns of social structure (and I don't necessarily mean patterns of actual relations or ties per se) affect the boundaries of trust that people experience, the kinds of social distance they perceive, the kinds of exchange in which they engage, the kinds of justice and equity they conceive, the kinds of mobilizational options they have, and the kinds of decisions they make.

Overall, one of the course's key aims is to provide you with a conceptual framework for comparing the organization and mobilization of different groups and societies, and to conduct such comparison across typical disciplinary lines and across the macro-meso divide (I don't know how much micro there will be). In other words, this course provides a kind of toolkit for interpreting social structure in terms of groups and networks.

Requirements

The major written requirement for this course is one paper, approximately 20-25 pages in length, due at the end of the semester. Ideally this should be a paper based on a case of your own choosing that illustrates some of the forms of organization, in pure or hybrid form, that we will study, and draws out some of the implications of these structures for the construction of interests, the pursuit of action, social stability, historical development, emergence of conflict--the choices are numerous. I will expect you to consult with me at least a couple of times during the semester about the project you intend to pursue, and the kinds of questions you wish to address. If you have a really hard time coming up with a substantive topic, there is the possibility of doing an analytical or review paper explicitly based on at least a couple of books that we read, or themes we address, in the course.

The required readings are marked with an asterisk. Comments and questions drawn from supplemental readings are welcome, but for the purposes of achieving a shared understanding of material, we’ll focus on the required stuff. I’d like to farm out responsibility for introducing the different readings, and questions about them, to different students on a rotating basis. We’ll work this out soon. Solid and consistent participation in class is likely to enhance one's grade.

Required Texts

No books were ordered for purchase through the bookstore, nor was a packet constructed (mea maxima culpa). All materials will be available on Reserve at the Kilmer Library on Livingston Campus, and all required materials will be available for photocopying from me personally as well, or in the departmental library. The books I might suggest buying (e.g., through amazon.com), simply because of their extensive use in the course, are:

Mary Douglas, How Institutions Think

Max Weber, Economy and Society, two volumes

Thomas Ertman, Birth of the Leviathan

Perry Anderson, Lineages of the Absolutist State

Shmuel Eisenstadt and Luis Roniger, Patrons, Clients, and Friends: Interpersonal Relations and the Structure of Trust in Society

Class Schedule

Week 1: January 20

Introduction and overview of the course

Week 2: January 27

Interactions versus role relationships; grids and groups; knowledge embedded in social structures; emergent structure; opening taxonomies.

*S. F. Nadel, The Theory of Social Structure, "preliminaries" (perhaps also chap. 4; classic work on role relationships) [HM51.N3 1957a]

Mary Douglas, How Institutions Think, chs. 3, 4, 5, 6, 8 (we will be reading these chunks later in the term, so we needn’t read them now) [GN479.D68 1986]

Max Weber, Economy and Society, part 1, ch.3 (a great introduction to Weberian structural typology, but not the same typology we’ll use later in the course) [HM57.W342 1978]

*Harrison White, Identity and Control, chs. 1, 2, 4 (some hard slogging on emergent organization; let's see if we can make some sense of it) [HM131.W443 1992]

*Thomas Ertman, Birth of the Leviathan, ch. 1 (sets up the material for the later part of the course in slightly different language with some classically comparative historical variables used to explain differentiation of structures) [JN5.E77 1997]

Week 3: February 3

ORGANIZATIONAL FORM/MOBILIZATION TYPE #I: SEGMENTARY OPPOSITION

a) "Chinese Box" structure

*E. E. Evans-Pritchard, The Nuer, chapter 4 [DT132.E8]

*Mary Douglas, How Institutions Think, ch. 6 [GN479.D68 1986]

*Clifford Geertz, "Notes on a Balinese Cockfight," in The Interpretation of Cultures, ch.15 [GN315.G36]

Robin Fox, Kinship and Marriage, chs. 1, 3, 4, 6-8 [GN480.F68]

Lilian Brudner and Douglas R. White, "Class Property and Structural Endogamy: Visualizing Networked Histories," in Theory and Society 25 (1997):132-180.

David Herlihy, Medieval Households, ch. 4 [HQ611.H46 1985]

b) schism in religious communities:

Benjamin Zablocki, The Joyful Community [BX8129.B64Z3 1980] or [HQ971.Z3]

Week 4: February 10

SEGMENTARY OPPOSITION (cont'd)

c) Multidivisional Bureaucracy

Max Weber, Economy and Society, ch. 11 [HM57.W342 1978]

*Herbert Simon, The Sciences of the Artificial, ch. 8 [Q175.S564]

*Karin Knorr-Cetina, Epistemic Cultures, ch. 2 [not available]

Mary Douglas, How Institutions Think, ch. 1 and passim. [GN479.D68 1986]

*Alfred Chandler, Strategy and Structure, introduction and ch.3 [HD70.U5C5 1970]

Rodney Clark, The Japanese Company

*Robert G. Eccles and Harrison C. White, "Firm and Market Interfaces of Profit Center Control," in Siegwart Lindenberg et al. (eds.), Approaches to Social Theory [HM13.A66 1986]

Richard Cyert and James G. March, A Behavioral Theory of the Firm, chs. 3, 5, 6 [HD30.23.C9 1992]

*James G. March, "The Business Firm as a Political Coalition," Journal of Politics 24 (1962):662-678.

Robert Huckfeldt, Politics in Context: Assimilation and Conflict in Urban Neighborhoods, chs. 2, 4, 5 [HN80.B9H83 1986]

Week 5: February 17

Macro-political examples of segmentary opposition:

Federalism and Ethnic Separatism

a) Nigeria

*David Laitin, Hegemony and Culture: Politics and Religious Change Among the Yoruba, chs. 6,7 [DT515.45.Y67L35 1986]

Robin Luckham, The Nigerian Military: A Sociological Analysis of Authority and Revolt, 1960-67 [UA869.N54L8]

Larry Diamond, Class, Ethnicity, and Democracy in Nigeria: The Failure of the First Republic [DT515.832.D53 1988]

b) the former Yugoslavia

*Christopher Boehm, Blood Revenge: An Anthropology of Feuding in Montenegro, selections [DR1822.B63 1984]

Dennison Rusinow, The Yugoslavia Experiment, 1948-1977[DR370.R87]

*Misha Glenny, The Fall of Yugoslavia: The Third Balkan War, selections [DR1313.G57 1996]

Ivo Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia [DR1295.B36 1984]

c) the former Soviet Union and more

David Laitin, "Review Essay: National Uprisings in the Soviet Union," World Politics (1992):139-177.

*Rogers Brubaker, Nationalism Reframed: Nationhood and the National Question in the New Europe, chs. 1, 2, maybe 4 and 6 [DJK51.B78 1996]

Rogers Brubaker, "Myths and Misconceptions in the Study of Nationalism," unpublished ms. 1998

Week 6: February 24

ORGANIZATIONAL FORM/MOBILIZATION TYPE #II: CLIENTELISM

a) Anthropological data:

*Fredrik Barth, Political Leadership Among the Swat Pathans, introduction, chs. 5,7,9 [DS485.S8B3 1965]

*Shmuel Eisenstadt and Luis Roniger, Patrons, Clients, and Friends: Interpersonal Relations and the Structure of Trust in Society, chs. 1, 3, 4 (parts), 6 [HM132.E37 1984]

Steffen W. Schmidt et al., Friends, Followers, and Factions: A Reader in Political Clientelism, selected sections by Lande, Scott, Campbell, and others [JF2111.F83]

Joyce Pettigrew, Robber Noblemen: A Study of the Political System of the Sikh Jats, chs. 6,10-12 [DS432.J3P47]

Andrew Strathern, The Rope of Moka: Big-Men and Ceremonial Exchange in Mount Hagan, New Guinea GN671.N5S8]

Anton Blok, The Mafia of a Sicilian Village, 1860-1960: A Study of Violent Peasant Entrepreneurs, ch. 1 [HV6453.I82S6123 1975]

[Roger Gould, 1998 SSHA paper on Corsican violence(?)]

b) Ancient Rome:

E. Badian, Foreign Clientelae, 264-270 BC, introduction, chs. 1-3, 7, 11 [DG83.3.B3 1967]

Lily Ross Taylor, Party Politics in the Age of Caesar [DG81.T38 1949a]

*Richard P. Saller, Personal Patronage under the Early Empire [DG83.3.S44 1982]

Week 7: March 2

More Clientelism Examples: Patronage and Political Machines

a) Renaissance Florence

*John F. Padgett and Christopher K. Ansell, "Robust Action and the Rise of the Medici, 1400-1434, American Journal of Sociology 98 (1993):1259-1319.

Dale Kent, The Rise of the Medici, 1426-1434, selections [DG737.55.K46]

*Paul McLean, "A Frame Analysis of Favor Seeking in the Renaissance: Agency, Networks, and Political Culture." American Journal of Sociology 104,1:51-91

James Hankins, "Cosimo de' Medici as a Patron of Humanistic Literature." In Cosimo `il Vecchio' de' Medici, 1389-1464: Essays in Commemoration of the 600th Anniversary of Cosimo de' Medici's Birth, pp. 69-94. Edited by Francis Ames-Lewis. [DG737.7.C67 1992]

b) American Machine Politics

*Martin Shefter, "The Emergence of the Political Machine: An Alternate View," in Willis D. Hawley et al., Theoretical Perspectives on Urban Politics [JS341.T53]

*Robert Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York, ch.33 [NA9085.M68C37 1975]

Steven Erie, Rainbow's End: Irish-Americans and the Dilemmas of Urban Machine Politics, 1840-1945 [E184.I6E75 1988]

Harold Gosnell, Machine Politics: Chicago Style [JS708.G6 1968b]

c) Modern Italy

*Alan S. Zuckerman, The Politics of Faction: Christian Democratic Rule in Italy [JF2011.Z83]

Judith Chubb, Patronage, Power and Poverty in Southern Italy [DG829.C49 1982]

Sidney Tarrow, Between Center and Periphery: Grassroots Politicians in Italy and France [JS4947.T32]

*Robert Putnam, Making Democracy Work, selections [JN5477.R35P866 1993]

Week 8: March 9

Economic systems: personal connections and contracts

*Robert R. Faulkner, Music on Demand: Composers and Careers in the Hollywood Film Industry [ML3795.F39 1983]

*Wayne Baker and Robert Faulkner, "Role as Resource in the Hollywood Film Industry," American Journal of Sociology 97 (1991):279-309

Everett Rogers and Judith Larsen, Silicon Valley Fever [HD9696.A3U593 1984]

Mark Granovetter, Getting a Job: A Study of Contracts and Careers [HF5383.G68]

Robert G. Eccles and Dwight Crane, Doing Deals: Investment Banks at Work [HG1616.I5E33 1988]

Roger Gould, "Power and Social Structure in Community Elites," Social Forces 68 (1989):531-552.

Roger Gould and Roberto Fernandez, "Structures of Mediation: A Formal Approach to Brokerage in Transaction Networks," Sociological Methodology 19:89-126.

Roberto Fernandez and Roger Gould, "A Dilemma of State Power: Brokerage and Influence in the National Health Policy Domain," American Journal of Sociology 99 (1994):1455-91.

Contrasting perspective: Circulation and generalized exchange

*Peter Ekeh, Social Exchange Theory: The Two Traditions, ch. 3 [HM24.E37 1974b]

Marcel Mauss, The Gift [GT3040.M3813 1990b]

*Stuart Macaulay, "Non-Contractual Relations in Business: A Preliminary Study," American Sociological Review 28 (1963):55-67

*John Padgett and Paul McLean, "The Social Relations Underpinning Florentine Markets: Evidence from the 1427 Catasto," unpublished ms.

[something by Gary Hamilton and Gary Gereffi?]

BREAK WEEK: March 16

Week 9: March 23

ORGANIZATIONAL FORM/MOBILIZATION TYPE #III: HIERATIC PURITY

Charisma and grace

a) caste

*Louis Dumont, Homo Hierarchus, ch.2, postface [HT720.D813 1980]

Adrian Mayer, Caste and Kinship in Central India[DS422.C3M3 1966]

b) the Catholic Church

Max Weber, Economy and Society, ch. 14 (excerpts) [HM57.W342 1978]

Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism

*Hendryk Spruyt, The Sovereign State and Its Competitors, ch. 3 [JC327.S65 1994]

Geoffrey Willis, St. Augustine and the Donatist Controversy, chs. 4, 6 [BR1720.A9W5]

*George Duby, The Three Orders: Feudal Society Imagined, chs. 4-13, or briefer selections [HN425.D78313]

*Mary Douglas, How Institutions Think, ch. 4 [GN479.D68 1986]

Ernst Kantorowicz, The King's Two Bodies: A Study of Medieval Political Theology [JC385.K25 1981]

c) Modern Heroism and the Professions

Barry Schwartz, "George Washington and the Whig Conception of Heroic Leadership," American Sociological Review 48 (1983):18-33

Burton Bledstein, The Culture of Professionalism: The Middle Class and the Development of Higher Education in America, chs. 3, 4 [LA227.1.B53 1978]

Andrew Abbott, The System of the Professions [HD8038.U5A615 1988]

Andrew Abbott, "Status and Status Strain in the Professions," American Journal of Sociology 86 (1981):819-835

*Paul Starr, The Social Transformation of American Medicine, chs. I:1, 3, 4; II, 5 [RA395.A3S77 1982]

Week 10: March 30

ORGANIZATIONAL FORM/MOBILIZATION TYPE #IV: PATRIMONIALISM

*Max Weber, Economy and Society, part 2, chs. 4, 12 [HM57.W342 1978]

a) slavery

Georg Simmel, "The Stranger," in Don Levine (ed.), Georg Simmel on Individuality and Social Forms [HM57.S48]

*Orlando Patterson, Slavery and Social Death, ch. 2 [HT871.P37]

Richard Hellie, Slavery in Russia, 1450-1725 [HT1206.H44]

Eugene Genovese, Roll, Jordan, Roll [E443.G46]

Keith Hopkins, Conquerors and Slaves: Sociological Studies in Roman History, ch. 4 [HT863.H66]

b) patrimonial bureaucracy

*Karen Barkey, Bandits and Bureaucrats, chs. 2, 6, 7 [HV6453.T8B37 1994]

Albert Lybyer, The Government of the Ottoman Empire in the Time of Suleiman the Magnificent, chs. 2, 3 [DR506.L981G] or [DR507.L8 1913a]

Conrad Totman, Politics in the Tokugawa Bakufu, 1660-1843 [DS871.T6]

Perry Anderson, Lineages of the Absolutist State, part 2, ch. 6 [JC381.A54]

Jerome Blum, Lord and Peasant in Russia, chs. 9, 11, 18 [HT807.B55] or [JC212.C22 1947?]

Steven Hoch, Serfdom and Social Control in Russia, introduction, chs. 3, 5 [HT807.H63 1986]

Week 11: April 6

Hybrid Forms I: European Absolutism: Hieratism and Patrimonialism

a) France

*Thomas Ertman, Birth of the Leviathan, ch. 3 [JN5.E77 1997]

Perry Anderson, Lineages of the Absolutist State, part 1, ch. 4 [JC381.A54]

Franklin Ford, Robe and Sword, chs. 1-6 [DC33.4.F7]

Roland Mousnier, The Institutions of France Under the Absolutist Monarchy [HN425.M6813]

William Beik, Absolutism and Society in Seventeenth Century France [JN2433.L36A43 1985]

Guy Chaussinand-Nogaret, The French Nobility in the Eighteenth Century [HT653.F7C4713 1985]

Louis Bergeron, France Under Napoleon [DC201.B4713]

Roger Gould, Insurgent Identities, selections [HN438.P3G68 1995]

*Ezra Suleiman, Politics, Power, and Bureaucracy in France: The Administrative Elite, selections [JN2728.S94]

*Michel Crozier and Jean-Claude Thoenig, "The Regulation of Complex Systems," Administrative Science Quarterly 21 (1976):547-570.

[plus something by Bourdieu?]

b) Prussia

*Thomas Ertman, Birth of the Leviathan, ch. 5 [JN5.E77 1997]

Hans Rosenberg, Bureaucracy, Aristocracy and Autocracy: The Prussian Experience, 1660-1815 [JN4431.R76 1968]

*Philip S. Gorski, "The Protestant Ethic Revisited: Disciplinary Revolution in Holland and Prussia" American Journal of Sociology 99(2):266-317

Perry Anderson, Lineages of the Absolutist State, part 2, ch. 3 [JC381.A54]

Week 12: April 13

Hybrid Forms II: European Republicanism as Clientelism and Patrimonialism

a) Poland

*Paul McLean, "Networks, Culture, and Political Mobilization

in Eighteenth Century Poland," unpublished ms. 1999

*Thomas Ertman, Birth of the Leviathan, ch. 6 [JN5.E77 1997]

*Mary Douglas, How Institutions Think, ch. 3 [GN479.D68 1986]

Peter Evans, "Multiple Hierarchies and Organizational Control," Administrative Science Quarterly 20:250-259.

Hybrid Form III: Segmentary Opposition and Hieratism Understood through the Lens of Exchange Processes and Emergent Hierarchy

*Ivan Chase, "Social Process and Hierarchy Formation in Small Groups: A Comparative Perspective," American Sociological Review 45:905-24

Peter Blau, Exchange and Power in Social Life, chs. 5, 11, 12 [HM131.B59 1986]

*John Padgett, "Marriage and Elite Structure in Renaissance Florence," 1282-1500, unpublished ms. 1994

[plus Chris Ansell, AJS paper on dissertation?]

Week 13: April 20

Hybrid Form IV: Segmentary Opposition and Clientelism

a) Renaissance Florence

*John Najemy, Corporatism and Consensus in Florentine Electoral Politics, 1280-1400 [JS5817.3.N34]

John Najemy, "The Dialogue of Power in Florentine Politics." In City States in Classical Antiquity and Medieval Italy, pp. 269-288. [DF285.C57 1991b]

*John F. Padgett, "Organizational Genesis, Identity, and Control: The Transformation of Banking in Renaissance Florence," unpublished ms., October 1999.

b) American democracy, North and South

Richard Bensell, Yankee Leviathan: The Origins of Central State Authority in America, 1859-1877 [JK231.B46 1990]

*Theda Skocpol, Protecting Soldiers and Mothers, introduction, chs. 1, 8 [HV91.S56 1992]

Michael Schwartz, Radical Protest and Social Structure: The Southern Farmer's Alliance and Cotton Tenancy, 1880-1890 [HD1485.N35S37 1976]

Elisabeth Clemens, The People’s Lobby: Organizational Innovation and the Rise of Interest Group Politics in the United States, 1890-1925 [JK1118.C49 1997]

*V. O. Key, Southern Politics in State and Nation, chs. 3, 6, 7, 18 [F215.K45 1984]

Week 14: April 27

Hybrid Form V: Hieratism and Clientelism

a) England

*Thomas Ertman, Birth of the Leviathan, ch. 4 [JN5.E77 1997]

*Peter Bearman, Relations Into Rhetorics, selections [HN398.N56B43 1993]

[add something about 19th c class hierarchy? amateurism?]

Richard Lachmann, "Elite Conflict and State Formation in 16th and 17th Century England and France," American Sociological Review 54 (1989):141-162 [book: HC254.L33 1987]