IIVG Papers Veröffentlichungsreihe des Internationalen Instituts

Veröffentlichungsreihe des Internationalen Instituts für Vergleichende Gesellschaftsforschung/Globale Entwicklungen

Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin

IIVG/dp 85-106

CHANGES OF POLITICAL SYSTEMS SOME COMPARATIVE INDICATIONS

by

S. N. Eisenstadt +) June, 1985

+) Elie2er Kaplan School of Economic and Social Sciences and The Truman Research Institute, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Prepared for the Conference on Comparative Research on National Political Systems, Berlin, July 09-12, 1984

Publication Series of the International Institute for Comparative Social Research/Global Developments

Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin

Steinplatz 2, D-100Ö Berlin 12

Die in dieser Arbeit vertretenen Auffassungen sind die des Verfassers und nicht notwendigerweise die des Inter­

nationalen Instituts für Vergleichende Gesellschafts- forschung/Globale Entwicklungen.

The views expressed in this paperr are those of the

author and not necessarily those of the International

Institute for Comparative Social Research/Global Develop

ments.

FOREWORD

A Sketch toward a General Theory of Revolutions: Where, When, Why

Professor Eisenstadt has written a paper on a fascinating topic at a very high level of abstraction. Why, he asks, have some countries

had "Great Revolutions" and some have not? In the classic revolutions of 17th century-England, the American colonies and France in the 18th century and 20th century Russia armed rebellion, new political or religious creeds, large cultural and social changes, and the building of new institutions all came together within one or a very few d e c a d e s . T h e i r nearly simultaneous occurence made them interact more strongly and made their effects more profound.

How did this simultaneity arise in so many countries?

Speaking of a middle-class or "bourgeois" revolution does not suffice for an answer. Money, markets, merchants, and even employers of hired labor does not suffice for an answer. All these existed also in

countries and periods such as in the Islamic world, China, Japan, and perhaps India, where no such coincidences of several large and radical changes could be founded, and where such changes did not occur simultaneously, if they occured at all.

Eisenstadt sees the answer in basic differences in the structure of the two types of societies. His argument cannot be repeated in this foreword. His structural analysis is general and abstract, and yet it is at the same time specific, thought-provoking and enlightening.

I cannot agree with it in every point, particularly in regard to what he calls "early Europe" , and I am looking forward to some 2)

occasion to discuss these matters with him. But I have learned much from his paper and I trust other readers will, too.

- 2 -

In the upshot , it seems to me, his argument raises a large question.

If no "Great Revolutions" occured in societies of the traditional- patrimonial type, what does this imply for the future, when the spread of social mobilization, mass communications, politicization and

demands for ethnic, regional and group autonomy is changing these old revolution-preventing characteristics?'*Will Eisenstadt's two types of societies become more similar to each other and will great changes in this or that country tend to coalesce more closely in each case, or will they tend to become more separated and strung out over greater length of time?

Finally, large-scale violence was a part of each classic "Great Revolution" Eisenstadt referred to. But is it an essential point?

Was not the Industrial Revolution in England (c. 1760-1860) and later elsewhere also a great revolution, albeit one without major bloodshed of the "classic" type? And might not Japan's Meiji Restoration and its sequels (c. 1868-1930) also be considered in its effects a major revolution of some kind? If there are to be major processes of multidimensional social and cultural change

in the future, must they always include wars and civil wars?

People will search for answers to these questions for many years to come. But Professor Eisenstadt's paper illuminates some important steps in that journey.

Notes

1) In addition to the references in Professor Eisenstadt's paper, see e.g. Crane Brinton, The Anatomy of Revolutio ,1938 New York,

W W.Norton; 2nd ed. 1952, New" York,’ Princeton-Hall; Crane, Brinton, A Decade of Revolution, 1934, London, New York, Harper & Row.

See also discussion of "Revolution and the Relatively Non-Violent Self-Transformation of Societies", in: Karl W. Deutsch Politcs and Governments. How People decide their Fate, 3rd. ed., 1980, Boston, Houghton Mifflin, pp.20-21, 147-149.

2) Robert S. Lopez, La Naissance de 1 'Europe, 1962, Paris, A. Colin;

Robert S. Lopez, The Birth of Europe", 1967, Phoenix House, London, 1?67,. New York, M. Ivans.

Introduction — The Problem

In thia paper we shall present an analysis of several patterns of change in political systems. Our starting point will be that view of such changes shich has greatly influenced the sociological and political science analysis of the problem, and which has been greatly influenced by the view of revolutionary change -- the Great Revolutions, as being the epitome of "real“ change.

It is indeed one of the most interesting paradoxes of classical and contem­

porary social analysis alike that the conception of revolutionary change, as set forth mainly by Marx and the Marxists, shares some basic concepts and assump­

tions with the ideologically presumably conservative evolutionists and neo­

evolutionists (K. Eder [ed], 1973; C. Seyfarth and W.M. Sprondel [eds], 1973).

Above all, they share some crucial assumtpions about the nature of the transitions between different stages of social development — a concept which was central to evolutionary and Marxist sociology alike. All these schools or approaches, as well as the contemporary neo-evolutionary theories and

neo—Marxist theories, assumed that the transition from one stage to another involved a radical break with the past and concomitant changes in all spheres — political, social, economic. Only such changes were seen by both the evolu­

tionists and the Marxists as the "real" and most significant changes in the development of societies in general, and modern societies in particular. Those who believed that such changes occurred through a revolutionary process assumed also that this process would take place through the combination of several types of collective action, such as rebellions, intellectual or religious heterodoxies and central political stuggle, as well as potential institution building (S.N.

Eisenstadt, 1978; C. Friedrich, 1966; E. Kamenka fed], 1971; B. Mazlish, A.D.

Kaledin, D.B. Ralston (eds) 1971).

2

However, a closer look at the historical evidence clearly indicates that these characteristics were not true ot most of the social changes and transfor­

mations that took place throughout the major civilizations — be it the Islamic world, China, Japan and even early Europe — in their "historical” ,

"traditional" periods. Beyond this was the fact that many of the processes of change and transformation in modern Europe <i.e. in Germany or Italy) or in other modernizing societies (such as Japan, where the Meji Restoration generated far-reaching social transformation without a revolutionary-ideological sym­

bolism) were not affected through such processes, nor have they always evinced such "totality" of change.

In different civilizations and historical settings, a variety of com­

binations of continuity and change have developed in different spheres of insti­

tutional life. Moreover, in only a very few societies have such changes taken place through the combination of rebellions, heterodoxies, central political struggle and institutional building as envisaged in the "revolutionary" model.

In each civilization a variety of combinations formed among different movements of change and these combinations followed their own course toward change and transformation.

Accordingly, in the following sections, we shall attempt to indicate how variations in patterns of change in different societies can be explained. The central focus of our analysis will be the distinction between societies in which different types of social changes in the political center and its symbolism, in the structure of ruling classes and in economic relations — as well as dif­

ferent movements of change — heterodoxies, rebellions and political struggle — tended to come together (Of these, indeed, the modern revolution constituted the most extreme and dramatic illustration), as against those societies in which these processes and movements tended to be more dissociated from one another.

Problems of Change ln Imperial and Imperial Feudal Systems

The most important illustrations of societies in which these different agents and movements of change tended to come together are different Imperial and Imperial Feudal societies, i.e., the Roman and Hellenistic, the Chinese, the Byzantine, the Russian, the Abbasid, the Ottoman Empires and the major regimes of Western and Central Europe (S.N. Eisenstadt [ed] 1971a, pp. 221-244).

The most significant characteristics of the patterns of change that deve­

loped in these societies was a relatively high degree of coalescent between dimensions of the macro-societal order, high rates and directions of change of collectivities and institutional frameworks; high rate of internal restruc­

turing of the political system itself and strong connections between the various movements of protest and political struggle, as well as a very high level of articulation of political issues and organization (S.N. Eisenstadt, 1978).

Even within these Imperial and Imperial feudal systems the most frequent types of changes were dynastic. Sometimes these were connected with changes in the boundaries of a polity, and sometimes also, as in the case of the Byzantine Empire, they led to the disappearance of the polity — without leading to a con­

comitant disappearance of other ethnic, religious or regional collectivities or of religious, cultural or economic institutional complexes. In these Empires and Imperial-feudal societies, other patterns developed in which he degree of coalescence between changes in the political regimes and other aspects of the macro-societal order was much greater. Thus, in these empires, dynastic changes were sometimes connected with changes in the composition of political elites, in the structure of a broader state; in their impact on the central political institutions. These were also connected with changes in the relative predomi­

nance of some major groups in the political arena; even with direction assump­

4 -

tion or usurpation of political power and decison making by new groups, for example military groups or some upper bureaucratic groups. Moreover, such

changes were also often connected with shifts in intergroup structure and in the distribution of power in the society. They were often involved either with the emergence of new strata or with far reaching changes in the principles of struc­

tural organization of existing groups and in the relations between the central elites and broader social groups and also in the principles of hierarchization in society. Thus, such changes were often related to the fortunes of pro­

fessional, cultural and religious elites and institutions as opposed to more ascriptive groups. They were also connected with shifts in the balance of power between the monarch and the aristocracy, and between the aristocracy and the urban groups and the free peasantry, or with shifts in the strength and indepen­

dence of the bureaucracy, as well as with changes in the principles of the poli­

tical articulation of such groups; within the varied autonomous access of different groups to the center and to each other.

These societies show a much closer connection in the rates and restruc­

turing of the different parts of the macro-societal order than can be found in other types of traditional societies — such as the patrimonial city-state or

tribal system mentioned above. Even in the Imperial societies, the actual boun­

daries of '’ethnic'*, "religious" cultural and political collectivities and of institutional (economic, social and religious) systems tended to vary. Many of the "Great Traditions" survived — above all in the form of Churches, such as the Greek Orthodox — after the fall of their respectiv empires. But in such situations, with the sole exception of Islam, these Great Traditions tended to become somewhat emaciated, restricted and less dynamic in sharp constrast to parallel developments in Buddhist or Hindu societies (Louis Dumont, 1970;

Milton Singer, 1972; Burton Stein [ed], 1976; S.J. Tambiah, 1976).

Ethnie, regional and national collectivities or religious sects which per­

sisted beyond the demise of their empires were more resilient and continuous;

but even their articulation and organization tended to be relatively weak after the demise of their empires —— especially if compared again with similar deve­

lopments in Hindu or Buddhist societies. A similar picture emerges with respect to the realtion between continuity of economic frameworks and the political

boundaries of the Empires. While economic enterpreneurs — and above all com­

mercial and ’’industrial" ones — had many "outside" connections and markets, the bulk of their activities was within the Imperial boundaries and their political peripheries. Similarly, the articulation of social hierarchies and strata as well as the scope of status-consciousness were closely related with the Imperial boundaries. Hence, changes in the scope and structural principles of the econo­

mic systems or strata formation tended to impinge directly on the political cen­

ters while concomitantly, far-reaching changes in the political regimes could affect the economic and social spheres.

6

Rebellions, Heterodoxies and Political Struggle in Imperial and Imperial-Feudal Societies

In close relation to these patterns of change there developed in the Imperial feudal systems a tendency to articulate the ideology of the political struggle, emphasizing the connection with other movements of rebellion and pro­

test (S.N. Eisenstadt, 1969, 1971a, pp. 250-313).

This articulation and organization of political struggle led to the

emergence of political leaders or enterpreneurs who attempted to represent the values or interests of broad groups and states, and not only of "narrow" famly organizational groups. Frequently the rulers themselves, their representatives or members of the ruling elite played such leadership roles. In most of these regimes there developed more differentiated and autonomous types of political organization, such as cliques and semi-organized political parties. This occurred even if the extent of both their organizational continuity and their distinctive autonomy from other social spheres was much smaller than that of modern parties. These political systems also showed tendencies towards coalescence between the major types of protest, i.e. between rebellions and heresies, between these and institution building by secondary elites, above all

in the economic and cultural spheres and between each of these and the more central political struggle and processes. In imperial states some of these con­

nections could become more than just ad hoc coalitions. They could give rise to closer organizational and symbolic "merging" of these movements, possibly

generating new symbolic and organizational institutional patterns. This last tendency was closely realted to the high level of symbolic and ideological arti­

culation of political struggle, some of which focused on far-reaching redistri­

bution of economic resources (especially of land and of debts), throughout the community. sometimes this could also merge into a struggle over the socio-

economic contours of the whole community and over the contents and patterns of participation in its center or over the scope of participation of different social groups in its political life, or what could be called in more modern political parlance, the scope of political equality.

The pattern of change that developed in other traditional societies — especially in the so-called patrimonial societies, such as the Ancient Near Eatern and Persian, and most Southeast Asian kingdoms and in most city states and tribal federations in the anient Mediterranean was characterized by dif­

ferent features. Although space does not allow for the analysis of this pattern int he same detail allotted to the Imperial and Imperial-feudal pattern, we may point out briefly some of its major chacteristics. This pattern of change was characterized by a relatively low level of coalescence between changes in the principles and boundaries of regimes and other collectivities and institutions;

and by the closely related tendency of segregation between different types of movements of protest and political struggle (S.N. Eisenstadt (ed.) 1971a, pp.

138-177, 1973).

A comparison between these two patterns of change in taditional societies indicate that there is a close connection between the degree of convergence of different types of movements of protest, between them and the central political struggle on the one hand, and the degree of coalescence between changes in the different components of the macro socieal order. The closer the connection bet­

ween these movements and processes and institutional innovations, the higher the degree of segration between the different types of movements of protest and political struggle, and the lower the degree of coalescence between changes in the different components of the macro-societal order.

Clearly, even within traditional societies, especially in the classical city-states of Greek and Roman antiquity and in the Near Eastern, especially

- 8

ancient Israelite and Islamic tribal federations — there are some exceptions to this correlation between coalescence of movements of protest and convergence of changes in the different dimensions of the macro societal order. Moreover, within each of the idea-typical patterns of change analyzed above, there deve­

loped a great variety, but we shall have to foregoe their analysis here due to space limitations.

Instead, we shall proceed to the next question: whether it is possible to identify the social and cultural characteristics of the Imperial and Imperial- feudal societies on the one hand, and the patrimonial ones on the other, which may explain the development within them of different patterns of change.

Cultural Orientation and Center-Periphery Relation in Imperial and Imperial-Feudal Societies

What are the conditions which account for the major differences in the pat­

terns of change between Imperial and patrimonial societies? It is not easy to identify such conditions in terms of variables often stressed in the sociologi­

cal literature — such as the type of social division of labor and degree of economic development, of structural differentiation or of class relations or struggle. As against these explanations of processes of change, we shall empha­

sis the combination of cultural orientations, structure of centers, coalitions of elites and constellations of specific historical moments.

Thus in greater detail we shall attempt to analyse these processes of change. First of all, in terms of some of the cultural orientations prevalent in these different types of societies; secondly, in the combination of the former with structural characteristics of societies which cut across similar levels of technology on the one hand and of structural differentiation or of class composition on the other; (the most important of such characteristics, as we shall see in greater detail later one, are the structures of their centers and of center periphery relations; the structuring of social hierarchies, of strata formation and of the major collectivities) and lastly the structure and coalitions of elites predominant in them.

Imperial and Imperial-feudal societies also showed a predominance of several specific cultural orientations or codes. As we have already indicated above, most of these Empires — with the partial exception of the Roman and the Hellenistic, developed in close relation to some of the Great Civilizations or Traditions. These include the special Chinese blend of Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism; the Christian tradition in its variety; and the Islamic one. More of these Traditions emerged, with the exception of the late comer Islam, into the

10

so-called Axial age, i.e. around the first millenium B.C. That period saw the breakthroughs to some of the Great Civilizations, the respective "leaps" into history of the great cultural innovators — the Hebrew prophets, the Greek phi­

losophers; Jesus and his disciples; Confucius, the codifiers of the Brahmin tradition and Buddha (S.N. Eisenstadt, 1969, 1982a).

Most of these traditions or civilizations also shared basic culture orien­

tations or codes characteristic of the Axial Age civilizations. First, they possessed the conception of a high level of autonomy and distinction between the cosmic and mundane orders, but at the same time of their mutual relevance.

Second, while they shared the emphasis on the tension between the cosmic and mundane world with other civilizations — such as the Hindu and Buddhist, these civilizations in which the Imperial and Imperial-feudal regimes developed empha­

sized the resolution of this tension, the road to salvation is not assured througha total negation of this world but in the political, military and cultural and (especially in the European case) economic spheres as the bridge between the transcendental cosmic and the mundane world. Third, these civiliza­

tions emphasized a high level of commitment of the different sectors of the population to the cosmic and social orders, and autonomous access of at least some of the stata of these societies to the major attributes of these orders.

The major characteristics of center-periphery relations in the Imperial and Imperial-feudal societies (S.N. Eisenstadt, 1966, 1971b, pp. 87-119) was a high level of distinctiveness of the center and its perception as a distinct symbolic and organizational unit. The centers attempted not only to extract resources from the perhiphery but also to permeate it and to reconstruct it symbolically and to mobilize it structurally. Many of these societies also developed a

potential for the impingement of at least part of the periphery on the center or centers.

The political and to some degree also the cultural-religious centers in all these societies were conceived as autonomous foci of the charismatic elements of the socio-political and often also of the cosmic cultural order, as the major embodiments of the charismatic qualities of the cosmic order they became reflected in the social order or related to it. It was these centers — the political, religious, and cultural — which embodied the Great Traditions that also developed in these societies as distinct from local traditions, not only in content but also in their very symbolic and organizational structural charac­

teristics. In structural terms, the distinctiveness and autonomy of the

Imperial'centers was mainly evident in their separation from other social units of the periphery, and int heir ability to develop and maintain their own speci­

fic symbols and criteria of recruitment and organization. In most of these societies the socio-political and the cultural order represented in the centers were seen to compass the periphery beyond its own specific local traditions.

Unlike the patrimonial, the Imperial systems worked on the assumption that the periphery could indeed have some at least symbolic access to the center, and that such access was to a very large extent contingent on some weakening of the social and cultural closeness and self-efficiency and on its developing some active orientation to the social and cultural order of the center. This per­

meation of the periphery by the center was evident in the development by the centers, of widespread channels of communication which emphasized their symbolic and structural differences and in their attempts to break through — however slightly — the ascriptive ties of the groups on the periphery. The impingement of the periphery on the center was weaker than the permeation of the periphery by the center. yet howver weak, this tendency was also reinforced — albeit in varying degrees in different Imperial societies — by a potential multiplicity of centers and collectivities, of "ethnic", religious and political communities

as well as by the wide scope of their respective markets.

12

Symbolic Orientations, Structuring of Institutions, and Patterns of Change

This analysis reveals a very close relation between (a) the degree of coalescence between manifestations of protest, institution building, the levels of articulation and ideologication of the political struggle, and of coalescence of changes in the political system with (2) those in other components of the macro-societal order and the degree of distinctiveness of the center, center- periphery relations, the principles of hierarchization and types of cultural orientations. It also shows that the tendency to such articulation and

coalescence tends to be greater i n those societies which are characterized by (1) a high symbolic and institutional distinctiveness of the center from the periphery; (2) relatively wide autonomous strata orientation and multiplicity of autonomous secondary elites; and (3) cultural orientation toward a high level of tension between the transcendental and the mundane order, a strong wordly orientation towards a resolution of this tension and/or a high level of commitment to it and of not taking it as given.

As opposed to this are the various patrimonial societies. In those societies there is (1) a low degree of symbolic and institutional distinction between center and periphery and a narrow status association; (2) a small degree of autonomy of secondary elites and the predominant cultural orientation which has either a low level of distinction and tension between the transcenden­

tal and the mundane order or a high level of such distinction, in which the resolution is other wordly; (4) a low level of commitment to the socio­

political and even to the cultural order and a tendency to accept it as given are characterized by a tendency to segregation of movements of rebellion, heterodoxy, institution-building and political protest and struggle.

Thus we see a close relation or parallelism between the degree of symbolic

articulation or "problematization" in the respective cultural orientations, of some of the major problems of human existence on the one hand, and a high degree of symbolic and institutional distinctiveness of the«major aspects of the social order, on the other. We define the degree of symbolic articulation of problems of human existence, of nature, of social life thus; its problematization is greater insofar as any formulation of these problems does not accept the data of human existence as given, but questions some of their givens and premises. This is some ak.in to C. Geertz’s definition of rationalization: "the tendency to pose the basic problems of the major symbolic spheres in terms of growing abstraction of their formulation, of growing logical abstraction of their for­

mulation, of growing logical coherence and general phrasing" (Clifford Geertz, 1973). Such problematization need not, however, be "rational" in the usual sense of the word; it may, for instance, develop in mystical or aesthetic directions and different cultural orientations or codes generate different degrees of non-acceptance of the assumptions of human existence.

Such problematic articulation is greater insofar as there is (1) a percep­

tion of tensions between the transcendental and the mundane order; and (2) a high degree of commitment to such order when it is not accepted as given, and

«■»

when the effort to resolve the tension between the transcendental and the mun­

dane worlds is this-worldly rather than other-worldly. The higher the degree of such symbolic articulation of the "problematic" of human existence, is connected with a parallel symbolization of the major aspects ofinstitutional structure,

i.e. a high level of distinction between the center and of symbolic articulation of center-periphery relations; of social hierarchies and of stratification as well as of a high ideological component in the process of political struggle.

In such cases, other conditions being equal, some connection could develop bet­

ween the different types of rebellion, heterodoxy and political struggle, as

■14

well as the coalescence in the rates and direction of change of different insti tutional spheres

Autonomy of Elites, Institutional Entrepreneurs and Patterns of Change

The mere emphasis on such parallelism between these two forms of symbolic articulation does not explain their relationship to different patterns of change. Indeed, it may smack of some sort of emanatism very akin to what many pure structuralists, i.e. Levi-Strauss, have been accused of (I. Rossi (ed) 1974; see also Eisenstadt & Curelaru, 1976).

In order to overcome this weakness, it is necessary to specify the actual social mechanisms and actors by whom these symbolic orientations are carried into the institutional sphere. The clue to this problem lies not so much in the mechanics of the social division of labor usually stressed in the literature — such as degree of structural differentiation or class structure and antagonism, but much more following Weber's most seminal insights — in the nature of the various major institutional entrepreneurs or elites. First there are the func­

tional elites often mentioned in sociological literature; but there are also the articulators of models of cultural order and of the cohesion of the major ascriptive solidarities. Second are the major institutional frameworks — regu­

lative, legal and communicative — in which these entrepreneurs function. They are, on the one hand, the more active carriers of the cultural orientations while on the other hand, different coalitions of such entrepreneurs provide the institutional and symbolic articulation of the different collective actions, organizations and movements and the linkages between them. In this way such coalitions shape first, the major institutional features of a society — espe­

cially the characteristics center-periphery relations, and the patterns of strata-formation within them. Second, coalitions shape the institutional and symbolic articulation of movements of rebellion and protest and political

16

struggle, as well as of various types of systemic contradictions which develop in different societies.

Thus the same activities and mechanisms which construct the major institu­

tional frameworks of any given society also generate the most important poten­

tials for change within it, shaping patterns and direction of change to a large degree.

It is the structure of such entrepreneurial activities which provides the crucial link between cultural orientations and isntitutional structure; a nd difference in the structure of such entrepreneurs explain some of the relations between types of cultural orientations and institutional patterns in general and different patterns of change in particular.

The most important differences in the characteristics of such elites and entrepreneurs are (1) the degree of their symbolic and institutional differen­

tiation' and autonomy; (2) the relations between them and broader ascriptive groups and strata; and (3) the concomitant autonomy of the institutional, pro­

fessional, legal or communicative frameworks within which these entrepreneurs functions. The opposite of such autonomy is not necessarly the non-existence of different specialized tasks but rather their absorption into broader ascriptive collectivities or networks. Thus, such autonomy is not to be equated with spe­

cialization and differentiation in terms of the social division of labor.

Rather it refers to the autonomous symbolic definition and institutional bases of these activities.

The extent of such autonomy of these enterpreneurs is, on the one hand, greatly dependent on the types of symbolic orientation which are carried by these elites. The more such orientations generate the problematization of the givens of human existence, the stronger also the tendency to the autonomous crystallization of such elites and frameworks. On the other hand, the greater

the autonomy of the enterpreneurs and of the regulative frameworks within which they operate, the greater also the tendency to a high level of symbolic articu­

lation of the major components of the social order, and to autonomous access of such elites and collectivities to each other, to a high degree of mutual linka­

ges between them and to their common convergence on the centers — as well as the tendency of such enterpreneurs to organize collective action in general, and rebellions and political struggle in particular in relatively "autonomous”

formations.

18

Cultural Orientations, Structrure of Elites and Patterns of Change — Analytical Conclusions

The material about the two ideal types of societies analyzed above — the Imperial and Imperial-feudal on the one hand and the patrimonial ones on the other — bear out the relation between types of entrepreneurs, institutional contours and patterns of change.

Thus in the Imperial and Imperial-feudal (and exceptional city-states and tribal federations), the higher degree of symbolic distinction of the center and of strata formation were carried by a multiplicity of functional elites and representatives of the solidarity of different collectivities, which had autono­

mous bases and potentially autonomous access to the center and to each other.

It was these elites with their impingement on the centers and the periphery alike that shaped various movements of protest and of political activities and struggle within them. Each of these secondary elites, of articulartors of the solidarity of different collectivities; of cultural models and traditions, of political entrepreneurs, could become a starting point of some movements of pro­

test or of political struggle with a higher level of organization and symbolic articulation and with some potential orientations and linkages among themselves and to the center (Eisenstadt, 1982b).

As against this, we find in patrimonial city-states and tribal regimes a combination of lack of structural distinction between center and periphery, a high degree of status segregation, weaker organizational and symbolic articula­

tion of movements of rebellion, conflicts and linkages among them and the

center. This combination was connected with a relatively low level of the sym­

bolic articulation of different collectivities as well as of secondary elites — whether functional ones or articulators of cultural models or of the solidarity of different collectivities; and with a high degree of absorption of such

institutional entrepreneurs into ascriptive groups with little symbolical and organizational autonomy, autonomous access to the center or linkages among themselves.

It is only when the civilizational or cultural and the structural con­

ditions come together that the possilibility of occurrence* of revolutions takes place. If only the first type of conditions occur, and not the second, as has been the case in many Islamic societies, such possiblity becomes minimized.

20

The Historical Framework and Conditions of Revolutions

The combination of cultural and structural characteristics which can be found in the Imperial and Imperial-feudal societies generates processes of change somewhat similar to those presented in the image of revolution. The '’problematic" cultural orientations inspired visions of new types of social order, while the organizational and structural characteristics provided the fra­

meworks through which some aspects of these visions could be institutionalized and the two were combined by the activities of the different "entrepreneurs"

analyzed above.

Through the interaction between these structural and cultural charac­

teristics the different conditions which have been singled out in the literature lead to revolution. These conditions of revolution are, as we have seen, inter- and intra-elite competition; their interweaving with the broader social

movements; the political articulation of the feeling of relative deprivation of broader groups which become linked with one another and in such a way lead to the outbreaks of "real" revolutions, and the concomitant institutional changes.

In other types of societies, these various types of "preconditions" or of preci­

pitants, while possibly also leading to the demise of regimes, to internal were

*»

and to some far-reaching changes will not lead in either "revolutionary" direc­

tion and/or to the type of social transformation connected with it.

But the "mere" prevalence within these societies of the above mentioned cultural orientations and structural characteristics does not explain or assure their resulting in revolutions. Even in these societies the first "tru" modern revolutions constituted a sort of "mutation", an entirely new type of process of change. These revolutions developed only in very specific socio-historical cir­

cumstances, which we should mention only very briefly here. The most important circumstances are those of relatively early stages of transition of modern set­

tings in which there occurs the coincidence of three major aspects of the breakthrough from a "traditional" to a modern setting. These aspects are, first, transition from a "traditional" or "closed" pattern of legitimation of political authority; as well as possibly also in the definition of symbols of collective identity to an open one; second, the transition to an open system of stratification, to "class" system, rooted in or connected with a trend to market economy in general and industrial economy in particular; and third, and closely connected with the former, the creation of and/or incorporation of the respec­

tive societal units into a series of continuously changing international politi­

cal, economic and cultural international systems.

The coincidence of these transitions raises a series of problems which call for redefinition of almost all the major symbolic premises and institutional arrangements, above all inasmuch as they bear on the access to power and the structure of the political centers. The growing socio-economic change and dif­

ferentiation provides the movements of protest and political struggle and inno­

vation with a larger number of groups ready for "social mobilization", and the intensification of processes of change generated a larger number of elites of institutional entrepreneurs to serve as agents of such mobilization, as linkages between themselves and between the centers and broader strata.

- 22

Concluding Observations

Hence, in these types of situations of change the potentialities for sym­

bolically and organizationally linking movements of protest, rebellions and heterodoxies, and central political struggle and institution building could become actualized and focused on the reconstruction of the social order.

It is in these circumstances that the potentialities of change through revolution become intensified and that the special mutations of revolution may develop. But it tends to develop only — or mainly — in those societies which have been characterized already by a "coalescent’’ pattern of change. In these societies revolutions emerge out" of the intensification of those processes of change, in the multiplicity of secondary elites, of political and economic eli­

tes together with articulators of collective solidarity or of cultural models.

Each of these have a strong connection both to the periphery and to the center.

Revolutions require too the growth of linkages between such groups and elites and between them and the center of societies.

In other cases, which for reasons of space we cannot discuss here, but which will be discussed in the larger work, indications are that only the com­

bination of the cultural and structural characteristics, and of historical cir­

cumstances analyzed above, that generates the potentialities of revolutions.

Thus, the Japanese case — • the Meji Restoration (Hall, 1970, chs. 13-16; Ward [edj, 1968) indicates that Imperial-feudal structures, when not connected with the perception of tension between the transcendental and the mundane order — while giving rise to far-reaching structural transformation does not give rise to a full-scale ideological symbolic revolution. The various Islamic societies (see, for instance, Vatikiotis (ed.) 1968) show that the prevalence of the

appropriate cultural orientation when not combined with an Imperial or Imperial- feudal structure does not give rise to "full revolutions" and only when — as in

the Ottoman Empire — combined with them does it generate such potentialities.

(Mardin, 1971).

Nor does the process of social transformation attendant on breakthrough to modernization in "patrimonial" societies (Eisenstadt, 1973) conform to the pat­

tern of "revolutionary" transformation — and neither do the patterns of radica­

lism and social transformation, which develop in the historical circumstances not of breakthrough to modernization but of late modernization.

Thus that particular pattern of social change subsumed under the image of revolutions tends to develop only in very specific socio-historical conditions and only in some types of societies or civilizations. In other societies and in other historical circumstances far-reaching social changes and processes or restructuring evolve in different patterns which still have to be systematically studied.

25

Eugene Kamenka, "The Concept of Political Revolution", in C.J. Friedrich (ed.) Revolution (New York, Atherton Press, 1966), pp. 122-135.

--- -— -, Towards Revolution. The Revolution Reader: Writings From Contemporary Revolutionary Leaders Throughout the World, London, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1971, 2 vols.

S.A. Mardin, "Ideology and Religion in the Turkish Revolution" in International Journal of Middle East Studies, 2, 1971, pp. 197-211.

Bruce Mazlich, A.D. Kaledin, D.B. Raison (eds.) Revolution: A Reader (New York, Macmillan, 1971).

I. Rossi (ed.) The Unconsciousness in Culture: The Structuralism o f Claude Levi-Strauss in Perspective (New York, Dutton, 1974).

C. Seyfarth and W.M. Sprondel. (ed.) Religion und Gesellschaftliche Entwicklung.

Frankfurt am Main, Suhrkamp, 1973.

Milton Singer, When a Great Tradition Modernizes (New York, Praeger, 1972).

Burton Stein (ed.) Essays on South India (Hawaii, University of Hawaii Press) Asian Studies at Hawaii, 15, pp. 64-91.

S.J. Tambiah, World Conqueror and World Renouncer (New York, Cambridge University Press, 1976).

P.J. Vatikiotis (ed.) Revolutions in the Middle East (London, George Allen

& Unwin, 1972).

Robert E. Ward (ed.) Political Development in Modern Japan (Princeton, Prince­

ton University Press, 1968).