The Effects of Incorporation into World-Systems on Ethnic

Processes: Lessons from the Ancient World for the Modern World.

Professor Thomas D. Hall

Department of Sociology & Anthropology

DePauw University

Greencastle, IN 46135-0037

317-658-4519

internet: thall@depauw.edu

Paper prepared for presentation on the panel on

Insecurity: Migration (Refugees) and Ethnic Nationalism

as Symptoms of World Systemic Crisis

at International Studies Association meeting, Toronto, March 1997

Please do not cite our quote with permission of the author.

ABSTRACT:

This paper discusses how incorporation into a world-system (ancient and modern) can create, transform, or destroy ethnic groups. Drawing on analysis of ancient world-systems (Chase-Dunn and Hall 1997a), the paper summarizes the many ways ethnic groups are affected by incorporation into an expanding world-system. This capsule summary of about 5,000 years of state - ethnic group interaction suggests ways in which the study of modern ethnic relations might be reframed:

(1) the ethnically homogeneous state has never been empirically common (McNeill 1986);

(2) ethnicity has always been somewhat fluid with respect to identity, boundaries, cultural content, and membership;

(3) the modern world differs from ancient world most significantly with respect to volume and velocity of ethnic processes;

(4) for both ancient and modern worlds, ethnic processes cannot be understood without careful consideration of their interstate, or world-systemic, context.

(5) that contemporary ethnic conflicts have contemporary, not ancient, roots; and

(6) that those roots are found in modernity itself.

These lessons generate at least two puzzles:

(1) how and why the ideal of the ethnically homogeneous state arose, and remains a vital force in world politics; and

(2) whether the speed of late 20th century processes represents a quantitative or qualitative shift in ethnic processes.

INTRODUCTION

I will argue two fundamental points in this paper. First, the processes by which ethnic groups are created (ethnogenesis), transformed, and destroyed cannot be understood without attending carefully to the larger, interstate context within which these processes occur. Though the contextual setting is far from providing a complete explanation, it is vital to constructing such and explanation. For those closely familiar with world-system theory, this a specific extension of the world-system theory claim that all local social processes are shaped by, and in turn shape, world-system processes (Bach 1980). Second, new insights into contemporary ethnic processes may be gained by examining ancient, that is to say pre-fifteenth century processes. This will help distinguish new processes from old processes, and help untangle complex ethnic processes. I hasten to add that I see this paper as merely one statement in a continuing dialogue among students of ancient ethnicity and modern ethnicity. I hope each group of scholars will learn from the other.

For several years I have collaborated with Christopher Chase-Dunn in studying precapitalist, that is before the fifteenth century, world-systems. To do this we have had to modify extensively the world-system models originally proposed by Immanuel Wallerstein (Chase-Dunn and Hall 1997a). In particular I have elaborated the concept of incorporation into a world-system of either a region or a group, or both (Hall 1986, 1987, 1989a:Ch. 3; Chap. 4). In this paper I focus on how world-systemic processes can create, transform, or destroy ethnic groups, and how those processes are the same, and differ between ancient and modern world-systems.

In order to do so, I begin with a brief discussion of definitional issues, then summarize the historic depth of ethnic-like relations. With the stage thus set I will summarize the comparative world-systems approach to these issues. After noting two remaining puzzles, I conclude with a few lessons from the study of ancient ethnic conflicts for the study of modern ones.

DEFINITIONAL ISSUES:

It would be all too easy to get bogged down in all sorts of fine conceptual distinctions about race, ethnicity, nationality, and identity. However, I prefer to extend Arthur Stinchcombe's (1978) dictum that counting is the last, not first step in theoretical and empirical investigation, to argue that definitions should emerge within theoretical and empirical context. However, to begin this discussion, garden variety definitions will do. Ethnicity is a publicly recognized, shared feeling of belong to the same group defined by kinship or biology. Race is the same thing, but marked by one or more phenotypical manifestations. Nationality is the same sense as ethnicity, but defined by citizenship or subjection to a state. In this discussion I will use ethnicity as the cover term--not because I wish to gloss over important distinction--but for the more prosaic purpose of simpler exposition.

These definitions are rather facile. In the late twentieth century due to increased race-ethnic-national mixing--the Tiger Woods phenomenon--these distinctions can blur significantly. However, in ancient times the distinctions sometimes collapse to the same thing, especially for nonstate societies, where often--but not always--the there was no difference between "primordialist" and "situational" definitions of group identity.

Furthermore, the tension between biology and politics is significant throughout the range of phenomena that these three terms address. Race is often seen as largely biological, whereas nationality is typically seen as largely political. This is far from accidental, but rather is a manifestation of the shift from kin-ordered societies to tributary or state-ordered societies (discussed below and in Chase-Dunn & Hall 1997a and Sanderson 1995a).

To begin to understand and analyze the tension and confusion in these terms, I will briefly recap what we can learn from world history on the matter.

POLYETHNICITY IS NORMAL, NOT NATIONAL STATES

William H. McNeill claims that world history shows "polyethnicity as normal in civilized societies, whereas the ideal of an ethnically unitary state was exceptional in theory and rarely approached in practice" (McNeill 1986:4). By polyethnicity McNeill means what we conventionally call plural or multicultural societies, without making some of the finer distinctions used by Fred Riggs (1994, 1997a). McNeill couches his argument in terms of "civilization" and "barbarism," by which he means what Gerhard Lenski (Lenski, Nolan, Lenski 1995) would call agrarian states and horticultural, pastoral, or foraging societies, or what I would call tributary and kin ordered modes of accumulation (Chase-Dunn and Hall 1997a, espec. Chs. 2 and 3). In short, the drive for nation-building, especially when focused on racial-ethnic-linguistic-cultural homogeneity is in aberration of the last few centuries in the over 5,000 years of history of states. The recent resurgence of plural states is a continuation of the natural condition of states.

This raises two questions. First, why this change, especially in the face of overwhelming evidence that ethnic-racial-linguistic-cultural diversity remains the statistical norm of states (see Gurr 1993)? This question I will defer to the end this discussion. Second, why is such diversity so pervasive? I will begin with McNeill's explanation, then turn to world-systems elaborations of his explanation.

McNeill argues that three fundamental processes constantly generate create polyethnicity in states. Polyethnicity is common first and foremost because states, based on agriculture for over 95% of their existence, are far more productive, have higher population densities, and are much wealthier (even if very unequally distributed) than nonstate societies. Hence they often displace or conquer the others as they spread into new territories, absorbing new peoples.

Second, this expansion is fueled by differentials in the occurrence disease. As McNeill notes (1986:12; and 1976), until the mid 19th century cities were net population sinks. Their populations always had to be replaced. Where this did not occur voluntarily, it was accomplished through force. Slaves typically became lowest ranking members of society. Occasionally, though, they were palace guards. Once in a while these palace guards took over the government (e.g., Mamluks in Egypt). In either case, the importation of new populations tended to increase polyethnicity.

Third, trade led to mixing. Some long distance traders took up residence in distance lands, creating trade diasporas. This facilitated trade because traders knew that at the end of a long exchange (whether direct, or indirect) they would be dealing with people who traded by the same rules. These communities maintained their differences from their host populations and were often recognized by host governments as having the right to govern their own affairs (Curtin 1984). Later, when universal religions (Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, etc.) united large areas, ethnic enclaves were no longer as necessary as before. Trade diasporas gave way to what Curtin (1984) calls trade ecumenes--that is, large areas where values where shared. Where trade diasporas persisted, members often adhered to a different world religion as well as being ethnically distinct.

To sum up, McNeill's argument is that polyethnicity is due to "the political, commercial, and epidemiologic consequences of civilized social articulation" (McNeill 1986:25). Or put in more conventional language ethnic diversity is a necessary consequence of the normal functioning of states.

I now turn to an elaboration of this argument, or what might be called a "yes, but" critique. That is, I find McNeill's argument persuasive, but somewhat miss-specified in its emphasis on states. Rather, I argue that the generation of diversity also inheres in world-systems.

THE CONTRIBUTION OF A WORLD-SYSTEMS PERSPECTIVE

A key insight and finding of a world-system perspective is that the world-system is a fundamental unit of analysis within which all other social processes and relations must be studies (Bach 1980). This does not mean that everything can be explained by or from a world-system perspective. It only means that a world-system perspective must be a part of any broad explanation. Thus, my critique of McNeill's analysis of polyethnicity, is not that it is wrong, but that it is incomplete.

Several scholars have been modified and extended world-system theory into pre-modern, that is pre 1500 C.E., settings. Though they disagree on a number of issues, they all agree that processes of long-term social change since at least 5,000 years ago require study from a world-system perspective, as well as from conventional, civilizational, state, and local perspectives. At least two points from my work with Christopher Chase-Dunn are especially germane here. First, all world-systems expand and "pulsate" (Chase-Dunn and Hall 1997a, 1997b), that is expand and contract, or expand rapidly then more slowly. Second, we argue that all world-systems have four boundaries demarcated by sharp declines different types of interactions:

a) those shaped by bulk goods trade networks (BGN);

b) those shaped by political military interactions (PMN);

c) those shaped by prestige or luxury goods networks (PGN);

d) those shaped by information networks (IN).

Often these are nested, as shown in Figure 1. It is only in very small, isolated world-systems, islands, and in the modern, global world-system of the late twentieth century that these four boundaries coincide.

FIGURE 1 ABOUT HERE

Expansion of world-systems involves gradually incorporating new regions and new peoples into the system as it expands. When one world-system expands into the territory of another, typically there is some type of merger, rather than full incorporation (this is discussed in detail in Chase-Dunn & Hall 1997a). A key point here is that incorporation can occur along any of the four boundaries, and these may not coincide.

I have shown (Hall 1986, 1989a) that incorporation is not simply of matter of being in or out of the system, but rather is a matter of degree (see Figure 2). I further argued that changes in a world-system itself can cause lessening of the degree of incorporation, despite a general trend toward tighter and tighter incorporation. The pulsation of world-system is one of the causes of these reversals, as are changes in frontier policies and practices of states, and heightened resistance to incorporation by those being engulfed.

Indeed, these shifting zones of incorporation make up many of the world's frontier regions. These are the places where the formation and transformation of ethnicity is most active as various peoples and regions are incorporated into world-systems. The process of incorporation varies with the type of world-system doing the incorporation--tributary or capitalist world-systems--and with the type of group being incorporated--state or nonstate group. The difference between states and nonstate groups is a salient distinction, but not the only one.

Both tributary and capitalist world-systems have a range of subtypes. Tributary can range from highly decentralize (feudal systems) to highly centralized (something akin to Marx's oriental despotism--albeit not limited to or all that common in Eastern Eurasia. Capitalist systems range from early mercantile systems in 16th through 18th century Europe to fully productive capitalist systems, the one that has increasingly dominated the world since the late 18th century. This latter distinction overlaps somewhat with Riggs (1997a, 1997b) distinction between capitalism and industrialism, and shares his recognition that industrial states or production capitalism differs in its social consequences significantly from all early forms of states and world-systems.

Of special concern here is how these processes differ in premodern settings, and what we may learn from them about ethnic relations and processes. In premodern settings, political considerations are as frequent as access to trade and resources as reasons for incorporation. These reasons remain common, if not the most frequent, reasons for incorporation in early merchant capitalism. Encounters with a large variety of nonstate societies are more common than in the modern world-system, although such encounters have been common in the modern world-system. What is distinctive, as McNeill (1986) argues, is that premodern systems and states did not try to force ethnic uniformity. Rather, they tolerated difference as long as the goals of the state were met. This does not mean that there were not forced changes in religion, governance, customs and so forth. Only that complete assimilation was almost never a goal. Polyethnicty, or what we more conventionally call pluralism was the goal. Furthermore, since most states were multi-ethnic, there is no reason to expect that subjects would find it odious to be conquered by yet another ethnic elite, unless of course taxes increased or they forcibly relocated or pressed into slavery. In that case their objections, and rare rebellions, would be couched in those terms, not ethnic terms.

Especially worthy of note are the transformative consequences of incorporation. Depending on a number of specific circumstances incorporation can fragment groups, destroying fragile states and thereby engendering a number of "tribes." Other circumstances favor formation of states by amalgamating nonstate societies. Both of these processes have occurred repeatedly among Central Asian pastoralists (Barfield 1989; Hall 1991; Frank 1992; Chase-Dunn and Hall 1997a:Ch. 8). Chiefdoms may be formed from formerly band organized groups (Comanches in the American Southwest [Hall 1989a], or Araucanians in La Plata [Hall in press a; Jones in press]. If there is prolonged interaction and interbreeding (and sometimes intermarriage) new hybrid groups may be formed, such as Metís descended from Native American women and male French fur traders; or genízaros descended from Native American and Hispanic populations in southwestern United States (Meyer 1994; Hall 1989a, 1989b).

Frequently, incorporated groups lose former autonomy and become ethnic minorities. Native Americans in United States and Canada are familiar examples. This was also the fate of the Hispanic populations of New Mexico, California, and Texas after 1848 (see Hall 1989a). Entirely new identities can be created when groups are relocated and old identities stripped and replaced with new ones, as happened to African slaves imported into the United States. Where states, or portions of states are absorbed territorial minorities are created. This is especially common in the colonial ares of the modern world-system. These absorbed groups give rise many ethnic movements and civil wars in the modern world (Gurr and Harff 1994).

The modern world differs significantly from the premodern world. First, states, for the most part, have become much larger, encompassing more minority groups. Second, states have increasingly emphasized ethnic unity in their nation-building efforts. Third, the right to a separate, ethnically homogeneous state is often used to justify claims of independence. Erstwhile native peoples have been especially savvy in using the doctrine of sovereignty to press such claims (Wilmer 1993). Fourth, the frequency with which claims of sovereignty are pressed directly contradicts all predictions of modernization theory. These occurrences appear to be much more common in the modern world.

Finally, all of this suggests that there has been a fundamental shift in the nature of ethnicity in the modern world from what it was in the premodern world. For the premodern world a primordialist approach to ethnicity is at least plausible, if not indeed more accurate. In the modern world, by contrast, situational, reactive, or interest-based ethnicity seems to be far more common, rendering the primordialist approach almost untenable (Hall 1984). Part and parcel of this change is the increasing politicization of ethnicity, and identity in general. Indeed, much of the conceptual confusion that attends discussions of ethnicity and race derives from the new preponderance of situationally defined groups in confrontation with primordialist conceptions of what ethnicity and race mean.

Some of the difference may be an artifact of differing time scales. For instance the formation of a new ethnic group, say Metís or genízaros, takes many generations, whereas many contemporary conflicts focus around shorter-term issues. Similarly, it took decades or even centuries of interactions among nomadic peoples and with Spaniards and Anglos to create or transform the loosely connected "bands" of nomadic peoples inhabiting what is now southwestern United States into the Indian nations we know today.

Our understanding of these differences is not helped by the propensity of many such movements to impute deeply ancient roots to relatively recent events. Some of Vine Deloria's remarks (1995) about Lakota people always having been in what are now the Dakotas come to mind, and recent controversy's about the Bering Straights theory of the population of the Americas.

According to Malcolm (1994) various partisans in Bosnia have sought to manipulate and use ancient conflicts to excuse or even obscure current motivations in the war there:

The biggest obstacle to understanding the conflict is the assumption that what has happened in that country is the product--natural, spontaneous and at the same time necessary--of forces lying within Bosnia's own internal history. That is the myth which was carefully propagated by those who caused the conflict, who wanted the world to believe that what they and their gunmen were doing was done not by them, but by impersonal and inevitable historical forces beyond anyone's control (p. xix).

Malcolm makes two points that are germane here. First, that external factors shaped the conflict (Serbian manipulations and the misunderstandings of Western powers of the nature of the conflict). Second, that roots of the conflict are not ancient, but quintessentially modern. Rather, ancient conflicts have been manipulated as a rationalization for the seizure of property and power by any means whatsoever. Malcolm notes in support of this analysis the efforts to bomb archives, as specific targets, in order to destroy the history--all the better to revise it to suit current purposes.

This is precisely what Fred Riggs (1997a, 1997b) has called a "para-modern" process: the harmful side of modernization. Contemporary ethnic conflicts have contemporary causes. As Riggs puts it, "If anyone living today could claim descent from the Philistines, they would have plenty to fight about--primordial wars mean nothing today except in the minds of those who can use the myths to buttress their contemporary struggles" (Riggs 1997b:9).

The western powers have, themselves, fallen victim to the ancient roots argument. However, some observers have noted that the conflicts in central Africa are not ethnic or tribal, but about scarce resources. Ethnic differences are the excuse for depriving some people of their resources and/or eliminating them as competitors. Thus, ethnicity has become the "rationalization of choice" for a wide variety of conflicts. The irony here is that such conflicts may, themselves, be ethnogenetic, creating the very groups whose existence is imputed to have been the root of the conflict.

Conflict as a cause of ethnogenesis, however, is not limited to the modern world. Conflicts between Burmese language groups and Thai language groups helped form Burma and Siam out of loose federations of what appear to have been chiefdoms. Still, the groups today are clearly distinct in culture and state structure. However, the constant taking of prisoners in the centuries of warfare insures that neither group is genetically pure, or even distinct. This, however, does not seem to hold as strongly for the numerous "hill tribes" in those two states.

As Fred Riggs argues (1997a:7), cleavages, which occur when "a community rejects that identity [of the conqueror] and demands recognition of its sovereignty as an independent or autonomous people" often give rise to violence in the modern world. Under this definition, cleavages were extremely rare in the ancient world. Rather, diversity was common. As Riggs notes, the presence of democracy and nationalism in the modern world (along with industrialism) create conditions which not only foment cleavages, but promote violent ethnonationalist movements when democratic means can not achieve sufficient autonomy.

Before turning the conclusions that may be drawn from this discussion, I want to comment on two puzzles it raises, but does not solve.

TWO PUZZLES:

As alluded to earlier, this analysis of polyethnicity or pluralism generates two puzzles: (1) why the ideal of ethnic homogeneity emerged and flourished in the 18th and 19th centuries; and (2) why ethnic conflict is becoming so common in the late 20th century?

1. WHY EQUATE STATES WITH ETHNIC HOMOGENEITY?

McNeill's answer is again rooted in ancient history, and partially instructive. Early Rome and Athens, were, indeed ethnically homogeneous. But as they grew they became more diverse. Writers from that transitional period saw this as a problem and wrote nostalgically about the glorious (presumably ethnically pure) past. In the late middle ages northern Europeans thinkers were reading these ancients and presumed this was the way to greatness.

John Bartlett in the Making of Europe (1993) argues that Norman culture of knighthood spread throughout the western end of the Eurasian land mass, creating the idea, and the actuality of Europe as a distinctive region. The highly variegated terrain of western Eurasia favored smaller, and hence more homogeneous states. Thus, the intellectuals reading the ancients found themselves in much the same situation the ancient writers. They lived in recently homogeneous states which were becoming diverse.

Increasing communication and trade created pressure for developing standardized languages and uniform practices. The world wide burst in population growth in the mid 18th century made it easier for cities to recruit workers from the same ethnic group. This facilitated the development of national languages, made an ideal of ethnic homogeneity seem feasible.

The key in both McNeill's and my own view was the growing need for larger armies. As the need for infantry grew, state elites had to devise a way of recruiting larger numbers without raising the dangers inherent in arming peasants. The boon of citizenship proved to be the answer. Citizenship, however, carried with it a right to participation (democracy in some form) further heightened pressures for cultural uniformity.

This is far from a sufficient explanation for the rise of the ideal of the ethnically homogeous state. There is much more to it. Fred Riggs, I think, has made important contributions to understanding the rise of this ideal (1994, 1997a, 1997b), but more remains to be done.

2. Why the Rise in Ethnic Conflict?

McNeill claims the ideal of the ethnically pure state began to erode around the time of World War I. He attributes this to the waves of decolonization and the realization by imperial powers that ethnic homogeneity was neither possible nor necessary.

This account of the rise and demise of ethnically homogeneous nationalism is far from satisfactory. But to explicate it fully would take far more time and space than is appropriate here. Clearly though, as the Bosnian example shows, ethnonationalism remains a convenient ideology for rationalizing seizure of power and property. That is, the ideal of ethnically homogeneous states can be marshalled for other political causes. Be that as it may, we can conclude with McNeill (1986:36) that:

"The accelerated mingling of diverse peoples within state boundaries that we everywhere witness in our own time, and specifically since World War I, is therefore a return to normal as far as western European nations are concerned."

Though agree that recent increases in ethnic conflict are a return to "normal," this does not fully explain the timing of the rise.

I will leave aside the puzzles of why the chimera of ethnically homogeneous states persists, despite its obvious everyday empirical contradictions, and the timing of the resurgence of ethic conflict. I turn to the conclusions that emerge from the analysis of ancient states and world-systems.

CONCLUSIONS:

The first, and possibly most important conclusion is that ethnically homogeneous states have been rare since the first formation of states. When they do occur they are peculiar accidents of history, or brief phases on the way to ethnic diversity. This not only reframes our problem from why so much ethnic unrest today, to why should anyone have seriously have expected otherwise, but also suggests radical changes in policies regarding ethnicity. Chief is that we should continue to criticize the drive for ethnic purity as fundamentally unnecessary, in Bosnia, Rwanda, Canada, the United States, and everywhere else. Furthermore, there is no real need for assimilationist policies. Pluralism is not only possible, but preferable. However, this does not give any guidelines for making pluralism workable.

Second, there are many criteria by which groups have been distinguished. These criteria rise and fall in salience with world-systemic changes. Key differences follow the four world-system boundaries: bulk goods networks, political-military networks, prestige goods networks, and information networks. Hence there are different incorporation processes, or trajectories of incorporation, as well as varying degrees of incorporation along each of these boundaries. All give rise to different kinds of ethnic minorities. In the modern world-system, as these four boundaries have come to coincide, the mechanisms which generate ethnic groups have changed. Whether they have become fewer remains unclear. That they are different, however, is inescapable.

Third, ethnic phenomena and relations can not be understood solely by reference to local processes, but must always studied within their broader national and international contexts. This is true for both ancient and modern instances. Yet those contexts, are themselves, significantly different in the ancient and modern worlds. Thus lessons from the premodern passed must be used with caution.

Fourth, world-systems, as well as states, create diversity. More often they transform it, primarily, but not exclusively by incorporation. The processes are part and parcel of the normal functioning of states and world-systems. Thus, ethnic diversity is normal.

Fifth, ethnicity has always been somewhat fluid with respect to identity, boundaries, cultural content, and membership. It changes through time. It is impermanent.

Sixth, a major difference between the modern world and the ancient world is volume and velocity of ethnic processes and the pervasiveness of states. In short, while a primordialist approach may have made sense in many ancient world contexts, it very seldom does in the modern world. Phrased alternatively, the very nature of ethnicity has changed in the modern world. This is precisely why there is so much confusion and contention about what it is and means, and why it subject to so much postmodern deconstruction and reconstruction.

Seventh, in the case of nonstate societies, and even some states, incorporation into a world-system, or even a state, transforms formerly autonomous social organizations into sub-parts of a larger whole. That is, "tribes" become minority groups.

Eighth, the drive for sovereignty by such groups is an attempt to regain that autonomy. Formerly nonstate societies have been especially adept at manipulating the concept of sovereignty to their own advantage. As Franke Wilmer (1993) observes, to deny their claims to sovereignty is to deny validity of the concept of sovereignty itself.

Ninth, the processes creating ethnic conflicts are part and parcel of modernity. That is, not only did modernization theory err in predicting the demise of ethnicity (and status markers generally), if failed utterly to understand that modernity creates such ethnic conflicts. As Fred Riggs has put it (1997a, 1997b) modernity has its downsides, ethnic conflict being a major one. I would amend his argument only slightly to note (as in the third point) this downside of modernity is a property of the world-system, not of states. Thus, explanations of its workings must attend the forces driving world-system evolution.

Finally, the pursuit of ethnic homogeneity is chimera, often used to justify pursuit of other goals, like wealth and power. It is a rationalization. Like all rationalizations, it works better if there is some plausible factual basis upon which it might draw. Thus, the policy recommendations listed under the first item above. In terms of praxis, it is high time that the concept of the ethnically pure state be constantly and harshly criticized. This, however, does not mean that claims for equal treatment should be ignored. Rather, it means that the task at hand for social scientist, politicians, and citizens is to devise ways in which states and societies may function while differences are supported and even celebrated. This, to be sure, is a daunting task.

NOTES