NOTES FROM Ames, K.M. 1995. Chiefly Power and Household Production on the Northwest Coast.in Price, T.D. and G.M. Feinman; The Foundations of Social Inequality.
Plenum Press:155-187
Cameron M. Smith, February 1998, Dept. of Archaeology
Simon Fraser University, CanadaInequalities have always existed in human societies, at least on the level of individual relationships. Why and how do permanent elites grow from this seedbed? There are two classes of materialist answers: ELITE as MANAGER and ELITE as THUG. These represent Haas' 'integrationist' and 'conflict' schools of thought, respectively.
- ELITE as MANAGER: Elites arise from needs of complex division of labour for coordination of tasks, task groups, and information flow. In Service's (1975) classic formulation, emerging elites manage regional specialization in production through redistribution, leading to the formation of chiefdoms. It is clear, however, that chiefs may do little or no redistribution. The elite-as-manager model is not currently very widely accepted.
- ELITE as THUG: Elites arise from some group which manages to gain control of production and labour. Elites gain control and reproduce their ranks out of their own self-interest. They do not arise from societal need to coordinate anything: they may do that, but it is not how they come to exist.
Hayden (this volume 1995) describes societies in which control over production is indirect and fluid, based ultimately on the ability of individuals to manipulate the production of others through debt and contract. In his model, these situations arise, ultimately, where rich environments or higly productive economies permit. The central question becomes what are the circumstances in which inequality...becomes institutionalized and persists regardless of production levels and other social and economic changes?. On the NWC, some form of status distinction for at least 4,000 years, and elites for at least 3,000 years. The elite developed in concert with significant social and economic changes. Explanations for this evolution:
- Schalk (1977), Ames (1981): complex task organization requited for taking and preserving salmon, coupled with need to perform other subsistence tasks simultaneously, required management leading to the evolution of the elite.
- Matson (1983) and Coupland (1988): elite developed from control of resources, either as consequence of resource ownership (Matson) or out or conflict over control (Coupland).
- Arnold (1992): (in California): chiefs arose through the control of specialized production.
Because the NWC peoples of the 19th and 18th CAD are the worlds' best examples of complex hunter-gatherers, understanding of them is crucial to anthropology. In addition to being hunter-gatherers, the NWC socieiteis are examples of stratification in the absence of larger polities. The household was the polity on the NWC. This chapter argues that the evolution of social class on the NWC cannot be understood apart from the evolution of household economy on the NWC. The NWC elite were financed by households as instruments of production. THe elite, however, played out their roles on household, village and regional scales. This chapter considers cultural evolution a spatial as well as temporal process. It also asks why there was not more intense stratification, as seen in Hawaii. POWER
Power to derives from informal office
Power over derives from coersion of subordinates.
Power over usually comes with power to, but the reverse is not always true. Hastorff refines: power to organize and power over organization.
Four scales of power (Wolf 1990):
- personal,
- singular interpersonal,
- multiple interpersonal (e.g. tactical, organizational),
- structural interpersonal (e.g. social labour allocation).
MY VIEW: Ultimately, power is about the ability to constrain options and to impose such constraints upon others. Power may also be derived through a reward system but the reward system seems to be based on a cache of 'importance' on the side of the giver (must have something to give in the first place); thus, power derived of reward likely follows power derived as constraint imposition.
EMBEDDED SPECIALISTS
Specialists have been seen as (a) attached (e.g. contractually bound) to elites, (b) independent (e.g. working for an unspecified demand group) or (c) institutionalized (e.g. cloistered work beasts as in Costin's Inka weaver example. None of these concepts are adequate for the NWS specialists. NWC elites may have both contributed to and controlled production as specialists in the making of important items such as masks and houses. EMBEDDED SPECIALISTS are full- or part-time specialists whose vocation is a part of the household or local economy, and the specialist's activity is integral to the functioning of that economy. Performance is part of the individual's social role defined not just in terms of society or economy, but also in terms of kinship. These specialists are neither contractually bound, nor do they work for an unspecified 'demand crowd', or as work beasts for a state power; these may be members of the elite, and making particular elite goods is part of their 'power to' and 'power over'. On the Northwest Coast, Ames argues that elites had POWER TO but not POWER OVER. THE NORTHWEST COAST MODE OF PRODUCTION
Scale, Social Divisions and Labour (Means of Production)
On the NWC, the household was the smallest social unit, consisting of an extended family. Multiple households lived in plankhouse dwellings. Rectangular dwellings of this scale appear on the NWC between 2,800 -- 3,200 BP, on the Oregon Coast and in Northern BC, respectively. Groups of plankhouses formed villages of populations large enough to be biologically self-sufficient, from 180-500 individuals. In some ways, the sum of households within a physical plankhouse or even sev eral plankhouses may be seen as the household. Production, consumption, distribution (transmission) and reproduction all occured on the scale of the household, here meaning the groups of households occupying a plankhouse dwelling. A gender-based division of labour emphasized independent cooperation by both genders directed to a common end. Slave labour was important. There is some important degree of economic specialization compared to many hunter-gatherers.
Resources and Processing (Items and Materials of Production) A critical resource was salmon because it was stored readily and occurred predictably and in abundance. Secondary sources (e.g. sturgeon, clam, wappato) and regional variation are important. Though local groups were generally sedentary or semisedentary, movement due to seasonal rounds were complex. Resources and resource patches were owned, but ownership patterns varied. Preservation and storage of many resources was very important. The short shelf life of stored salmon (c. 6 months) was an important constraint on spring subsistence practices. Creation of wealth was ultimately dependent on producing food surpluses, though wealth took forms other than food. Redistribution by potlatch was important and there was a strong ethos against hoarding. Regional trade was important.
Ownership (Social Relations of Production) Households occupied one or more plankhouses, ranging in population from 80-150 individuals. Households owned estates of corporeal and noncorporeal property. In this chapter, estate-holding households, are termed Houses with a capital H. Corporeal property included resource localities, the ground on which dwellings were built, the dwellings themselves and the processef food and wealth produced by the household [including slaves]. Noncorporeal property included the rights to resource locales, rights to songs and ritual performances and the rights to particular animal helpers and spirit beings. Noncorporeal property is commonly termed 'privelege'. In theory, household members had equal access to household property.
SOCIAL STRATIFICATION on the NORTHWEST COAST
Minimally, there were on the Northwest coast two social classes: the Free and the Slave. For example, among the Coast Tsimshan, the following divisions obtained:
TITLE MEMBERSHIP CRITERION EXAMPLE Real People Holding large amounts of titles and rights. Chiefly families. Other People Holding some titles and rights. Titleholders with less titles and rights than Real People. Often this class contained 'specialists'. Unhealed People Free people, but without any titles or property rights. Free people (commoner class). Slave Captured extra-local individual engaged in forced servitude. Any slave. In addition, each social class carries a rank of 'purity', from maximally pure (real people, elites) to least pure (slaves). Distinctions between classes was normally maintained by marriage within classes and the rule that children of a marriage inherited a rank no higher than thar of the lower-ranked parent. [e.g. a caste system]. While details varied, such was the general state of social organization on the coast, at least in the 18th and 19th CAD.
SCALE is quite important -- at the House level, distinction between the elite and other free peoples were not always clear-cut; free people were ranked rather than strictly stratified. At the village and region level, elite become more evident and polarized.
Stratification levels crosscut kin groups, households, towns, regions and species. Chiefs of Salmon and Bear people were much more powerful (conceptually) than human chiefs. Details of how the chiefs became chiefs vary, as do distinctions between social strata; still it remains clear that social stratification was in place and an important part of precontact aboriginal life on the NWC.
Technically, NWC society was RANKED rather than STRATIFIED because of the existence of slaves (Fried 1967). Donald (1985) calls the NWC 'class-divided', in which class is present and important but does not dominate or determine all social relationships. Donald (1985) defines class:
'Class is present in a society when significant segments of that society have relatively permanent diferential access to resources and/or power. In addition, a class must be capable of reproducting itself biologically. This precludes gender or age categories from being regarded as classes.'On the NWC, kin group affiliation was the source of primary social identity, rather than class. The heirarchy of identity might then be:
Clan (Village)
House (single or multiple dwellings = one productive House)
Extended Family (kin group within House)
Social Class
Individual NameGENERATION and MAINTENENCE of HOUSE STATURE
The success, wealth, prestige and long-term strength of a House depended on the productivity of its estate and the number of members it posessed. Thus, Houses sought to increase thier titles and rights andincrease their physical membership. Physical membership could be increased by the acquisition of slaves. Right and title increase could be achieved by coerced or forced title ownership from neighbouring groups. The potlatch was one mechanism of House size increase, redistributing populations according to the charisma and productivity displayed by chiefs in representing their Houses.
Slaves were both labour and wealth; their labour could be used to produce wealth, but they could also be traded as valued material 'items' to obtain other wealth. Slave raids may be seen as conversion of free people (of other groups) into wealth (of raiding groups).
A HISTORY OF NORTHWEST COAST STATUS DISTINCTIONS
Burial evidence primarily used here.
1,500-5,000 BP, inhumation was a burial practice (among others) on the NWC. Grave goods and lip plugs are the main identifiers of status in archaeological remnants of these inhumations. Labrets: worn only by high-status women in NWC in contact period and to some restricted set of people for 4,000 years. Gender and region of origin are two major dimesions structuring status on the coast. At least 2 major changes of status definition have appeared on the coast in the past 5,000 years.
LABRETS: these leave indelible tooth wear and are thus easily recognized skeletally, indicating attributes of the living individual rather than the postmortem treatment of that individual. Many are broken in grave contexts, perhaps ritually. Appear >3,500 BP at Pender Island (Vancouver) and Blue Jackets Creek (Haida Gwaii). Appears that while both men and women could wear labrets at this time, only a restricted number of males and females had access to labrets. After 3,500 BP, a divergence in labret wear in S and N coasts. In the N from 1.500 - 3,000 BP, more labrets worn by males. After 1,500 BP, labrets worn by females. In the S, between 2,000 - 3,500 BP, worn by males and females, but from 2,000 BP on, labrets generally disappear and are replaced by cranial deformation by free males and females of whatever class (e.g. elite or commoner). SO, for 4,000 years on the NWC, it was important to distinguish certain individuals in a very direct manner; either by cranial deformation or by labret wear. Gender and geographical region may also be identified by these methods.
GRAVE GOODS: While grave items of >3,500 BP are mostly items use in daily contexts, at Pender Island (Carlson 1991) burials contained horn spoons carved with zoomorphic motifs at c. >4,000BP. After 2,500 BP, grave goods are widespread on the NWC. Necklaces, chopped stone burial blades, copper beads, dentalium, bone blades and so on are common grave goods. There are significant problems with burial data for this period, however, due to different practices (inhumation, cremation, canoe burials), sampling and so on. Still, other evidence of some stratification is probably seen in elaborate goods such as trophy skulls, dog burials, the use of sea otter teeth as studs on boxes, and so on. What is most clear is that between 3,500 - 1,500 BP, grave goods are seen to be differentiated in quanitity and quality. In the South, no apparent gender differentiation of grave goods in this period; but in the North, more males are buried and more of these have grave goods than females. After c. 1,500 BP, across the coast, interrments seem to vanish.
SLAVERY: The evidence for the antiquity of slavery is ambiguous. Historically, slaves were disposed of casually, e.g. dragged to a forest or tossed into the surf. At Rupert, BC, there is evidence for decapitation of middle-aged females and the deposit of other individuals in 'unconventional' (extended as opposed to conventionally flexed) burial postures at c. 3.500 BP. On the S coast, scalped skeletons are seen at >2,200 BP.
CONTEMPORARY EVENTS:
1. The widespread presence of wealthy graves by 2,500 BP is somewhat later than evidence for several major developments on the coast:
- development of heavy reliance on stored salmon
- appearance of plankhouse villages
- warfare in the North.
2. Expansion of warfare and and shifting tribal distributions in the N (and probably the S as well) between 1,000 - 2,000 BP, possibly accompanied by appearance of the rectangular plankhouse.
THE POWER AND FUNCTIONS OF NORTHWEST COAST CHIEFS
On the NWC, House chief was the basic elite office. All chiefs were House chiefs, regardless of what other offices they might have held. House chiefs were usually drawn from the ranks of the exatant elites. Individuals could form new houses. There were several scales of chiefs: In the case of local confederacies, the highest ranked chief of all confederation units (villages) was confederate chief. There were also Great Chiefs, individuals of remarkable stature and charisma who could organize large raids, command tribute or have influence over several villages. This appears to be an anthropological term not used by aboriginals. Some feel that Great Chiefs were a result of the fur trade, while others feel they existed previously at least among the Haida and Tsimshan. The more famous Great Chiefs are Maquinna of the Nuuchalnulth (e.g. Friendly Bay, W Vancouver Island) and Legax of the Coast Tsimshan. Maquinna may have had control over 10,000 people, in one form or another. Both chiefs dominated trade in their respective areas.
House chiefs managed their House estates with INSTRUMENTAL and EXPRESSIVE power over physical and nonmaterial assets of the House, respectively. An important role of the House Chief was to control access to resource patches by extra-House groups; permission was almost always granted, for which tribute was a common payment. Chiefs also decided on the timing of resource patch use, declaring certain locales open or closed; they also managed the movement of people seasonally. Chiefs also organized raids and wars.
There was either variation along the coast in how much power Chiefs had with respect to their House materials and immaterial righs, or variation in how such was ethnographically observed and recorded. While a chief may have managed the estate, the estate utlimately probably belonged to the House. On the other hand, among the Nuuchalnulth, titles and property were the sole property of chiefs. In addition, what was owned in a particular patch varied: some considered all items in a patch to be theirs by title, other considered only key resources in a given patch.
The exact nature of title and resource OWNERSHIP is not clear, though it is clear that Houses were aligned with certain resource patches and that Chiefs often controlled access to these patches.
Expressive power involved crest display, song performance, dance and narrative and the invocation of spirit power. Chiefs were responsible for the spiritual well-being of their Houses, and while they could be shamans, they were not necessarily shamans. Chiefs managed and represented their House at potlatches.
Chiefs also had House councils and commonly sought advice.
Despite their considerable potential for interpersonal power, 'respect' received by chiefs could vary considerably and they had little direct control over the individual. The Tlingit paid little attention to chiefs in daily life. SO, the NWC Chiefs appear powerful, but what is their real power?. House chiefs had the power to wage war, conduct trade, organize resource patch use and display the House wealth. However, there seems little evidence that they had power over any one or any House, directly. Chiefs could organize but not directly manipulate or command. Only in the case of Chinook (siezing food from slaves by elites) can Ames find an example of direct power over, and in this case Ray (1938) considers Chinookan chiefs more powerful than any others on the NWC.
Slaves
Chiefs owned slaves, who served as both an eminently malleable work force and a durable, mobile element of material wealth. Slave labour provided the wealth on which Chiefly power could be built. Slaves did not exist socially and were thus non-gendered, and all slaves did all sorts of work.
The Spatial Scale of Chiefly Power
The instrumental base of Chiefly power was that of the House estate. Power was ultimately dervied of a rich and productive household with a large population of producers.
As mentioned above, the fundamental social unit was the Household, however when interacting with extralocals, the Village (grouping of Houses) was considered the fundamental unit. Houses and Chiefs were linked through potlatch and marriage to other Houses scattered on the coast. The North and South coasts probably estimate real interaction spheres. While there were long-distance ties, the House reamined the main political unit.
SUMMARY OF CHIEFLY POWER
Chiefs were firmly rooted in their households or territories, and all chiefs were first and foremost House chiefs. The prestige of a House and Chief were dependent on:CHIEFS, HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION and EMBEDDED SPECIALISTS
- resource productivity (which relied to a large extent on the products of slave labour),
- social and trade ties to other Houses,
- ownership and control of titles to resource patches.
Chiefs had tremendous power to but little power over, except in the case of slaves. In this case, Chiefs had ultimate power of life and death, and thereby directly controlled a population of workers for any task; such control could bring material wealth leading to respect, influence and power. Chiefly power was constrained, however, by council and the possibility of fission (new House establishment).
CHIEFLY LABOUR
There are few good data on the exact role of Chiefss and the elite in daily productive activities, such as hunting, fishing and so on. (e.g. Tlingit chiefs were not suppposed to do this sort of activity, though there is evidence that Nuuchalnulth chiefs both did and did not participate in whale hunting on an economic scale. Boas states that Tsimshan elites should be experts in all activities, and princes in hunting particularly. Possibly the Coast Salish chiefs took part in daily production...if they felt like it....and so on.).
SLAVES
Slave labour was directly controlled in the only distinct expression of power over on the NWC. The products of slave labour were House property but could be appropriated by the elite. Proportion of slaves per House varies from 2% - 30%. Being socially stripped, slaves could be used for any task (they were nongendered) and may have served as a solution to labour bottlenects, e.g. massive salmon harvests as tasks requiring complex simultaneous action.
SPECIALISTS
Embedded specialists worked at tasks economically and socially necessary for household reproduction. Specialists appear to have been aligned with houses by birth, with their trade inherited. They could be a part of the chiefly elite and could hold titles. When they were part of the elite class, they produced elite goods not as contracted to elites but as a role of the elite.
Specialist activities are poorly documented but included: Wood Carver, Wood Worker, Painter, Canoe-Maker, Plank Maker, Mask Carver.
Specialists were also hired on contract basis and during this period lived in the household of the hiring elite. High-status carvers could control their own destiny, interacting with elites and Chiefs as equals.
GENDER
Both men and women could hold high rank and wield Chiefly power. For at least 2,500 years, gender was an important variable of status. The products of women's labour was central to household consumption and trade/exchange.
THE ROLE OF CHIEFS and ELITES in HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION: Archaeological Record
HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTION
The following sites are considered here: Tuadlad Altu and Sbabadid (near Seattle), Meier (Portland) and Ozette (Oly. peninsula).
Sbabadid: 1790-1825 AD plankhouse, artifact distributions suggest harpooner within the house; also evidence for working of copper, bone and lithics. [but keep in mind the problems with Chatters' analysis there; that harpooner is doubtful I think].
Ozeyte: c.1750 AD plankhouses, well perserved. Food distinctions between higher and lower status houses, less work in high-status, harpooning by high-status, feasting (?) by high status.
Meier: c.1400 - 1830 AD plankhouse, bulk food processing in the S, elite in the N. Elite controlled the means of production (e.g. guns, nets, metal tools) to some extent. Some wood carving in N as well, probably.
Tualdad Altu: 1600 - 1500 BP. Subsistence and fabrication tool distinction between ends of house indicating differences in labour between areas, suggesting specialization in mammalian predator and sea mammal hunting, and net making.
SPECIALIZATION
Copper items from >2000 BP at Rupert may be earliest evidence for specialized production. At c.4000 BP, a zoomorphic wood-carving handle is seen in the NWC. At Pender Island, zoomorphic spoons are probably the result of specialized labour (>4000 BP). Stone adzes indicate woodworking specialization at least to 3500 BP. By 2200 BP, large freight canoes, suggesting specialization, certainly existed.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
NWC Chiefs (at least in 19th CAD) had considerable power to but limited power over, except in the case of slave labour, which provided much of the material wealth that led to influence and respect as a Chief. Power was based on such wealth, processed and stored in the physical plankhouse, as well as on trade relations with other polities. Power was balanced by council and the possibility of fission. Titleholders may have had tactical power in control over specialist production. Specialist production could include items of material wealth (e.g. canoe) as well as items of immaterial wealth (e.g. mask, ceremonial screen). With the House as the primary instrument of production, consumption, polity and identity, Chiefly power was primarily restricted to Houses, although Chiefs represented their Houses at potlatch. Potlatch redistributed populations, primarily, from one House to another, based on the charisma and reputation of a given Chief. Thre elite may have monopolized certain skills critical to social and economic reproduction, such as mask and canoe production.
NWC Chiefs faces a contradiction: on the one hand, their position depended on their ability to efficiently and productively manage the physical resources of the House (the estate) and to coerce the household population to do what Chiefs wanted them to do. On the other hand, their position depended on a steady supply of slave labour; it is this contradiction, as well as that of the scale of power (House and Village) that generates competing views of NWC Chiefs as managers or thugs.
Chiefs had power to organize and influence, but except in the case of slaves, no power over. The potential to fission was an important counter to power, as was council. Elite power was limited, primarily, to House or Village. The main constraint on this power -- the reason that more inclusive polities did not occur -- is likely found in scale: while populations (e.g. Chinook) often lived in circumscribed areas (e.g. Wapato Valley), Chiefs attempting to operate regionally would face enormous problems of communication and effective control.
Elites appear to have been in place on the Coast for at least 2,500 - 3,000 years, and their origins likely lie in the formation of large, permanent households around 3,000-3,500 BP. Ames feels the original elite were direct descendants of the House founders, people who give the House cross-generational continuity.
The use of slaves may have evolved as a method of overcoming the problems faced by ambitious elites who could not generate wealth without power over some productive population.
The evolution of inequality on the NWC can only be understood at several interacting scales. The scale of household is fundamental, but so too are the scales of village and region and lineage tie. Social, political and economic interaction scales are crucial as well. The NWC lacked stratified polities. The development of polities in the NWC would have required a simultaneous reorganisation of household and regional social and political economies by a preexisting elite. Such changes would have occurred swiftly, rather than over the long-term. A materialist approach to the evolution of inequality must account for why such transitions occur, succceed and/or fail.
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