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82 P. F. Lazarsfeld
a modern form of economic organization, they will revert to their feudal past.
Their transitional character is due to a number of contradictions. One set of
contradictions arises from the ruler’s policies, directed against some strata of
the population while favouring others. Another set centers on the fact that the
bureaucratic organs developed special orientations and interests of their own
which often contradicted the interests of the rulers. Two areas in which contradictions
were most pronounced were those of legitimation and stratification in
which the new middle groups, unable to free themselves from traditional symbols,
simply aristocratized themselves. Further, within the economic and administrative
field, there was the opposition between long-range and short-range policies.
Together with the growing trends towards an autonomous bureaucracy
which played a central regulative function in these systems, these contradictions
laid the foundations for an ‘anti-system’ denoting the built-in tendency to
change.
Runciman’s study echoes the sociologists’ interest in the segmentation of
systems. The term really has two meanings. In one, it refers to the study of
special groups within a population; indeed, the comparison of manual and nonmanual
workers is a cornerstone in Runciman’s book. Recent work in studies
of the elite deal with segments in this sense.16
But sociologists are also concerned with a second meaning of the term segmentation;
they speak of the political, the economic, the spiritual subsystems. A
person can have much power and little money or wealth without power. It was
Max Weber who proposed distinguishing between income, prestige, and political
power. While often united, they may vary independently. The idea itself
appears in many forms. The most influential modern version is Thomas Marshall’s
study on the development of citizenship in England. According to this
author, civil rights emerge first in the frame of incipient capitalism. To preserve
these rights, courts are established with seats far away from the local communities.
The way in which the courts operate is a political problem, and so, the
fight for political rights comes next. Social rights develop partly as a result of
education, partly through the instrumentation of political and civil rights.
Marshall’s essay is probably one of the most often quoted items in macrosociological
literature.
The example taken from Lipset is a special case of a third sociological concern:
the role of values in the working of a social system. People feel that certain
goals and certain ways to act are right; these values then become determinants of
their choices and their relations to each other. It is certainly not quite clear
how the coercive role of values develops. There is agreement that it has its origin
in the socialization of the child. But it can be maintained in a variety of ways:
by fear of sanctions, by imitation of others, by a super-ego, etc.’7 Despite this
ideological uncertainty, values play a considerable role in many macrosociological
studies. As one further example I choose Lucian Pyz’s discussion of politics
in Burma, I cannot do justice to the breadth of his analysis, and quote only one
item because it refers to a linguistic use.
Pye discusses two values in detail. One connotes the notion of leadership
powerfully exercised. In Burma, all strata consider this highly desirable;