The Development of Political Anthropology

Political anthropology is a field that demands attention and precision. Modern political anthropology started in the 1940s with the research into the political histories of several foreign countries.

Beginnings of Political Anthropology

According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, the roots of political anthropology can be traced back to Montesquieu and Alexis de Tocqueville. These 18th and 19th century experts in politics and the law saw politics and government as constructions of the cultural atmosphere.

Of course, while there are many connections between politics and culture, the concept of divine right can be viewed as an example of this idea. People in certain cultures believed that monarchs ruled because they had a God given right to do so. This principles remained in society for quite awhile, but then started to dissolve.

Political Anthropology in the 20th Century

The birth of modern political anthropology is not really have said to start until the 1940s. Several studies occurred during this time that led to the establishment of political anthropology as it is known today. The Encyclopedia Britannica lists the following publications as the roots for the field today.

• African Political Systems
• Political Systems of Highland Burma
• Government in Zazzau

African Political Systems looks to the political and tribal systems of past times in Africa as a meanings for explaining certain political and cultural constructions and actions. This study-and others in the field-do not look to the world in a vacuum.

As anthropology progressed into the 20th century as a field, people began looking outside their own societies. For example, in African Political Systems, the researchers looked to see how what they found in Africa could be applied to other political systems. Such a process reaches to the heart of anthropology, which is to discover why various societies have such similar components to them.

Social Connections

While the Political Systems of Highland Burma is often regarded as a social anthropological investment, the very fact that the title contains the word "political" tells us that people were starting to understand cross disciplinary connections. When a political system is based on a hierarchy, understanding the ways in which social class and standing feeds into that hierarchy is absolutely crucial.

Wikipedia.org defines political anthropology as the study "that concerns the structure of political systems, looked at from the basis of the structure of societies." Therefore, clearly, the implication that politics and the social arena are connected is implied in the very definition of political anthropology.

Political Anthropology Today

As you have seen from this history of political anthropology, other components of life come into play when specialists are discussing the political arenas. As this field has developed, that statement has become even more pertinent and true. Researchers have begun looking even more into the cultural and the ethnic components of political structures, because after all, the differences between ethnicities are a political structure in and of themselves.

The different fields of anthropology are distinct, certainly, as they place a focus on various parts of the human experience and history. However, they also work together to form a complete picture of the complex relationships amongst people across time and space.