Bondarenko Dmitri M. Homoarchy

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III
Was There Benin Bureaucracy?
1. Weber’s theory vs. Benin realities
So, it looks reasonable to examine the list of the bureaucrats’ characteristic
features Max Weber singled out. Do they fit titled chiefs – administrators of
the 13 th – 19 th centuries Benin Kingdom? 20 (See also Bondarenko 2001: 212–
250; 2002; 2005b). Weber (1947/1922: 333–334) wrote about bureaucrats:
(1) They are personally free and subject to authority only
with respect to their impersonal official obligations;
(2) They are organized in a clearly defined hierarchy of
offices; (3) Each office has a clearly defined sphere of
competence in the legal sense; (4) The office is filled by a
free contractual relationship. Thus, in principle, there is
free selection; (5) Candidates… are appointed, not
elected; (6) They are remunerated by fixed salaries…
(7) The office is treated as a sole, or at least the primary,
occupation of the incumbent; (8) It constitutes a career...
(9) The official works entirely separated from ownership
of the means of administration and without appropriation
of his position; (10) He is subject to strict and systematic
discipline and control in the conduct of the office.
Are there any grounds to regard Benin titled chiefs bureaucrats, i.e.,
professional administrators? 21
The administrative system of the Kingdom formed in its most
important features during the 13 th – mid-15 th centuries and remained basically
the same till the end of the country’s independence (introduction of the title of
Queen Mother – Iyoba in the 16 th century may be recognized as the only
important innovation in this sphere of the subsequent period). From the mid-
15 th century on, mostly a redistribution of functions and amount of power
between the supreme ruler and titled chiefs, on the one hand, and among
different categories of the chiefs, on the other hand, was taking place.
Every titled chief in Benin belonged to one of two broad categories:
his title was either hereditary (what is impossible if he is really a bureaucrat –
see Weber’s point 9) or not. There were rather few hereditary titles in the
Kingdom: those of the most aristocratic title-holders congregation members –
the Uzama N’Ihinron (the “kingmakers”), ranked highest among all the chiefs