作茧自缚

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• 我们将国家视为一个官僚体系的机构，其官员在计税和征税（谷物、劳役或实物）方面具备专业分层，并对一名或数名统治者负责。我们认为国家是一个能在相当复杂的、分层的、等级化社会中行使行政权力的组织，而且该社会具有显著的劳力分工现象（纺织工、手工艺匠、祭师、金属工、文员、士兵、农民）。有些人会采用更严格的标准：国家应该拥有一支军队、防御围墙、一个宏伟的仪典中心或宫殿，也许再加上一位国王或女王。 ……在这些特征中，我建议特别重视领土和专业化的国家机器：城墙、赋税制度以及官僚体系。 (查看原文)

  沙皮狗 3赞 2020-07-18 22:38:23

• Why, however, should cereal grains play such a massive role in the earliest states? After all, other crops, in particular legumes such as lentils, chickpeas, and peas, had been domesticated in the Middle East and, in China, taro and soybean. Why were they not the basis of state formation? More broadly, why have no 'lentil states', chickpea states, taro states, sago states, breadfruit states, yam states, cassava states, potato states, peanut states, or banana states appeared in the historical record? ... The key to the nexus between grains and states lies, I believe, in the fact that only the cereal grains and serve as a basis for taxation: visible, divisible, assessable, storable, transportable and ‘rationable’. Other crops – legumes, tubers, and starch plants – have some of these desirabl... (查看原文)

  lowai 2赞 2018-03-04 10:25:36

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