How did empires rule different peoples across vast expanses of space and time? And how did small numbers of imperial bureaucrats govern large numbers of subordinated peoples? Empires and Bureaucracy in World History seeks answers to these fundamental problems in imperial studies by exploring the power and limits of bureaucracy. The book is pioneering in bringing together historians of antiquity and the Middle Ages with scholars of post-medieval European empires, while a genuinely world-historical perspective is provided by chapters on China, the Incas and the Ottomans. The editors identify a paradox in how bureaucracy operated on the scale of empires and so help explain why some empires endured for centuries while, in the contemporary world, empires fail almost before they begin. By adopting a cross-chronological and world-historical approach, the book challenges the abiding association of bureaucratic rationality with 'modernity' and the so-called 'Rise of the West'.
Author(s): Peter Crooks; Timothy H. Parsons
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2016
01.0_pp_i_iv_Frontmatter
02.0_pp_v_vii_Contents
03.0_pp_viii_viii_List_of_Figures
04.0_pp_ix_ix_List_of_Maps
05.0_pp_x_x_List_of_Tables
06.0_pp_xi_xii_List_of_Contributors
07.0_pp_xiii_xvi_Preface
08.0_pp_xvii_xxii_List_of_Abbreviations
09.0_pp_1_2_Introduction
09.1_pp_3_28_Empires_Bureaucracy_and_the_Paradox_of_Power
10.0_pp_29_30_Empires_and_Bureaucracy_in_World-Historical_Perspective
10.1_pp_31_53_China_as_a_Contrasting_Case_Bureaucracy_and_Empire_in_Song_China
10.2_pp_54_80_Conflict_and_Cooperation_between_Arab_Rulers_and_Persian_Administrators_in_the_Formative_Period_of_I
10.3_pp_81_101_Bureaucracy_without_Alphabetic_Writing_Governing_the_Inca_Empire_c14381532
10.4_pp_102_126_The_Ottoman_Empire_12991923_The_Bureaucratization_of_Patrimonial_Authority
11.0_pp_127_128_From_Late_Antiquity_to_the_Middle_Ages
11.1_pp_129_146_The_Late_Roman_Empire_Was_before_All_Things_a_Bureaucratic_State
11.2_pp_147_169_Bureaucracies_Elites_and_Clans_The_Case_of_Byzantium_c6001100
11.3_pp_170_196_Charlemagne_and_Carolingian_Military_Administration
11.4_pp_197_220_Bureaucracy_the_English_State_and_the_Crisis_of_the_Angevin_Empire_11991205
11.5_pp_221_249_The_Parchment_Imperialists_Texts_Scribes_and_the_Medieval_Western_Empire_c1250c1440
11.6_pp_250_288_Before_Humpty_Dumpty_The_First_English_Empire_and_the_Brittleness_of_Bureaucracy_12591453
12.0_pp_289_290_From_the_Age_of_European_Expansion_to_the_End_of_Empires
12.1_pp_291_317_Magistrates_to_Administrators_Composite_Monarchy_to_Fiscal-Military_Empire_Empire_and_Bureaucracy_in
12.2_pp_318_343_Britains_Overseas_Empire_before_1780_Overwhelmingly_Successful_and_Bureaucratically_Challenged
12.3_pp_344_363_Les_Enfants_du_Siecle_An_Empire_of_Young_Professionals_and_the_Creation_of_a_Bureaucratic_Imperial_E
12.4_pp_364_390_Bureaucracy_Power_and_Violence_in_Colonial_India_The_Role_of_Indian_Subalterns
12.5_pp_391_411_From_Chief_to_Technocrat_Labour_and_Colonial_Authority_in_PostWorld_War_II_Africa
12.6_pp_412_434_The_Unintended_Consequences_of_Bureaucratic_Modernization_in_PostWorld_War_II_British_Africa
13.0_pp_435_436_Afterword
