From Stewards to Bureaucrats: Architecture and Information Flow at Chan Chan, Peru

• Published in: Latin American antiquity 2003-09, Vol.14 (3), p.243-274
• Main Author: Topic, John R.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Architecture; Architecture, Ancient; Chief executive officers; Commodities; Corporate bureaucracy; Cubicles; Herding; Herds; History; Information flow; Political aspects; Political economy; Public administration; Public architecture; Social aspects; Standardization
• ISSN: 1045-6635; 2325-5080
• DOI: 10.2307/3557560

Archaeologists working with complex societies are concerned with the administration of political economies. Beginning with the premise that there are differing forms of administration and that bureaucracy, in the classic formulation of Max Weber, is one of these, I develop a heuristic dichotomy between two types of administrators: stewards (who closely supervise goods and people) and bureaucrats (who process and control information). Bureaucracy is often linked to written records, but in the Central Andes alternative methods of record keeping were developed, such as the quipu or knotted string record. I argue that one alternative record-keeping device was an architectural form, the U-shaped structure. U-shaped structures are closely identified with the administrative architecture of the Chimu kingdom (ca. A.D. 850–1470) on the north coast of Peru. Four independent lines of argument demonstrate the development of bureaucracy from stewardship at Chan Chan, the capital of the Chimu kingdom. Brief comparisons are made between the Chimu administrative pattern and commodity and information flow in the earlier Huari and Tiwanku civilizations, and with the later Inka pattern. These comparisons show how record-keeping technology affects political economy and the strategy of expansion.