Oriental Despotism 171for 45 days until, after 180 days, the job was completed.^23 From 1881 on, at a time
of decay and disintegration, ‘the whole of the corvée fell on the poorest classes’,^24
the smaller number being compensated for by an increase in the labour-time to 90
days. In some regions the conscripts were kept busy ‘for 180 days’.^25
b. Integration
Orderly cooperation involves planned integration. Such integration is especially
necessary when the objectives are elaborate and the cooperating teams large.
Above the tribal level, hydraulic activities are usually comprehensive. Most
writers who mention the cooperative aspect of hydraulic agriculture think in the
main of digging, dredging and damming; and the organizational tasks involved in
these labours is certainly considerable. But the planners of a major hydraulic
enterprise are confronted with problems of a much more complex kind. How
many persons are needed? And where can such persons be found? On the basis of
previously made registers, the planners must determine the quota and criteria of
selection. Notification follows selection, and mobilization notification. The
assembled groups frequently proceed in quasimilitary columns. Having reached
their destination, the buck privates of the hydraulic army must be distributed in
proper numbers and according to whatever division of operations (spading, carry-
ing of mud, etc.) is customary. If raw materials such as straw, faggots, lumber or
stone have to be procured, auxiliary operations are organized; and if the work
teams – in toto or in part – must be provided with food and drink, still other ways
of appropriation, transport and distribution have to be developed. Even in its
simplest form, agrohydraulic operations necessitate substantial integrative action.
In their more elaborate variations, they involve extensive and complex organiza-
tional planning.
c. Leadership
All teamwork requires team leaders; and the work of large integrated teams requires
on-the-spot leaders and disciplinarians as well as overall organizers and planners.
The great enterprises of hydraulic agriculture involve both types of direction. The
foreman usually performs no menial work at all; and except for a few engineering
specialists the sergeants and officers of the labour force are essentially organizers.
To be sure, the physical element – including threats of punishment and actual
coercion – is never absent. But here, if anywhere, recorded experience and calcu-
lated foresight are crucial. It is the circumspection, resourcefulness and integrative
skill of the supreme leader and his aides which play the decisive role in initiating,
accomplishing and perpetuating the major works of hydraulic economy.
d. Hydraulic leadership – political leadership
The effective management of these works involves an organizational web which
covers either the whole, or at least the dynamic core, of the country’s population.
In consequence, those who control this network are uniquely prepared to wield
supreme political power.