Centralized bureaucratic power in the East arose from the demands of large-scale irrigation agriculture

Evidence

In his essay on The Theory of Oriental Society', Wittfogel again defended the view that only an analysis starting from the structure of the productive forces could provide an explanation for the specific laws of social movement in the East and explain both the stagnation of the East and the rise of the West towards modern industrial society in the perspective of universal history. He saw the explanation for the dominant role played in the East by centralized bureaucratic administrative power as lying in the way that it suited the specifically oriental’ requirements of the agricultural production process. These appeared not only in the East but also wherever else the vital necessity for large-scale irrigation works arose. Following on from Marx, he mentioned China as a supreme example of the form of society created by the Asiatic mode of production', corresponding to oriental society’ at the level of productive relations, and to `oriental despotism’ at the political level. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 196

Categorization

• DEFINE: Lays out Wittfogel’s tripartite conceptual scheme: Asiatic mode of production (productive relations), oriental society, oriental despotism (political level).
• XREF: Connects to Wittfogel’s later Oriental Despotism and the wider Marxist debate over the Asiatic mode of production.