The Inner Conflict of Tradition: Essays in Indian Ritual, Kingship, and Society c16.33

c16.33

The first and pivotal point that offered itself as an opening for the operation of the modern state was the jural order of rights and shares. But in order to stabilize itself, the modern state had to withdraw from society, that is, it had to lift its right to a part of the "grain heap" out of the overall order of differential and shared rights. Instead of being the holder of a differential right among other such right holders—albeit the single most important one—it had to levy its revenues under a title of a different nature, whether that of a rent or a tax. But if the state was not to slide back into the order of differential rights and so become again an integral part of society, another concept of property was needed, namely, the single-stranded tie between the owner and his land and the exclusion of other holders of rights in the same land.³⁹