Now, this leads us to what are the various kind of civil societies (knowing the fact that by this term we include military dictatorship, kingdoms… All kinds of societies which are not lead by civilians).
1) the societies without State (Stateless societies, Non State societies):
The most well known example are the Nuer from Sudan. Cf: E. E. Evans-Pritchard
In those kinds of societies, social hierarchy is low, power is not centralized and not structured through a centralized administration or proto administration. Authority is hold by family chiefs or elders or religious leaders.
Moral and religion are used as law or legal referent to sanction deviances, non respects of Tabou…
Such societies are centered on survival of the group.
Actual good example is Somalia. It is also the type of organization to which de regulated, and dismantled societies tend to go back in failed states during civil wars or more generally when the State (as an administration) is absent.
Such societies are seen by Hobbes as the Human Nature: the war of all against all. It’s the western imaginary “savage society”. (by the way, to me it’s much closer to Locke than Hobbes).
What in western politic has long been assimilated to anarchy (See Anarchy ) but is not, especially in traditional societies (See all theanthropoly in Africa, Oceania, South America…).
2) the societies with State:
The societies with Sate, at least the modern ones are based on Max Weber definition of the State.
Weber unveils the definition of the state that has become so pivotal to Western social thought: that the state is that entity which possesses a monopoly on the legitimate use of physical force
Weber distinguished three pure types of political leadership, domination and authority:
1. charismatic domination (familial and religious),
2. traditional domination (patriarchs, patrimonalism, feudalism), and
3. legal domination (modern law and state, bureaucracy).[56]
In his view, every historical relation between rulers and ruled contained such elements and they can be analysed on the basis of this tripartite distinction.[57] He also notes that the instability of charismatic authority inevitably forces it to "routinize" into a more structured form of authority. Likewise he notes that in a pure type of traditional rule, sufficient resistance to a master can lead to a "traditional revolution". Thus he alludes to an inevitable move towards a rational-legal structure of authority, utilising a bureaucratic structure.[58] Thus this theory can be sometimes viewed as part of the social evolutionism theory. This ties to his broader concept of rationalisation by suggesting the inevitability of a move in this direction.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Weber