Political Organisation of Pashtun Nomads and the State

The ruling elite of Afghanistan up to 1978 was ethnically, and to a certain extent even genealogically, closely related to those Pashtun tribes to which the bulk of Afghan nomads belong. Thus one might expect that the Afghan state had taken over at least some of the political functions of the nomads and therefore altered their political organisation to the extent that they no longer needed their own decision-making institutions or political leaders.