MOCHE: A PERUVIAN COASTAL COMMl Xl-n— GILl.IN 



93 



be derived mainly from income from municipal lands 

 plus a few fees. The two governments have offices 

 side by side on the main plaza of Moche. During 

 my time, the municipal office was seldom open, 

 except for the occasional meetings of the council. 

 The District office, on the other hand, maintained a 

 secretary who was paid a salary of 60 soles per 

 month. Usually the gobernador or the vice-jobcnta- 

 dor was also present during the morning. 



The central government has shown discretion in its 

 choice of officials, and the incumbents of the various 

 offices were personally well liked. The gobernador 

 was a tailor by profession, a foraslero linked by mar- 

 riage to Mochero families. The tcuicntc gobernador 

 was a respected true Mochero. The mayor was one 

 of the most trusted forasteros, and the vice mayor was 

 a true Mochero. 



Public services maintained l)y the municipality in- 

 clude the garbage collections (one man with a two- 

 wheeled cart and horse), the water system (a 

 windmill and tank, with pipes leading to six public 

 outlets in various parts of town), and the street 

 lights (square kerosene lamps hung or perched on 

 brackets fixed in house walls at street corners). The 

 District seems to concern itself mostly with the 

 issuance of required documents and the registry of 

 vital statistics, etc. 



The local irrigation administration has been previ- 

 ously mentioned. During a part of my stay a com- 

 mission of sanitary engineers was working in the 

 District on the problem of malaria control. During 

 a period of perhaps 2 months the commission en- 

 trusted with the surveys for the new land register 

 (catastro) was also present. Finally, the Government 

 agricultural school maintains a staft' of four to six 

 employees. 



In summary it is impossible to speak of a unified or 

 unifying political organization for Moche as a whole, 

 which has roots either functionally or historically in 

 its own culture. Such unity as exists is imposed from 

 the outside, and follows the pattern of local adminis- 

 tration prevalent throughout Peru in 19-14. There 

 are various arguments advanced in favor of this sys- 

 tem, most of which seem to boil down to the basic 

 fear of the national administration that "revolution- 

 ary" elements would get out of hand if local self- 

 government were permitted. And it can rightly be 

 claimed that surface order and tranquillity, at least, 

 prevail under the system. On the other hand, there is 

 nothing explicit in tlie attitude of the Government 



which would prevent community organization for 

 nonpolitical purposes. 



In Moche individuals are not molested in their daily 

 private activities (unless they are suspected of belong- 

 ing to the suppressed Aprista party), but they are 

 definitely discouraged from attempting to participate 

 on their own initiative in any way in decisions af- 

 fecting the community as a whole, although as indi- 

 viduals they are legally allowed to make complaints 

 by means of written depositions made out in proper 

 form. The governmental policy in Moche in 1944 

 was not that of a rigid dictatorship, but rather a fairly 

 tolerant and enlightened paternali.sm. 



A considerable amount of grumbling is current, 

 however, and the complaint is common that "Moche 

 is neglected" and has no effective way of tnaking its 

 wants and needs known to the higher administrative 

 centers. The governmental system has no social 

 mechanism pertaining to the community as a whole 

 for the settlement of those disputes and complaints 

 whose imjiortance have been previously discussed, no 

 mechaifism, that is, other than formal legal proceed- 

 ings. I am not aware that the law specifically pro- 

 hibits the formation of an informal community 

 council, or something similar, but the fact is that 

 Moche has not organized one, and the present set-up 

 affords neither encouragement nor training in non- 

 legal means of settling disputes amicably. In Aloche, 

 as elsewhere in Peru, no public meeting may legally 

 take place without the previous issuance of a police 

 permit, which is obtainable only after full explana- 

 tion of the purposes and expected constituency of the 

 gathering, its place, time, and program. The objec- 

 tive of this regulation is to prevent the formation of 

 disorderly mobs or subversive organizations. 



FAAIILIAL AND PSEUDOFAMILIAL 

 RELATIONSHIPS 

 Although Moche as a community lacks solidarity 

 and organization, each person is supported by three 

 nets of relationships, as it were, of a familial or 

 ixseudofanulial type: (1) his blood relationships, 

 (2) his marriage relationships, and (3) his cere- 

 monial kinship relationships. If Moche were a 

 primitive tribe we should probably follow the ethno- 

 logical habit of calling tlie whole complex the kinship 

 system. 



SEX" 



A boy begins to have sexual relations v.fhen he is 

 about 12 or 13, but such relations are restricted. 



" Most of my inform.ition on this topic came from male informants. 



