4 - Administration and Government

Summary

The first section (‘Centralisation’) traces the consolidation of authority in the hands of the benchers, whose internal supremacy appears to have been of fairly recent origin, and the growing interest of Elizabethan governments in the societies, with the effect of strengthening the benchers’ powers. Before the great expansion of membership, most of the routine administrative chores necessary to keep the societies operating on a day-to-day basis were undertaken by members themselves. But thereafter there was increasing reliance on salaried officers or servants (‘Bureaucratisation’), especially the creation of full-time administrative positions to assist the nominal temporary head of each society, the treasurer. On-going provision of catering and lodging depended on a continuously expanding domestic establishment. However the inns had both a ‘Servant Problem’, and a ‘Management Problem’. Servants depended for much of their income on tips and perquisites, leading to various conflicts of interest, while much of the responsibility for overseeing the societies’ affairs was shouldered by a small minority of benchers. The chapter concludes with a glance at difficulties experienced in managing the societies’ finances, which encouraged the commutation of former academic requirements into cash payments.