A comparison of Choson census registers from Sanŭm-hyon and Ming census registers from Huizhou clearly reveal structural differences between the two regarding the state and society. The main focii for comparison are relations between household and family, status of household members, the existence (or not) of a slave status such as nobi, the administrative structure for compiling the registers, and, through them, the characteristics of how the state governed the farming class. The study shows that during the Choson period, farmers were awarded tasks and duties (chik'yok) on an individual basis by the state, through which their social status was determined. Many of the farmers were nobi, enslaved men and women working either for the state or for yangban and government officials. The structure of the household between individual families was not necessarily uniform; an internal two-strata structure of chuho and hyopho is evident, higher and lower status households. State rule of the farming communities also showed a dual structure, with household members and land separated. It is very clear that inevitably the state governed only indirectly, through local petty officials of the “local scribe” (hyangni) class. Not only did these aspects not exist in contemporary Ming society but even in comparison with pre-Song history, Choson society exhibited special structural characteristics, in that it was not a centralized bureaucratic state like that which developed in the Ming.