The phrase "clan structure" is correct and can be used in written English.
It refers to the social organization and hierarchy within a clan or group of families. Example: The traditional society in the village was built upon a strong clan structure, with the eldest male member serving as the leader and making all major decisions for the group.
There is a huge difference in the way Somalis use the clan structure these days.
The resultant family was an extreme departure from the family in the consanguineal context, the traditional clan structure.
The 'Ndrangheta – whose name comes from the Greek for courage or loyalty – has a tight clan structure which has made it famously difficult to penetrate.
The tight-knit Chechen clan structure was ideally suited to running organised crime, first in the Soviet Union and then in Russia.
For the most part, Aboriginal people have retained their traditional clan structure, language, customs, and religious rituals, particularly in rural areas.
Mien society is organized around a clan structure that enables individuals living in very dispersed areas to have a sense of kinship.
The Luvale differ from other northwestern Zambian peoples in their strong lineage and clan structures.
George Galloway's victory in Bradford last week was at least in part a rebellion against the authority of traditional clan structures among diaspora Muslims of Kashmiri descent.
The organization of the peoples who came to inhabit the area north of the Nile River was mainly based on their clan structures.
Weiner stresses the urgency of his subject for reasons stretching from national security (he attributes early missteps in the war on terror to ignorance of clan structures) to self-preservation (fighting against the rise of clannishness in our own societies).
Despite a multiplicity of tribal and clan structures, the groups shared cultural similarities in their indissoluble links to their lands and the importance of myth and ritual in maintaining those links.
