Agricultural Societies Chapter 14 From Egalitarianism to Kleptocracy The evolution of Government and

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Agricultural SocietiesChapter 14From
Egalitarianism to KleptocracyThe evolution of
Government and Religion

• Text extracted from
• Guns Germs and Steel
• By Jared Diamond, 1997

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Government and Religion

• Descendents of those societies that achieved
• centralized government and organized religion
• earliest
• ended up dominating the modern world

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Government and Religion

• 4 main forces of history
• Resulting in the broadest patterns
• government religion
• germs
• writing
• technology

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Government and Religion

• How did government and religion arise?
• How did they become combined?

King Solomon
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Levels of Social Organization

• Bands
• Tribes
• Chiefdoms
• States

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Bands

• Tiny Populations typically 5-80 people
• Most are close relatives by birth or marriage
• All humans lived in bands until 40,000 years ago
  In recent history
• African Pygmies, Bushmen
• Australian Aborigines
• Eskimos

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Bands

• Usually nomadic
• live in areas where food is scarce
• Land used by whole group
• No specialization
• all able-bodied individuals forage for food
• Economic system
• Reciprocal Exchange
• No laws, police, or treaties to resolve
  conflicts
• But being closely related helps

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Bands

• No stratification into classes
• Egalitarian leadership based on
•  personality
•  strength
•  intelligence
•  fighting skill

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Fayu in New Guinea

• Four clans totaling 400 people
• Normally live as single families scattered in
  swampy area
• Come together once or twice a year to negotiate
  brides
• Formerly numbered 2,000
• Population reduced by Fayu killing Fayu
• Lacked political and social mechanisms to resolve
  disputes

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Tribes

• Society with hundreds of people, usually settled
  in many villages
• Few left today
• Shared language and culture
• More than one clan (kinship group)
• Land belongs to clans within a tribe
• Everyone knows everyone else by name and
  relationship

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Tribes

• Conflicts still solved by being closely related
• If two New Guinea Tribesmen were both away from
  their villages and happened upon one another
• They would engage in a long discussion to
  determine possible family ties
• Otherwise, no reason not to kill one another

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Tribes

• Social System egalitarian
• No upper or lower class
• Each has debts and obligations to many others
• No one can become more wealthy
• Government still egalitarian
• Decisions are made in a group
• Big Man would have limited power, may look and
  live like everyone else

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Reciprocity

• Reciprocity was the Basis of Early Economic
  Systems

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Reciprocity

• Gift giving creates an obligation to return
  similar gifts
• Feasting improves relations, prevents hostility,
  is an excellent way to store food
• Reciprocity leads to intermarriage
• Villages are connected by multiple ties of
  kinship
• Reciprocity results in food security, balances
  inequities
• Political leadership is bestowed on those that
  give the most

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Kerekere in Moala

• Moalans live in 1200 scattered villages in Fiji
  Pacific Islands
• Kerekere is a formal request for a good or
  service
• Can only kerekere a relative, but everyone  are
  relatives
• Are duty bound to honor a kerekere if you have
  what is asked for
• This system evens out inequity
• Prestige comes from giving more than taking   

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Chiefdoms

• Population several thousand to tens of thousands
  
• Arose about 7,500 years ago with rising
  populations
• In 1492, widespread in
•  N. and S. America
•  Africa
•  Polynesia

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Chiefdoms

• No chiefdoms left in 20th century
• Prime land taken by larger state societies
• Chiefdoms consolidated into states

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Chiefdoms

• Usually have Public Architecture
• Temples
• Tombs

Easter Islands
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Chiefdoms

• Most people unrelated to others
• People dont know most others by name
• For first time in history, people had to learn
  how to encounter strangers regularly
• without attempting to kill them  

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Chief

• Held monopoly on right to use force
• Held recognizable, hereditary office
• Wore distinguishing clothes demanded respect
• Was thought of as a god, or had a hotline to the
  gods

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Chief

• Centralized authority
• Monopoly on information
• Levels of Bureaucrats work under Chief
• Many specialized jobs that can be done by slaves
  

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Redistributive Economy

• Chief receives food from everyone, then
• Throws feast to redistribute
• Stores it for later redistribution
• Keeps much of it himself (tribute)
• Chief also claims labor for construction of
  public works
• Irrigation,
• Lavish Tombs

20,000 workers built the Taj Mahal
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Redistribution

• Chief receives foodstuffs, goods from many
• because he has power
• Chief has power because
• he regularly directs a flow of goods to his
  followers
• Early city-states operated on this principle

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Traders

• Traders did not make a profit but were agents of
  the empire
• Goods traded on a fixed-price basis
• Did not buy low and sell high

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Luxury Goods

• Food surpluses generated by common people feed
• Chief
• Bureaucrats Priests
• Craft Specialists
• Luxury Goods reserved for Chiefs

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Contribution Enforced

• In Mesopotamia, police ensured that farmers
  contributed
• Impersonality of city life
• ends feelings of obligation of Chief to people
• or vice versa

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Good Chiefdoms

• Good chiefdoms used tribute to provide important
  services to entire society
• Irrigation
• Religion
• Defense

Roman Aquaduct
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Kleptocracies

• At worst, chiefdoms were kleptocracies
• Transferred net wealth from commoners to upper
  class

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Kleptocracies

• How do kleptocracies keep from being overthrown?
• Disarm the populace, arm the elite
• Redistribute tribute in popular ways
• Use monopoly of force to keep public order
• Construct an ideology or religion that justifies
  kleptocracy

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State Religion

• State Religion
• Provides bond between people
• not based on kinship
• keeps them from killing each other
• Gives warriors a motive for sacrificing life in
  battle
• now much more effective in conquest

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States

• Populations of 50,000 to
• 1 Billion
• Usually literate elites
• sometimes literate population
• Arose 3,700 BC in Mesopotamia
• Later in Mesoamerica, China, Southeast Asia,
  Andes, West Africa

Babylon
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Earliest States
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States

• True cities, characterized by
• Monumental public works
• Palaces of rulers
• Accumulation of capital from tribute or taxes
• Concentration of people other than food producers
  

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States

• Early states hereditary leader equivalent to a
  king
• Democracies today crucial knowledge still
  available to only a few
• Central control, redistribution of tribute more
  far-reaching
• Even farmers not self-sufficient

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Mesopotamia

• Food produced by 4 specialist groups
• Cereal farmers
• Herders
• Fishermen
• Orchard and Garden growers

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Mesopotamia

• State took produce from each farming group
• Redistributed necessary supplies
• and the other foods not produced
• Exchanged wool by long distance trade
• for other essential raw materials
• Paid food rations to laborers
• who maintained irrigation systems for farmers

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Slavery

• Many states adopted slavery on much larger scale
  than chiefdoms because
• More use for slave labor
• More economic specialization
• More mass production
• More public works
• Warfare on a larger scale meant more captives
  available

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Bureaucracies

• More complex bureaucracies
• Formalized laws, judiciary, police
• Laws often written (by literate elite)
• Writing not developed until formation of state
  societies
• Mesopotamia
• Mesoamerica

Code of Hammurabi, Mesopotamia
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Religion

• Early state religions, standardized temples
• Many kings divine
• Kings often head of state religion
• Mesopotamian Temple was center of
• Religion
• Economic redistribution
• Writing
• Crafts technology

Babylonian Ziggurat
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Organization of States

• States organized on political and territorial
  lines not kinship and tribe boundaries
• States and empires often are multiethnic and
  multilingual
• Bureaucrats selected more on ability than
  heredity
• Modern states have non-hereditary leadership

Roman Empire
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Why Do States Arise?

• More complex societies usually conquer less
  complex ones
• Advantage of weapons, technology, numbers
• Centralized decision making more efficient in
  conquest
• Official religions, patriotic fervor
• make troops willing to fight suicidally
  fanaticism

Arab Muslim Empire
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How Do Chiefdoms Become States?

• Aristotle States are  the natural condition of
  human society.
• knew only Greek Societies of  400 BC
• Rousseau States formed by a social contract
• a rational decision of people based on self
  interest.
• Never happened this way
• Small groups do not give up their sovereignty
  willingly

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Irrigation Theory

• Major civilizations had large-scale irrigation
• Mesopotamia,
• Egypt
• China
• Mesoamerica
• Large-scale irrigation requires centralized
  bureaucracy for
• Construction
• Maintenance
• Management

Pre-Incan Irrigation
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Irrigation Theory Disputed

• States formed to create irrigation systems?
• But irrigation came after states formed
• States did not always have centrally controlled
  irrigation

Hanging Gardens, Babylon
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Population Theory

• Strong correlation between size of population and
  complexity of society
• Autocatalysis population growth leads to social
  complexity
• Social complexity leads to intensified food
  production and population growth

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Food Production Leads toSocial Complexity

• Requires seasonal labor. 
• After harvest, labor used for
• public works,
• wars of conquest
• Stored surpluses permit economic specialization,
  social stratification
• feed chiefs, elite, scribes, craftspeople,
  specialists,
• feed farmers while they are working on public
  works

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Food Production Leads toSocial Complexity

• Sedentary living required for
• Possessions
• Technology
• Crafts
• public works
• control of people

Mayan Temples, Mexico
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Large Populations Require Complex Social System

• Conflict resolution needed between unrelated
  people 
• need laws and authority
• Communal decisions impossible 
• need structure
• Reciprocal economy impossible 
• Need redistributive economy
• Density of population must be organized

Argebam, Iran
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Amalgamation of Smaller Units

• Occurs by merger under threat of external force
• 40 Cherokee chiefdoms joined together,
• American colonies joined together

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Amalgamation of Smaller Units

• Occurs by conquest among chiefdoms
• Zulu state
• Hawaii, Tahiti
• Aztecs, Incas (before Spanish arrived)
• Rome, Macedonian empire
• Etc.

Aztec Empire
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After Conquest

• Bands
• survivors can move away

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After Conquest

• Tribes
• Need the land
• Territory occupied.
• No need for slaves
• No need for survivors,
• except women as wives
• Defeated men are killed

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After Conquest by States and Chiefdoms

• Defeated can be used as slaves
• Or defeated can be exploited
• left in place to produce food, goods
• Deprived of political autonomy
• Made to pay taxes, tribute
• Amalgamate their society
• into victorious state or chiefdom

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Aztec Tribute

• Aztec Empire received tribute from its subjects
  and had tribute lists
• Spanish wanted tribute from Mexico
• Interested in Aztec Empires tribute lists

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Aztec Tribute

• Each year Aztec subjects paid Aztecs
• 7,000 tons of corn
• 4,000 tons of amaranth
• 2,000,000 cotton cloaks
• Huge quantities of Cacao beans, war costumes,
  shields, feather headdresses, amber