Discovering Neolithic political diversity

kw: book reviews, nonfiction, archaeology, anthropology, political science, history

I considered various titles for this review. One strong contender was "Is totalitarianism inevitable?" But that is too narrowly focused. The scope of The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, by David Graeber and David Wengrow, is nothing less than all of human history at least since the later part of the last Ice Age, 12-15,000 years ago.

To focus the authors' intent a bit: starting with the question, "What is the origin of inequality?", they explore the history of political thought and practice, and almost immediately reveal that the question is meaningless [indeed, it is a red herring intended to obscure the machinations of totalitarian thinkers - my sentiment]. Furthermore, they examine the framework of historical thinking that forms the basis of nearly all writing on historical development—egalitarian bands of nomadic foragers developed into agriculturalists, which began to settle into villages and cities and store grain, which necessitated concepts such as property rights and the need for hierarchical and bureaucratic structures to manage it all, culminating in kings and empires and other forms of coercive government—and they conclude that it is based on circular thinking. Generations of historians have primarily been gathering "evidence" to support the linear hypothesis, while wantonly disregarding and discarding a great mass of actual evidence that paints a very different picture; more properly, a multitude of pictures, of which the "modern" environment of nation-states that we find nearly worldwide is a recent development, even a recent aberration.

Consider the Cahokia Mounds, remnants of a large, settled area that was built up over a period of a few hundred years, primarily between about 900 and 1200 AD. This painting shows how it may have looked at its peak. The gigantic Monks Mound is near top center. The whole area was abandoned and depopulated by about 1350. Although there is evidence of two flooding episodes, in about 1200 and after 1350, it is unlikely that environmental factors led to its decline (in contrast to the environmental disaster that precipitated the decline of the Maya prior to 1000 AD).

At the time Europeans first arrived in the area in the 17th Century, a small number of indigenous Americans lived nearby, but avoided the area, designating it with words meaning "Death". Some think there had been an epidemic, but no archaeological evidence points to this. Others, including the authors of Dawn, consider it likely that a coercive political structure arose and became so overweening that, over a generation or two, everyone moved elsewhere. It is likely that the remaining "overlords", faced with declining numbers of "subjects", turned inward and effectively destroyed themselves, until the last few left, probably to find themselves considered pariahs by anyone they encountered.

The authors begin by examining two contrasting views of the human "state of nature", that of Rousseau and that of Hobbes. The first is based on the premise that people are naturally good and that equality is the natural state in which "early humans" lived in foraging bands like the Hadza of Tanzania, seen here. Such peoples have few possessions, and rather than elevating "mighty hunters", make fun of them.

The Hobbesian view is dystopian, based on the premise that people are naturally selfish and cruel. He it is who wrote in Leviathan that human life was "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." In fact, you can find Hobbesian societies even today: a few areas in which, if two men meet in the forest, they first stand back and discuss whether they have any common relatives or friends, to determine whether they should fight to the death, or collaborate. They are a lot like chimpanzees in that regard. There are others, and these are more common, where the two men would greet one another in a more friendly way, and discuss whether their two "tribes" have goods or skills worth trading. Such peoples are satisfyingly Rousseauian. One might compare them to bonobos, who "make love not war."

Gathering all the evidence they can, particularly in writings most authors skip over or fail to cite, the authors find a wealth of diversity in the social and political structures that have arisen over time. In areas with a definite sequence of seasons, such as North America, many peoples had a dual system: Part of the year, they would live in villages or towns—sometimes temporary like "tepee cities" and sometimes more permanent but occupied only part time—and part of the year they would be nomadic, following game animals. The political structure would evolve with the seasons. Some, in certain seasons had chiefs and temporary "police" to enforce their orders, but in the opposite season the whole structure would be disbanded. More usually, any "chiefs" were primarily skilled negotiators with no power.

Indeed, Europeans who studied the cultures they encountered in North America in the 1500's and later learned that tribal councils and other groups, frequently including both men and women, discussed politics a lot, and were quite capable of modifying political structures to suit not just the season but changing times…such as the incursion of "palefaces" who didn't recognize their rights and sovereignty. The authors make a case that indigenous Americans' political opinions, first during discussions and debates with early French and Spanish explorers, and later in Europe when some visited there, influenced Enlightenment thinkers as they developed the political theories that underlay both the French and American Revolutions. It is likely that some provisions in Bill of Rights (Amendments 1-10 of the U.S. Constitution) were in part based on rights the earlier Americans considered normal. By the time the Constitution was written, political discussions among the "civilized tribes" and European immigrants had been going on for almost 200 years.

Nation-states are, in historical terms, a recent innovation. Spain was unified early, in 1512. Latecomers such as Italy were formed in the middle 1800's. Empires unified before about 1000 AD fell, rose, and reformed from time to time, with final unification occurring in the same period (think of Greece).

Fun fact: During the 1600's and later, numerous indigenous Americans visited Europe. None of them wanted to return to Europe, and they abhorred the idea of living there permanently. During the same period, some Europeans lived for various periods of time among the tribes of North America, and later returned to the Euro-American societies they had lived in before. Many of them subsequently returned to "live with the Indians".

Another cultural trend is ferreted out from various areas, and the authors focus on the northwest coast of North America, from modern northern California to British Columbia. They describe two (very) contrasting cultures, the Kwakiutl and the Yurok, as exemplars of schismogenesis, in which peoples (such as Houstonites and New Yorkers) define themselves against one another. "One man's meat is another man's poison," in a proverb from my childhood. One tribe held slaves; the other did not and eschewed the practice. Members of one tribe were boastful; of the the other, self-effacing. Compared to these two tribes, the differences between Texans and New Yorkers practically vanish.

Though many examples from North America are used, in great part because of near-contemporary accounts written during the European influx, the authors bring together similar evidence from Mesopotamia, China, South America, and Africa. Through most of human history in all these areas, the concepts of "equality" and "inequality" were meaningless, and there are no words for them in most old languages, at least, not used is a social or political sense. [In Greek we find the word ισότης (isotés), which is used for "equality" in modern texts, but really means "parity" or "evenness", and is a more technical term]. A very common situation is found to be that "cities" were used only part of the year, in many, many places. This went on for millennia.

The real question then becomes, "How did the current situation arise?", even, "Why did humanity go down such a narrow social and political path?" In Chapter 2 the authors write,

"There is no doubt that something has gone terribly wrong with the world. A very small percentage of its population do control the fates of almost everyone else, and they are doing it in an increasingly disastrous fashion." (p 46)

And in Chapter 3:

"If human beings, through most of our history, have moved back and forth fluidly between different social arrangements, assembling and dismantling hierarchies on a regular basis, maybe the real question should be ‘how did we get stuck?’ How did we end up in one single mode?" (p 65)

All this serves to do no more than introduce the subject. The authors define a "civilization" as an "extended moral community". Kings, bureaucrats and armies are optional. Agriculture is even optional. Great amounts of evidence demonstrate this conclusively.

Consider this: it has been shown by experiment that wheat grass can be turned into wheat in a few decades, primarily by fostering mutations that permit the grain to remain attached to the stem after ripening. Yet the "grain revolution" in Mesopotamia, for example, was more of a mosey than a sprint, taking 3,000 years between the first purposeful use of wheat grass and the widespread cultivation of wheat as a crop that required a farmer's care.

The authors report that, in place after place, agricultural methods were used for a time, and then abandoned, only to be started anew after a few generations, and then abandoned again, and so forth. We find strong indications that the liberty of individuals and groups was found to conflict with settled society. Equality is not the point. In Chapter 12, in page 264, they contrast the French "republican" ideal, "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity", with the concept of social liberty, consisting of "(1) the freedom to move away or relocate from one's surroundings, (2) the freedom to ignore or disobey commands issued by others, and (3) the freedom to shape entirely new social realities, or shift back and forth between different ones."

When I was a child, my parents once praised American freedom, and contrasted it with Russian Communism, thus: "We don't need to carry papers. We can move from California to Utah without getting government permission. We can change jobs at will. We can even leave the country for any period of time we desire, and return whenever we want." I remember when the Berlin Wall was built. I also remember when it fell, on my birthday in 1989 (I wept joyfully for a long time at the news). Freedom of Location.

We find in the Bible the apostles telling the priests, "We are bound to obey God rather than men." Though they submitted to political sanctions such as imprisonment, they not only didn't agree to obey, they announced they would never obey improper laws. That is the basis of martyrdom. It is also the basis of Freedom of Conscience. You don't need a religious reason to disobey unjust laws.

The Declaration of Independence declares in its second paragraph, 

"That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

The idea that governments "derive their just powers from the consent of the governed" could have been based on things spoken by indigenous American statesmen a century earlier! Pay attention to that word "just". Most governments now on Earth, being authoritarian or totalitarian, are unjust. Thus, Chapter 10 is revolutionary. It is titled, "Why the State Has No Origin: The humble beginnings of sovereignty, bureaucracy and politics". Quite simply, it snuck in over generations. 

What has actually happened? The authors make passing reference to Jared Diamond's book Guns, Germs, and Steel. What follows is my very brief synthesis of the messages of the two books.

The bow and arrow go back as far as 70,000 years. Powerful composite bows came later, perhaps 3,000 to 4,000 years ago. The sling is at least 12,000 years old. In bronze age armies employing both archers and slingers, the slingers had greater range than the archers, with similar accuracy at distances up to a quarter mile; not terribly accurate at that distance, but 100 slingers or archers can produce a fusillade that keeps an opposing body of infantry at bay. But neither bow nor sling can be said to be a good sniper's weapon. A single archer or slinger is unlikely to achieve a clean kill, whether of man or deer, at distances exceeding 50 yards. Thus, for most of human history, coercion was limited to such distances. Freedom of Location, also known as self-exile in a political context, could be exercised rapidly enough to escape the enforcement of any ambitious "ruler" who presumed to give unpopular orders. The legends of Robin Hood and similar "outlaw" bands also show that weapon use can go both ways. Weapon parity supports Freedom to Say No.

Late Medieval and Enlightenment-era palace intrigue, which relied on spies, and the funds to pay (bribe) them, could extend the power of coercion over greater distances, albeit slowly. It took the invention of firearms, and later longer-range weapons such as missiles, plus instantaneous communications, to bring about the actual ability to control country-sized areas with any reliability. A sniper with a modern rifle can kill from half a mile away, provided there isn't much wind (the record is just over 2 miles!). Nobody can outrun the radio or telephone. Large, non-personal weapons can reach anywhere on Earth.

A second "weapon" in the arsenal of the modern state is surveillance. Prior to the development of cheap video equipment, this also relied on spies and informers. Not so much any more. My cell phone has five video cameras in it, each tuned to a different use. The NSA (plus legions of hackers) is able to use the phone's audio and video functions to spy on me and on my surroundings. Of course I have some amount of phone security, but I am not naïve; NSA can get in if they want. Not only so, cell tower equipment now typically records every "ping" from a nearby phone. Police in every country (including the U.S.) routinely obtain these records to trace the movements of "persons of interest"…or anyone else they so desire. Fourth Amendment be damned [If you need to move about un-tracked, of course turn off your phone, but also put it in a bag made from an aluminized Mylar balloon. The day will come when "going off grid" that way will be considered a suspicious act in itself].

These points emphasize my opinion that governments always tend towards becoming totalitarian. At some point, it could become infeasible for "citizens" (all will be "subjects") to overcome universal surveillance and universal coercion. For a little while, some may be able to mitigate electronic surveillance by the use of frequency-scanning equipment and a device called a HERF (look it up - it burns out drones or cameras, etc., from a distance).

Authors Graeber (now deceased) and Wengrow aren't going after governments. Rather, they are tweaking the noses of anthropologists and archaeologists who have, almost unanimously, fallen prey to the linear hypothesis of social progress. Social evolution, similarly to biological evolution, is a frequently-branching tree, with many branches being pruned away even as more arise. Somehow, the bushy tree of human civilizations and social experiments has been schwacked to a single twig, that has grown monstrous and world-spanning.

Perhaps if we can, on a much broader scale, understand the varieties of social and political developments of the past, we can with a clearer eye examine today's social and political institutions, and, if we are lucky, should we find them wanting, we could resurrect (no dinosaur DNA needed!) appropriate institutions, or develop entirely new ones, that better serve the present human population.