

Why class societies are the rule, not the exception - marchustvedt
http://www.futurity.org/society-culture/why-class-societies-are-rule-not-exception/

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toyg
I think people in social sciences tend to ignore the most obvious factor:
military power. A successful campaign needs rapid coordinated efforts, which
are best delivered by hierarchical models. And if you suck at war, chances are
that your civilization won't stick around for very long.

~~~
zeteo
>A successful campaign needs rapid coordinated efforts, which are best
delivered by hierarchical models.

This may be an argument for the superiority of militarist states (e.g.
Assyria, Prussia), but it's anachronistic for the study at hand, which deals
with the type of situation prevailing in e.g. the pre-civilization and pre-
organized army Neolithic.

~~~
toyg
I'm sure Neolithic tribes liked a good quarrel as much as anyone, and the
models do scale down. My group of brutes has a charismatic, fairly specialized
leader with good tactical skills and huge biceps; he imparts clear, undisputed
commands on the battlefield and knows how to plan a nightly raid on your
women. Your group of brutes is a bunch of equal individualists, with no real
specialization and where each brute does his own thing, resulting in endless
diatribes about "why should we defend your cave and let my cave get raided?".
Maybe you have an outstanding hunter, but he can't leverage the others as
easily and effectively as my uber-leader... until the tribe is so beaten down
and numbers are dwindling so much that they cave in to the hierarchical model
and let Best Hunter be the boss.

I'm generalizing here, but there's so much we don't know about those times...

~~~
zeteo
The key word in your example is "undisputed". The successful group that you
describe must have previously adopted a system of beliefs that elevates some
individuals over others. (It's a system of beliefs, and not sheer physical
force, as even the strongest individual can be overpowered by a coalition of
the disgruntled.) For the purposes of this paper's model, it doesn't matter
whether the distinction is based on strength, beauty or purported magical
powers.

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zeteo
Here's the paper:

[http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjourna...](http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0024683)

The crucial idea:

> Our simulation results support the hypothesis that socioeconomic
> stratification may have spread due to its effects on the demography of small
> groups—i.e. by demic diffusion—rather than cultural adoption. [...] In
> variable environments, stratified groups migrate more and are less likely to
> go extinct than egalitarian groups.

The main contribution of the paper seems to be the identification of a
survival advantage for unequal societies in unstable environments.

To make this more concrete, imagine two neighboring villages A and B, hit by a
catastrophic crop failure that has reduced harvest by 50%. In village A, there
is a strong ethos of equality; the dwindled resources are divided equally, and
basically midway through winter everyone dies of starvation.

In village B, the inhabitants strongly believe, on the contrary, that
tradition (gods, spirits, ancestor cults etc.) orders the elevation of some
above the others. The favored individuals get their normal full share of the
reduced harvest, and the un-favored get none. This results into an immediate
50% mortality; but the favored survive through the full winter.

After a series of adequate harvests, the B population increases enough to
split off a migrating group that takes over the (now abandoned) site of
village A. The ethos of inequality is taken with them, and thus spreads at the
expense of egalitarianism.

~~~
paxcoder
Here are a couple of alternative scenarios:

\- village A invades village B for food (the fact that out-of-touch
aristocrats occasionally send an army of unwilling soldiers at the gates of A
is another possible reason)

\- village B consumes more food than village A, simply because aristocrats
like to eat, so it starves first

\- in village B, servants die of starvation, the ruling class is incompetent
to feed itself

\- villagers of village B simply walk by foot into village A, leaving their
oppressors to care for themselves

\- there's a revolution in village B, making it, effectively, a village A2
(possible catalyst: shortage of food)

in other words, i don't think that's why. however, i haven't read the article,
so maybe their arguments are more convincing than yours.

~~~
zeteo
The idea that social inequality automatically involves an incompetent, idle
class of aristocrats giving orders to wretched underlings, who do all the
work, is a straw man. All that's required, for this model at least, is an
order of precedence in the distribution of food at harvest time (an
agricultural equivalent of preferred stock, if you will). This is irrespective
of how the food was produced, of the relative size of portions, and of whether
anyone takes commands from someone else. A very simple example of such social
stratification would be e.g. a "pecking order".

~~~
paxcoder
my point is that unequal distribution of food in case of a natural disaster is
not an absolute factor, it's only one of the possible scenarios that affect
the preservation of a system.

~~~
zeteo
Yes of course there are lots of other factors, and history itself is a series
of accidents. The point of this paper is that, all else being equal, a
stratification in the distribution of food seems to improve the resilience of
agricultural societies.

The reason this may be important, in my view, is that it offers a model for
what may have happened in the Ubaid period, when previously egalitarian
agricultural societies became gradually more stratified, and finally
transitioned into the beginnings of our civilization.

The traditional, Marxist explanation is that agriculture generated a
production surplus, which was illegitimately seized by upstart elites. This
paper's alternative model indicates incipiently hierarchical societies might
actually have had a survival advantage, under the conditions of the period.

~~~
paxcoder
Perhaps I should read the paper to see if they're generalizing or not, but I'm
too lazy to; if it was a wikipedia page - perhaps I would.

If we're talking hierarchy generally rather than (more) distinct classes -
which are not prone to (positive) change - I'd concur that it is more
successful in general. For the reason of being able to emphasize the
collective needs I suppose, though a question of mapping talent to positions
remains (and unmapping).

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nazgulnarsil
I find myself constantly amazed at academia's ability to pretend that ideas
that have been around for centuries are suddenly new and original.

~~~
yardie
Just because the idea isn't new doesn't mean it shouldn't be scrutinized for
reasons. It is entirely possible that class based societies existed for other
reasons then what we assume. In this case our assumption turned out to be
correct.

Now, how do are you going to convince koreans that sleeping under a fan isn't
going to kill them?

~~~
nazgulnarsil
I'm talking about refusing to acknowledge past thinkers on an idea even when
the new stuff is parroting old stuff. A prominent example is professor Romer's
Ted Talk.

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Husafan
Also, some people work harder than others.

~~~
danssig
Are you actually under the ridiculously naive impression that hard work =
success? I thought that had been satisfactorily disproven _years_ ago.

~~~
irrumator
That's a pretty strong statement without any proof to back it up. What is this
satisfactory proof that this "has been disproved _years_ ago"?

~~~
wazoox
For instance, academic success is about 60% socio-economical background, 15%
professors, which lets only 25% to individual variation. Similar data can be
found in many domains, like the importance of geography on a country economic
success, etc.

~~~
irrumator
\--wazoox, 2011. I guess these are more 'facts' out of the sky.

