4 ms·

From my lay understanding of anthropology, having read stuff by people like David Graeber, it does seem pretty well established that pre-agrarian societies were

From my lay understanding of anthropology, having read stuff by people like David Graeber, it does seem pretty well established that pre-agrarian societies were mostly organised non-hierarchically, or at least with very limited social stratification.

nwah1 5y ago
My understanding is that it varied based on the level of local resource scarcity.
- anonporridge 5y ago
  I'm assuming that local resource scarcity leads to more social hierarchies to manage and politic over the scarce resources, while those with abundant resources tend to not have significant social stratification because there's less incentive towards infighting. Seems like all societies would eventually devolve towards resource scarcity, since abundance will almost always lead to over population.
  - nine_k 5y ago
    Since humans have invented simple and painless birth control, this is no longer the case. Birth rates are falling across the world (including poor traditional societies), and are below replacement in many countries, basically in 100% of the Western civilization.
    - anonporridge 5y ago
      I personally believe birth rates are falling not because of easy birth control, but because the Earth is already extremely over populated and resources are increasingly scarce per capita. If anything, easy birth control is simply making the population correction softer than it would otherwise be, e.g. through war and famine. If we're lucky, our population will continue to decrease relatively peacefully and painlessly to a sustainable level, or until we open up new frontiers of resources and people feel like they have enough breathing room to start expanding again.
      - hkt 5y ago
        > I personally believe birth rates are falling not because of easy birth control, but because the Earth is already extremely over populated and resources are increasingly scarce per capita. People don't really make personal choices based on global level data. So I'd say there are two problems here: 1) is that there is enough to go around without wrecking the environment. For instance, it is markets that cause famines, not crop failures - a fairer way to distribute food (and organise its logistics) would ensure that nobody ever starved. Likewise shelter and so on. 2) People are mostly choosing not to have children (in rich countries) because of the precariousness of their own existence. Why have kids when you can be fired when the market turns and be left to a hostile welfare system? Why have kids when your landlord's right to evict you is considered more important than your right to a stable home? The real choice people are making is about not having children who might end up living in poverty. Secure people with rights have kids: the parents of the baby boomers are a great example of this, choosing to have big families after the war because they were encouraged and facilitated in doing so.
        nine_k 5y ago
        Statistics show that often poorer families in precarious circumstances have more kids than well-off families. Interestingly, your logic partly applies to well-off, too: the standards of some families are so high that they consider it impossible to keep them while having more than 1-2 kids. Many people choose to not have kids because it's a lot of work, and it takes a lot of time. They prefer to pursue other, more easily rewarding goals, like their careers. Pursuing a career while at the same time caring for a (small) child is notoriously hard, for pretty natural reasons: you can outsource being a mother only to a certain extent.

nwah1 5y ago

My understanding is that it varied based on the level of local resource scarcity.

anonporridge 5y ago
I'm assuming that local resource scarcity leads to more social hierarchies to manage and politic over the scarce resources, while those with abundant resources tend to not have significant social stratification because there's less incentive towards infighting. Seems like all societies would eventually devolve towards resource scarcity, since abundance will almost always lead to over population.
- nine_k 5y ago
  Since humans have invented simple and painless birth control, this is no longer the case. Birth rates are falling across the world (including poor traditional societies), and are below replacement in many countries, basically in 100% of the Western civilization.
  - anonporridge 5y ago
    I personally believe birth rates are falling not because of easy birth control, but because the Earth is already extremely over populated and resources are increasingly scarce per capita. If anything, easy birth control is simply making the population correction softer than it would otherwise be, e.g. through war and famine. If we're lucky, our population will continue to decrease relatively peacefully and painlessly to a sustainable level, or until we open up new frontiers of resources and people feel like they have enough breathing room to start expanding again.
    - hkt 5y ago
      > I personally believe birth rates are falling not because of easy birth control, but because the Earth is already extremely over populated and resources are increasingly scarce per capita. People don't really make personal choices based on global level data. So I'd say there are two problems here: 1) is that there is enough to go around without wrecking the environment. For instance, it is markets that cause famines, not crop failures - a fairer way to distribute food (and organise its logistics) would ensure that nobody ever starved. Likewise shelter and so on. 2) People are mostly choosing not to have children (in rich countries) because of the precariousness of their own existence. Why have kids when you can be fired when the market turns and be left to a hostile welfare system? Why have kids when your landlord's right to evict you is considered more important than your right to a stable home? The real choice people are making is about not having children who might end up living in poverty. Secure people with rights have kids: the parents of the baby boomers are a great example of this, choosing to have big families after the war because they were encouraged and facilitated in doing so.
      - nine_k 5y ago
        Statistics show that often poorer families in precarious circumstances have more kids than well-off families. Interestingly, your logic partly applies to well-off, too: the standards of some families are so high that they consider it impossible to keep them while having more than 1-2 kids. Many people choose to not have kids because it's a lot of work, and it takes a lot of time. They prefer to pursue other, more easily rewarding goals, like their careers. Pursuing a career while at the same time caring for a (small) child is notoriously hard, for pretty natural reasons: you can outsource being a mother only to a certain extent.