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I think you have that backwards - in an agricultural society, food production is distributed - so you can't have control over the food supply unless you have an
by jbattle 14y ago
I think you have that backwards - in an agricultural society, food production is distributed - so you can't have control over the food supply unless you have an inordinate amount of power over the population.
- hackinthebochs 14y agoThe point is that the existence of agriculture leads to many things, of which even more centralized control is the result. Agriculture by its nature supports more people than necessary to produce the food. This surplus necessarily begets an underclass and an a ruling class. The book Guns, Germs, and Steel has some very interesting case studies of societies that grew into very stratified political societies based on the discovery of agriculture. The cause/effect implication is clear because of analysis of cultures with a recent common origin who where the difference in outcomes were only a matter of properties of the land which encouraged or precluded agriculture.