In this significant book, Stanish builds a model of how complex stateless societies solve collective action problems to benefit their members in the absence of coercive leadership—not in the absence of leadership but in the absence of coercive leadership. The model is framed by game theory, which is recast as anthropological game theory, and collective action theory, making the claim that humans are conditional cooperators. Crucial to successful and sustainable cooperation is a “ritualized economy”: an economy with
rules of co-operative economic behavior . . . [encoded] . . . in a variety of ritual practices. This economy, structured by ritual, enculturated by habit, and culturally transmitted across generations, is the means by which the emergent properties of co-operation inherent in social interaction lead to “strong” forms of co-operation [p. 7].
Stanish accomplishes this in eight chapters, the first introducing the argument and key notions such as complex stateless societies and the ritualized economy. He distinguishes among simple stateless societies—hunter-gatherer bands—complex stateless societies, and states. Complex stateless societies are significantly larger than bands and contain both kin and non-kin who cooperate over long time periods, often on projects such as the construction of “special places” or monuments, but in the absence of coercive leadership. Stanish also introduces game theory and the behavioral economics’ concepts central to his argument.
Chapter 6 succinctly summarizes the model, which is composed of nine claims. In the shift from egalitarian to complex stateless societies, people are not forced to adopt hierarchies; increased population density is a necessary precondition that permits people to create complex forms of cooperation; individuals benefit from participating in cooperative groups; the cooperative group creates leadership positions lacking coercive power to meet group interests; group membership is fluid; successful groups solve free rider problems and allocate payoffs for group participation by developing appropriate norms and behaviors—“they assure success . . . [by] . . . ritualizing production and exchange” (p. 167); the strategies that produce group success persist and spread through either imitation by other groups or the group's absorption; successful groups reinforce and advertise their success by creating “special places” (e.g., monuments) on the landscape; and “group formation is cyclical. There is no inevitability in this process” (p. 168).
The intervening chapters (2 through 5) develop the theoretical and empirical bases for these claims. In Chapter 2 Stanish critiques classical economics, economic anthropology, and the concept of the rational, self-interested, utility-maximizing actor of classical economics, showing how this conception was set against the apparently irrational actors in “primitive”—i.e., non-Western, nonstate—economies. They are rational, but the premises of their rationality are different. Chapter 3 uses game theory to develop the argument that humans are conditional cooperators. The fourth chapter examines the history and theoretical role of coercion in social theories, using Hayden's aggrandizer theory as an influential modern example of coercion-based theories. Chapter 5 is a lengthy explanation of the “ritualized economy,” which is a form of economy not accommodated by standard economic theories. One of Stanish's conundrums is what to call it: ritualized is unsatisfactory, given its religious connotations in English, but the word best captures his sense.
He again defends this choice in the last chapter, the epilogue, where he revisits the concept of a ritualized economy. Chapter 7 is the archaeological test; Stanish applies the model to archaeological data, first to the relationship between population growth and nonstate complex societies and, second, to make predictions about the earliest “special places.” He tests the model against four case studies: Andean South America (where he conducts research), the Neolithic Near East, the Archaic in eastern North America, and Neolithic northwestern Europe.
The model is based on the voluminous ethnographic literature on nonstate complex societies, particularly that of Melanesia. Stanish's thinking is heavily influenced by Bronisław Malinowski. Stanish importantly revives the debate about the initial causes of permanent leadership: Was it managerial or coercive? His answer is managerial, but unlike in earlier theories, it arises bottom-up at the behest of group members, not top-down from the action of proto-elites. Stanish promises to tackle how we went from that to top-down coercive power in his next book. The ritualized economy concept should force a productive reevaluation of the political economies of nonstate societies.
The book is intellectually stimulating and dense but accessible and well written. The scholarship is impressive. It is not without flaws. Stanish's arguments rely too heavily on simple oppositions; I think, for example, that there is a lot more gray between noncoercive and coercive leadership than his critique of Hayden allows. But hopefully it will spark useful debate and research.
