Evolution of Egalitarianism and its Anthropological Understanding
* Egalitarianism, the evolution of. By Cathryn Townsend. The International Encyclopedia of Anthropology, 2018. [1]
URL = https://www.academia.edu/29417676/Egalitarianism_the_evolution_of
Description
"Theory on the evolution of egalitarianism and its relevance to anthropology is described in three sections. The first section carefully defines and delimits usage of the term egalitarianism in anthropology, outlines the form of social organization empirically observed in egalitarian societies, and clarifies the difference between egalitarian and acephalous societies. The second section describes multidisciplinary perspectives on the egalitarian disposition and behaviors found in humans, and how these contrast with those of nonhuman primates. Theories on how these behaviors and dispositions may have evolved are summarized. Finally, the roles of gender relations, sexual reproduction strategies, and cooperative breeding are mentioned in relation to the theory on the evolution of egalitarianism."
Excerpts
Anthropological History
Cathryn Townsend:
"An explanation of the evolutionary emergence of the egalitarian predisposition is required in order to account for the range of political behaviors observed in contemporary human societies (from extremely egalitarian to extremely hierarchical), compared with the consistently present dominance hierarchies of nonhuman primates such as chimpanzees, gorillas, and (to a moderate extent) bonobos. Te fact that by way of contrast with these, a wide range of political behaviors exists for humans, indicates that egalitarian tendencies came about due to unique selection pressures on our particular hominin lineage within the Homininae subfamily of the Hominidea (great ape) taxonomic family. An inference of this kind rests on the comparative phylogenetic method in evolutionary biology in which it is expected that related species will exhibit similar adaptations not because they evolved them due to separate evolutionary pressures but because they belong to the same common phylogeny. Tis phenomenon is known as “phylogenetic autocorrelation.” Divergence from autocorrelation is what needs to be explained in terms of selection pressures. While there are likely to have been precursor behaviors among early bipedal hominins, cooperative egalitarian behaviors may have emerged due to unique selection pressures during the Homo erectus to Homo sapiens phase of the human lineage. Early hominin morphology shows greater sex/size dimorphism compared with the genus Homo, which is indicative of higher male–male competition in the earlier hominin species because such an association is observed in nonhuman primates. The selection pressures involved may have been multiple and thus are best understood from the vantage point of various cross-disciplinary and complementary perspectives.
From the perspective of behavioral ecology and optimal foraging theory, some aspects of the egalitarian ethos are adaptive in that they are effective risk-mitigation strategies. Behavioral ecology works from the premise that organisms have risk-sensitive adaptations that help them to survive.
The risk-reduction strategies adopted by mobile hunter-gatherers tend to be:
(1) the pooling of resource harvests within a sharing network,
(2) mobility and/or fluid local-group composition that allows people to distribute themselves in accordance with resource distribution, and
(3) future discounting in which receiving a smaller reward immediately is preferred to the potential for a greater reward in the future.
These strategies match with the egalitarian practices of immediate-return hunter-gatherers in:
(1) their demand sharing,
(2) the avoidance mechanism, which allows people to move away from sources of conflict, and
(3) emphasis on the subsistence needs of the present alongside a lack of storage and investment.
The risk-mitigation strategies of mobile hunter-gatherers are plausibly associated
with the evolution of genus Homo because of the archaeological evidence of medium- to
large-game procurement commencing in the Pleistocene. Large-game hunting is a relatively risky subsistence strategy. It provides a food source that is worthy of sharing but its acquisition requires cooperation. In addition, there is evidence that the Pleistocene
brought climate change—specifically increased dry seasons with associated resource
scarcity. These are the environmental conditions in which sharing is most beneficial.
Cognitive science also brings its insights. Developmental psychologist Michael
Tomasello suggests that shared intentionality or intersubjectivity in pursuit of a com-
mon objective is the hallmark of human interaction as opposed to that of other apes.
For example, the gesture of pointing requires a mutual understanding of the intention
of the pointer to share information. In support of this, the “cooperative eye hypothesis”
proceeds from the corollary that only the genus Homo has a specific physiology—eyes
that are almond-shaped with white sclera—that make it easy to see others’ focus of
attention and suggests that this evolved to facilitate communication and cooperation.
Shared intentionality requires high levels of trust between people in a social group and
the ability to understand another’s intention to help or to share. The skills and motives
of shared intentionality have transformed the individualistic and competitive primate
social behaviors such as gaze following, manipulative communication, group action,
and social learning into the human cultural behaviors of joint attention, cooperative
communication, collaborative action, and instructed learning. Shared intentionality is
thus the cognitive capacity that makes egalitarianism and related cultural capacities
possible. In principle, specific mutations to eye shape and color could be traced
genetically to historical social changes in the Pleistocene."
(https://www.academia.edu/29417676/Egalitarianism_the_evolution_of)