Posted on by Art Powell

Over the past few weeks I have been reading some anthropology about hunters and gathers and have decided these so-called primitives are really the most civilized Peoples of all times. I absolutely do not want for myself or anyone else to go to that life style but I do think we should evaluate their cultures for ideas we could adopt. We need to put the civil in civilization.

In this post I propose to look at some of the things that make our society uncivilized and contrast these with what we know about hunters and gathers. A lot what makes us uncivilized are sources of in justice – overpopulation, forcing people to do things according to the values and morals of others and exploitation of people and resources. Generally these injustices are not a part of the lifestyle of hunters and gatherers.

This guy used to think that violence was a natural part of human nature and we just have to live with it. After reading about hunters and gatherers I am not so sure. These people are generally known for being peaceful and non-violent. One group, when threatened by some war-like neighbors just disappeared into the forest.

It would be interesting if an anthropologist would do a detailed study of this aspect of their lives.

Hunters and gathers must be expert psychologists as they have to teach their young to kill animals while remaining non violent in their human relationships. There often appears to be a spiritual aspect to their hunting. Apparently a lot of social control is with verbal tactics such as teasing or ridicule.

In contrast most civilized countries maintain standing armies, sometimes used for social control of populations and in some places it is acceptable for agents of the state to execute innocent people who happen to be in their way. Some people claim the right to force others to live by their values and morals and are often very successful at getting state support in the form of legislation. Our civilizations are also very tolerant of psychological violence. In spite of all the feminist propaganda we hear, women are very skilled at this type of violence. Violence is so pervasive in our societies that very few people get through their lives without experiencing some of it.

History tells us that so far all civilizations have failed although many people believe our own will last forever. As so many civilizations have failed this is a major issue. One theory is that previous civilizations have failed because they have depleted their topsoil. If this is true we need to proceed with caution as a lot of our food supply is dependent upon adding chemicals to the soil. We need to put a lot of effort into studying agriculture. It is too important to leave to people who make their living from it.

This blogger believes the major threat to our way of life is that we have used up most of the easily accessible energy and mineral resources on the earths crust. Yes, there are lots of resources left but cost of extracting them is such they are mostly useless unless we have some major technology breakthroughs.

In contrast there is archeological evidence that the bushmen of the Kalahari desert have maintained their civilization for up to 200,000 years. They did this by living hand to mouth, seldom having more than a day or two of food on hand and not over exploiting resources.

A significant feature of hunting and gathering is that most decision-making is by individuals. Leadership is low-key and individuals can easily move from one small group to another. The bushmen’s time came to an end when their territory was taken over by farmers and herders with the help of modern technology such as boreholes to provide reliable water supplies.

It is not clear if there was a natural transition from hunting and gathering or if farming and herding developed independently. What is significant is that the latter made for different social dynamics in that some people could make decisions that affected others. As these other types of food provision involved food storage they also led to residence mostly in one location, more and more complex tools and a more material lifestyle. This was probably the start of the decline into our uncivilized history.

Probably the most important of all freedoms is the right to make decisions according to our own values and morals. In our society this is a complex issue with many limits.

The first limitation, shared by hunters and gatherers, is the need to provide ourselves with food and shelter. We must spend some time on this although most hunters and gatherers devote far less time to this than we do. Anthropologists have found that a lot of them devote only 15 to 20 hours a week to this basic activity. The rest of the time they spend socializing, performing rituals, doing crafts or sleeping and being lazy.

The rest of the limits on freedom to make decisions follow from our economic organization often with religious sanctions. Modern technology and the use of oil in agriculture probably means we only need to work two or three hours a week but the work ethic requires us to work 40 to 60 hours a week. If one does not do this much work one is a deadbeat on not doing ones share. This is great for those people who want others to support their empires but not so great for the environment and the resource base and our right to decide for ourselves what we want to do.

Possession of money gives us freedom to make decisions but the way in which it is created is a limitation. Most of the money used in our exchange of goods and services is created when banks make loans in what is known as fractional reserve banking. This is a complex but easy to understand process that is fully explained in many places on the internet including this weblog and the e-book by this writer, Funny Money: Adapting to a Down Economy. As money is created by bankers they determine who gets it and what projects are undertaken. Creating money with an income scheme and national exchange trading scheme as proposed in my book would mean a major transfer of decision-making power to individuals.

Another limit on our ability to make independent decisions is the extensive use of marketing techniques by major corporations. I have often thought the best psychological insights come from marketing people and they do not hesitate to use their knowledge to influence how people think and what they do. Sadly, we have got to the point where a lot of people consider exploitive marketing to be normal, legitimate and even desirable. Some major Canadian companies have recently made the news because of the pressures put on their sales people, like to sell expensive internet or phone services to people who will never use them.

It is amazing how easily so many people get hooked into agendas set by others. It is easy to avoid being influenced by the marketers; just avoid television and social media. It is also easy for me to say that as I left home before my parents bought a television.

Not only are hunters and gatherers known for their peacefulness, they are also known for their equality. If people are not trying to aquire lots of material things, then economic equality becomes natural.

In our own culture we are aware of increasing inequality as more people suffer from the falling economy but we do not know how to change things. I believe everyone should have the opportunity to have the same standard of living as everyone else. It is painful to see people homeless and having to rely on food banks.

This writer believes inequality could be corrected with an income scheme and a true market economy. One of the features of a market economy is that competition wipes out the profits that allow some people to become rich.

The books I have read say little about sexuality but it appears most hunters and gathers are casual and accepting. Nor do they appear to have the sexual problems which plague so many people in our societies. It could be that we have something to learn from them about sex .

The key to what we call civilization is the agricultural surplus which is the food production in excess of what the producer needs for his own survival. Generally hunters and gathers do not have an agricultural surplus because once they have enough food for a day or two they stop working knowing that more is easily available when they need it.

The agricultural surplus is a two-sided coin. It releases people from food production to do other things some of which are positive and some of which are destructive. It can be the start of the decline onto the slippery slope into uncivilized behaviors,

The agricultural surplus presents a people with two questions; what to do with it and who makes the decision. These questions open up opportunities for people whose personality is to tell others what to do. This writer believes each of us should have to right to decide how his/her share of the surplus should be used.

Some economists like to tell students consumers control the economy in their spending decisions. This is correct so long as we make the right decisions. Many people want to go off the grid and live the simple life in the bush but that is not easy to do. The people who create the money want the rest of us to work at their projects rather than our own.

We have good material standards of living because our economy has been labor intensive and the demand for bodies has allowed us to extract from the elite a nice portion of the agricultural surplus. As technology increases and robots do more and more of the labor we are losing our bargaining power. The rich get richer and more people become poor. Frightening and uncivilized.

There is a slight ray of hope in our two or multi party electoral system. Some politicians are realizing tha to get votes they have to allow voters some share of the agricultural surplus.

There are lots of anecdotal evidence that our economy is on a down trend. Lots of people are suffering and lots more are likely to suffer. There are many unknowns in the future and most of them are frightening. Our goal should be to minimize the suffering and maximize the enjoyment of living.

We are unlikely to ever get consensus on how to deal with this situation as many people have a strong vested interest in the status quo. However, if we do not try, there will be no progress.

I once heard an engineer say, “If it is working, it is not complex enough.” I was not impressed with his engineering and I do not want to apply his principle to economics. Let us keep it simple. The challenge is to get the best out of technology without the technologists telling us how we should live to meet their goals.

This post has focused on some of the negative features of our civilization. I want to continue to enjoy the positive things, like being able to write this weblog, but I also want to correct some of the injustices and uncivilized behaviours. Genius is 90 per cent plagiarism and we should look for good ideas wherever we can find them.

The hunting and gathering lifestyle appears to be a lot simpler than what we have and it also appears to be a lot more civilized. Let’s put the civil back in civilization.

Note: Once upon a time this blogger took a course in Economic Anthropology and since then I have frequently read books on anthropology and especially economic anthropology. Prior to writing this post I read the following books:

Affluence without Abundance: The disappearing world of the bushmen, By James Suzman, 2017.

Hunters and Gathers: History, Evolution and Social Change, Edited by Tim Ingold, David Riches and James Woodburn, 1988.

Politics and history in band societies, Edited byEleanor Leacock and Richard Lee, 1982

Share this: Facebook

LinkedIn

Twitter

Email

Print

Reddit

Tumblr

Pinterest

Pocket

Telegram

WhatsApp

Skype

Like this: Like Loading... Related

Filed under: Economics | Tagged: agrcultural surplus, Anthropology, decision making, Economics, exploitation, inequality, marketing, money, overpopulation, primitive, social dynamics, sun, violence |