Full Description
Robert L. Carneiro is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in anthropology in the twentieth century, best known for "A Theory of the Origin of the State" (1970). His efforts throughout his career brought cultural evolutionism from its nineteenth-century origins into the twenty-first century. This book is comprised of thirteen essays, ordered and balanced according to Carneiro's own conceptual arrangement, and aims to contribute to revitalizing this durable, illuminating theoretical perspective for current and future generations of students and anthropologists.
Contents
Editor's Preface
Introduction
Chapter 1. Successive Reequilibrations as the Mechanism of Cultural Evolution
Chapter 2. Structure, Function, and Equilibrium in the Evolutionism of Herbert Spencer
Chapter 3. The Transition from Quantity to Quality: A Neglected Causal Mechanism in Accounting for Social Evolution
Chapter 4. A Reappraisal of the Roles of Technology and Organization in the Origin of Civilization
Chapter 5. Ascertaining, Testing, and Interpreting Sequences of Cultural Development
Chapter 6. Stellar Evolution and Social Evolution: A Study in Parallel Processes
Chapter 7. The Nature of the Chiefdom as Revealed by Evidence from the Cauca Valley of Colombia
Chapter 8. What Happened at the Flashpoint? Conjectures on Chiefdom Formation at the Very Moment of Conception
Chapter 9. Process vs. Stages: A False Dichotomy in Tracing the Rise of the State
Chapter 10. Was the Chiefdom a Congelation of Ideas?
Chapter 11. A Theory of the Origin of the State
Chapter 12. The Circumscription Theory: Challenge and Response
Chapter 13. Political Expansion as an Expression of the Principle of Competitive Exclusion
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
