Resource Control and the Development of Political Economies in Small-Scale Societies

Abstract

AbstractThe emergence of formalized leadership, institutionalized political hierarchies, and elite control over resources are key areas of study in relation to the emergence of complex societies. In this paper we consider these developments in two areas of the world: the Coast Salish region of the precontact Northwest Coast of North America and prehistoric southwestern Korea. On the Northwest Coast, increasing house size through time reflects an increasingly central role for households in orchestrating production and consumption. In southwestern Korea, houses and households expanded similarly with the adoption of dry farming agriculture. However, with the subsequent adoption of intensive, wet rice agriculture, houses shift to small, single-family structures and storage moves to external features. We contrast these case studies, attributing the divergent trends to distinct historical trajectories of household organization and differences in the scale at which resources were controllable. Analysis of these ...