Study sheds new light on the origin of civilization

Date:
April 11, 2022
Source:
University of Warwick
Summary:
New research challenges the conventional theory that the transition
from foraging to farming drove the development of complex,
hierarchical societies by creating agricultural surplus in areas
of fertile land.



FULL STORY ==========================================================================
New research from the University of Warwick, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Reichman University, Universitat Pompeu Fabra and the Barcelona School of Economics challenges the conventional theory that the transition
from foraging to farming drove the development of complex, hierarchical societies by creating agricultural surplus in areas of fertile land.


==========================================================================
In The Origin of the State: Land Productivity or Appropriability?,
published in the April issue of the Journal of Political Economy,
Professors Joram Mayshar, Omer Moav and Luigi Pascali show that high land productivity on its own does not lead to the development of tax-levying
states.

It is the adoption of cereal crops that is the key factor for the
emergence of hierarchy.

The authors theorise that this is because the nature of cereals require
that they be harvested and stored in accessible locations, making them
easier to appropriate as tax than root crops which remain in the ground,
and are less storable.

The researchers demonstrate a causal effect of cereal cultivation on
the emergence of hierarchy using empirical evidence drawn from multiple
data sets spanning several millennia, and find no similar effect for
land productivity.

Professor Mayshar said: "A theory linking land productivity and surplus
to the emergence of hierarchy has developed over a few centuries and
became conventional in thousands of books and articles. We show, both theoretically and empirically, that this theory is flawed." Underpinning
the study, Mayshar, Moav and Pascali developed and examined a large number
of data sets including the level of hierarchical complexity in society;
the geographic distribution of wild relatives of domesticated plants;
and land suitability for various crops to explore why in some regions,
despite thousands of years of successful farming, well-functioning states
did not emerge, while states that could tax and provide protection to
lives and property emerged elsewhere.



========================================================================== Professor Pascali said: "Using these novel data, we were able to
show that complex hierarchies, like complex chiefdoms and states,
arose in areas in which cereal crops, which are easy to tax and to
expropriate, were de-facto the only available crops. Paradoxically, the
most productive lands, those in which not only cereals but also roots
and tubers were available and productive, did not experience the same
political developments." They also employed the natural experiment of
the Columbian Exchange, the interchange of crops between the New World
and the Old World in the late 15th century which radically changed land productivity and the productivity advantage of cereals over roots and
tubers in most countries in the world.

Professor Pascali said "Constructing these new data sets, investigating
case studies, and developing the theory and empirical strategy took
us nearly a decade of hard work. We are very pleased to see that
the paper is finally printed in a journal with the standing of the
JPE." Professor Moav said: "Following the transition from foraging
to farming, hierarchical societies and, eventually, tax-levying
states have emerged. These states played a crucial role in economic
development by providing protection, law and order, which eventually
enabled industrialization and the unprecedented welfare enjoyed today
in many countries." "The conventional theory is that this disparity
is due to differences in land productivity. The conventional argument
is that food surplus must be produced before a state can tax farmers'
crops, and therefore that high land productivity plays the key role.

Professor Mayshar added: "We challenge the conventional productivity
theory, contending that it was not an increase in food production that
led to complex hierarchies and states, but rather the transition to
reliance on appropriable cereal grains that facilitate taxation by the
emerging elite. When it became possible to appropriate crops, a taxing
elite emerged, and this led to the state.

"Only where the climate and geography favoured cereals, was hierarchy
likely to develop. Our data shows that the greater the productivity
advantage of cereals over tubers, the greater the likelihood of hierarchy emerging.

"Suitability of highly productive roots and tubers is in fact a curse
of plenty, which prevented the emergence of states and impeded economic development."

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Warwick. Note: Content
may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Joram Mayshar, Omer Moav, Luigi Pascali. The Origin of the State:
Land
Productivity or Appropriability? Journal of Political Economy,
2022; 130 (4): 1091 DOI: 10.1086/718372 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/04/220411101257.htm

--- up 6 weeks, 10 hours, 50 minutes
* Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (1:317/3)