Rise and fall of political complexity in island South-East Asia and the Pacific

Nature • Vol/Iss. 467(7317) • Nature Publishing Group • • Published In • Pages: 801-804 •
By Currie, Thomas E., Greenhill, Simon J. , Gray, Russell D. , Hasegawa, Toshikazu, Mace, Ruth

Abstract

A central issue in anthropology is the process through which political organization (sometimes referred to as cultural complexity) evolves: competing models typically argue for either incremental increases in complexity or larger, non-sequential increases in complexity. Here, the authors evaluate six different models of political evolution, utilizing a phylogenetic approach to analyze the evolution of 84 Austronesian-speaking societies.

Samples

Sample Used Coded Data Comment
Ethnographic Atlas (EA)Other researchersSub-sample of Austronesian-speaking societies
Other (Drummond & Greenhill, 2009Other researchersLexical data

Hypotheses (6)

HypothesisSupported
Societies tend to change from simple forms of organization to more complex forms of organization in incremental steps, and decreases in hierarchical organization do not occur [The "rectilinear" model] (802).Low support (ranked 5th/6)
Societies tend to change from simple forms of organization to more complex forms of organization in incremental steps, and decreases to adjacent, less hierarchical forms of organization are possible [The "unilinear" model] (802).High support (Ranked 1st/6)
Societies tend to change from simple forms of organization to more complex forms of organization in incremental steps, and decreases in hierarchical organization to any less complex form can occur [The "relaxed unilinear" model] (802).High support (Ranked 2nd/6)
Societies tend to change from simple forms of organization to more complex forms of organization in non-sequential paths, and decreases in hierarchical organization do not occur [The "alternative trajectories" model] (802).Low support (ranked 6th/6)
Societies tend to change from simple forms of organization to more complex forms of organization in non-sequential paths, and decreases in hierarchical organization are also non-sequential [The "alternative trajectories (reversible)" model] (802).Low support (ranked 4th/6)
Societies change their political organization (increase or decrease) in any way (sequential or non-sequential) [The "full" model] (802).Low support (ranked 3rd/6)
Documents and Hypotheses Filed By: erik.ringen