Is technological/institutional diversity primarily the outcome of the quest after freedom and identity?

In The Dawn of Everything, Graeber and Wengrow (G–W) demonstrate the diversity of social structures, coined here “technological/institutional regimes” (TIRs), of the past 14 millennia. While G–W recognize the role of economic/ecological determinants, but only at secondary approximation. At first approximation, the motor behind the diversity of TIRs are two motives: i) the quest after freedom; and ii) the quest after cultural identity. This article argues that the set of the economic/ecological determinants is as important as the set of freedom/identity determinants. To assign a primary role to one set over the other amounts to reifying a false dichotomy.

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Published in: Reviews in Anthropology
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
See article on publisher's website: https://doi.org/10.1080/00938157.2024.2360776