The Capital, Government, and Revolution

[DinodudeEpic]

Chapter 1



The History of Economies

Before economies, human means of production were controlled by Patriarchs and Matriarchs who own families that were scattered across the globe. There was no trade in any form, just getting, using, and storing food.

Economy was first invented as a very primitive system. It had a barter system for distributing goods, where cattle and goat were traded for wheat and apple. There was no authority that would restrict the passage of goods, and the deals are informal. The men hunted while the women gathered, they would share it among their families, but not with the other people of the tribe. There would be barter deals every now and then, but they never were anything formal.

This system can be best known as the Tribal system(Tribalism), and it lasted roughly from the beginnings of human economics to around 4000 BC. It did have variations across the world depending on the tribe and culture involved, but the basics remain the same. A barter system of distributing goods, division of labor into 2 categories, and a family based system. Note that they are some tribes that evolved systems that have some features of communism, but those were isolated and don't meet all the criteria of communism.

A ruling class then arised from the system pretty quickly since it first began. They mostly were tribal chieftains that managed to not get overthrown by jealous tribesmen. They also arised separately and mostly never saw each other. In that sense, the ruling class consists of 1 person and his family per tribe.

Various practices were starting to be developed near the end of Tribalism; the development of Agriculture, the use of copper, and other events caused the division of labor to include even more roles. Also as some tribes fused via wars, social contracts, and/or growth in size, the ruling class per settlement increased in number in order to manage the tribe better. An aristocracy is slowly forming, ending the age of Tribalism, and beginning the age of Barterism.

(I'm making political theory piece by piece, but you can discuss about the theory in here.)

[Tommy4ever]

Whilst I am less sure of how the ruling class first emerged in society amongst tribals I believe the first true ruling class only came about with the advent of the city and of civilisation.

After people began to settle down into agriculture (some of then building cities) they tended to live in primitive communist societies in which everyone went out to do the same work in the fields and everyone got their fair share.

The two main elements of the ruling class to emerge from this society were the religious and secular powers. Those who controlled religion and those who controlled the defense of the new settlements (these civilised and propserous outposts were obviously a big target for any wandering peoples looking for easy gains and for other settled peoples looking for more land). There were also bureaucratic elements that were tied to the distribution of food.

So that's where the ruling class emerged. I'm not sure if you could call tribal leaders a ruling class. They are basically 'first citizens' rather than a full blown ruling class.

[DinodudeEpic]

Well, tribal society varies from place to place. Most tribal leaders are despots with absolute power however. But, they usually get beaten by some 'stronger' usurper. Note that some tribal societies may have council-like structures, but those would be more like primitive oligarchies. The most common system at the time was bartering, stealing, sharing the stuff amongst your tribe/family, and/or getting the stuff yourself.

Also, there was division of labor to an limited extent. But, to say that primitive societies were actually communist is pretty absurd, since the workers didn't actually own the means of production. (Which is required of socialism and communism. The Tribal Chieftain and his family still works, but none of the other workers own the tribe.)

(Yes, I think Marx was horribly wrong in the idea of 'primitive communism'.)

[Tim Finnegan]

Well, tribal society varies from place to place. Most tribal leaders are despots with absolute power however. But, they usually get beaten by some 'stronger' usurper. Note that some tribal societies may have council-like structures, but those would be more like primitive oligarchies. The most common system at the time was bartering, stealing, sharing the stuff amongst your tribe/family, and/or getting the stuff yourself.

Also, there was division of labor to an limited extent. But, to say that primitive societies were actually communist is pretty absurd, since the workers didn't actually own the means of production. (Which is required of socialism and communism. The Tribal Chieftain and his family still works, but none of the other workers own the tribe.)

(Yes, I think Marx was horribly wrong in the idea of 'primitive communism'.)
I think you may be trying to apply Marx's "primitive communism" too broadly, rather than it being a flawed concept in itself. Marx referred only to the most basic human social forms, comprised of small, largely nomadic kinship-groups, rather than simply referring to all "early" or "pre-state" social formations. Tribal chieftains, while not necessarily forming a ruling class as such, still possess tributary privileges that demand a certain level of material development which human societies must attain, rather than simply possessing from the start. Prior to that stage, the closest you get to "chieftains" are patriarchal (or, in some cases, matriarchal) figures whose authority is largely informal and based on social influence, rather than a formal tributary office. (Marshall Sahlins calls the distinction that between chieftainship and a "Big Man (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_man_%28anthropology%29)" system, taking as his illustration the complex hierarchies of chiefs and sub-chiefs found among the simple cultivators of the Polynesian islands, and the hunter-gatherer societies of the indigenous Papuans, the latter of which come very close to Marx's conception of "primitive communism".)

I think there's a tendency for Marxists to extend "primitive communism" to something interchangeable with "tribal-" or "clan-society", a major over-simplification, which may perhaps be why you've come to your conclusions? The former does presuppose kinship groups as the primary social institution, but that institution is merely characteristic of that social formation, rather than being indicative of it, and are found in some form or another in a great many pre-capitalist formations- capitalism by its nature disallowing such institutions to persist in anything but a ceremonial fashion.