Chapter 1. Successive Reequilibrations as the Mechanism of Cultural Evolution
Chapter 2. Structure, Function, and Equilibrium in the Evolutionism of Herbert Spencer
Chapter 3. The Transition from Quantity to Quality: A Neglected Causal Mechanism in Accounting for Social Evolution
Chapter 4. A Reappraisal of the Roles of Technology and Organization in the Origin of Civilization
Chapter 5. Ascertaining, Testing, and Interpreting Sequences of Cultural Development
Chapter 6. Stellar Evolution and Social Evolution: A Study in Parallel Processes
Chapter 7. The Nature of the Chiefdom as Revealed by Evidence from the Cauca Valley of Colombia
Chapter 8. What Happened at the Flashpoint? Conjectures on Chiefdom Formation at the Very Moment of Conception
Chapter 9. Process vs. Stages: A False Dichotomy in Tracing the Rise of the State
Chapter 10. Was the Chiefdom a Congelation of Ideas?
Chapter 11. A Theory of the Origin of the State
Chapter 12. The Circumscription Theory: Challenge and Response
Chapter 13. Political Expansion as an Expression of the Principle of Competitive Exclusion

Conclusion

Bibliography
Index

Carneiro

The Concise Evolutionary Essays

Edited by Robert Bates Graber

Foreword by Janet M. Chernela

276 pages, 13 ills., bibliog., index

ISBN 978-1-80539-837-0 Hb Published (March 2026)

eISBN 978-1-80539-838-7
web ISBN 978-1-80539-838-7

Details

“This book presents a number of important papers, previously published, by the respected anthropologist and proponent of cultural evolution, Robert L. Carneiro.” • Janet Chernela, University of Maryland

“The volume is especially useful in bringing to light quite a few of Carneiro’s works that have not got the attention they perhaps deserve…as the preface makes clear, [ ] Carneiro himself structured the chapter sequence, which gives the chapters a coherence, Carneiro’s personal imprimatur, and historical value as a document reflecting how he saw his ideas develop through his career.” • Paul Roscoe, University of Maine

Robert L. Carneiro is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in anthropology in the twentieth century, best known for “A Theory of the Origin of the State” (1970). His efforts throughout his career brought cultural evolutionism from its nineteenth-century origins into the twenty-first century. This book is comprised of thirteen essays, ordered and balanced according to Carneiro’s own conceptual arrangement, and aims to contribute to revitalizing this durable, illuminating theoretical perspective for current and future generations of students and anthropologists.

Robert Bates Graber is Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at Truman State University. He also taught at Millsaps College and held a visiting position with the University of Missouri’s Department of Anthropology. His books include A Scientific Model of Social and Cultural Evolution, and Meeting Anthropology Phase to Phase.

Subject: Anthropology (General) Archaeology

berghahn New York · Oxford

Contents

Carneiro

The Concise Evolutionary Essays

Edited by Robert Bates Graber

Foreword by Janet M. Chernela

Subject: Anthropology (General) Archaeology

Area:

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Contents

Carneiro

The Concise Evolutionary Essays

Edited by Robert Bates Graber

Foreword by Janet M. Chernela

Subject: Anthropology (General) Archaeology

Area: