The relationship between population, and more importantly population density, and the amount of resources available to that population clearly are factors that impact all human societies. For hunter-gatherers, it is relatively easy to balance population against the resource base by fissioning - splitting the group up into two smaller groups. Human bands also use marriage relationships (alliances) to create means for accessing resources in periods of shortage in their own territory. These arrangements tend to reduce conflict leaving groups such as the bushman relatively free of rivalry for resources.
As human societies began to settle down and begin to exploit their environment differently, there are significant changes that lead to craft specialization, trade and exchange, and ultimately wealth - the accumulation of status positions by a few members of society. In the following case, we can see how high status burials begin to tell us that people are accumulating wealth and wealth is beginning to be distributed unevenly within societies. 
As households became the primary social and economic unit, storage became important, and the sharing ethic within cultures began to fade. There was increasing opportunity for variability in household wealth. There is relatively little indication of wealth differences in early farming villages throughout the world, and some social levelling mechanisms (such as feasting and hospitality) helped to prevent accumulation of wealth at first. "Levelling mechanisms" functioned to counteract trends towards inequality. For example, polygamy has been discussed as having a levelling function, as more wives would mean more children and consequently the eventual fragmentation of the wealthy producers' assets. A "bigman" is someone responsible for feasting and the redistribution of surplus. This is particularly evident in New Guinea societies where bigmen play an important role in controlling the surplus of pigs.
In studies of peasant agriculture, there has been increasing recognition of the extent of wealth differences within communities and their effects on production parameters. There are richer farmers who have entirely different economic aims from poorer farmers. It is recognized that wealthy farmers have differential access to land, labour, animal inputs (traction and manure) and credit, to name a few important production parameters. Wealthier farmers can have different attitudes toward risk and innovation than their poorer counterparts.
The potential for accumulating surplus, the need to buffer risk, and the weakening of the egalitarian ethic may have led to the use of feasting and hospitality to gain status. For a bigman, it is the respect that society gives that motivates him. He does not have outright status but gains recognition and that drives his willingness to work for society. In effect, however, it elevates him even though he remains poor. It is possible to think that "competitive feasing" was a major impetus to increasing social inequality that would lead to greater and greater inequality.
Why did some people acquire more wealth than others? Clearly one of the major factors in developing inequity in wealth distribution was to take place as societies settled down. Naturally, forces that would leave some with more favorable access to good land and resources would make it possible for wealth to accumulate in the hands of some and not others. Another factor is a change in society itself. Some people went from being farmers to artisans, traders, and pot manufacturers. Here, they could as specialists, begin to acquire wealth that farmers could not.
Brian Fagan (reading on ancient Egypt) likens this to a game of Monopoly in which each player maximizes the opportunities thrown out by the dice. Both individuals and entire villages took full advantage of favorable locations; access to desirable resources, such as potting clay or gold mines; and chance breaks that came their way. These communities, like Monopoly players, were basically equal opportunists. Inevitably someone, or some hamlet, gained an unforeseen advantage, either from trading expertise, or unusually high crop yields - better farm land with higher yields or incentives that were higher. Equilibrium gave way to the inevitable momentum, where some communities acquired more wealth and more political power than their neighbors the ancient equivalent of building Monopoly hotels on Park Avenue. Their victory made possible a monopoly over local trade, food surpluses, and other commodities, which overrode any possible threat posed by other political or economic players. In the process, individuals within those communities gained certain advantages and began to accumulate wealth that others did not.
Hundreds of Monopoly "games" unfolded. As generations passed, the number of players decreased and the stakes increased as progressively wealthier and more powerful people vied for economic power and political dominance. Players changed some acquired great influence, then lost it as charismatic individuals died or trading opportunities ended. Out of this came "winners" who possessed not only wealth but power. An unequal society was born. An egalitarian way of life gave way to a stratified and hierarchical one. The way in which leaders might be judged may have been based on the fairness by which they redistributed wealth back into society, but the fundamental inequality found within this new way of life was to inevitably be wrought with difficulties. Marx has pointed out how inequities in the distribution of wealth can lead to social upheaval. It really does mean that society must always address how effective rulers might be by how well they address the needs of people who are dependent upon their redistribution. Tax rebates in our world today are a way for politicians to make people feel better about their lives. How well leaders managed and redistributed community, and ultimately state resources, was always to be a critical factor in judging their effectiveness.
Moving from monopoly to something slightly different, George Carlin has a comedy routine called "stuff". The following is a brief clip taken from this routine. Listen to Carlin as he talks about what our possessing "stuff" limiting our ability to move around so easily. Hunter-gatherers do not have a lot of "stuff" to carry nor do they have large families. Possessions come from settling down and as Carlin puts it so nicely - they increase and we have more and more "stuff" Think about the significance in your life today and how we do have an entire "industry" created for the storage of "stuff".
|
|
Finally, we can see the effects of unequal distribution of wealth in many ways even today. We have more millionaires today in the United States but the wealth of America is held by fewer people percentage wise than ever before. The real wealthy are fewer proproportionately today. The following is an interesting case study of the impact of how wealth and the distribution of it create societal issues for us today
Great Divide Widens as Economy Worsens
.