Four arguments about the origins of settled life can be classified according to the causal determinants postulated.
climatic change The ‘oasis’ or ‘propinquity’ theory holds that desiccation at the end of the Pleistocene forced people, plants and animals into smaller areas where permanent water was available (Pumpelly 1908; Childe 1942, 1951). This enforced juxtaposition led to symbiosis and domestication and in turn to food production which encouraged settling down. Later research in Southwest Asia by Braidwood (1952) concluded that there was little evidence of major climatic change and the observation that such change in the past had not resulted in the cultural developments postulated.
resource abundance/diversity A number of scholars, noting that macroenvironmental change may be insufficient as an explanation for the adoption of sedentism, have focused on such change at the micro-level. Coe and Flannery (1964: 651, 653; Flannery and Coe 1968) used ‘microenvironments’ and ‘microenvironment reduction’ to commentthat only a drastic reduction in the number of exploitable niches concentrated in space would have permitted full-time village life. With data drawn from research in the Tehuacan Valley and the Guatemalan Pacific coast, they noted that whereas after the appearance of agriculture groups remained nomadic in Tehuacan, coastal populations became
sedentary. A combination of effective food production and wild food resources from coastal lagoon-estuary systems facilitated year-round village occupation, negating the need for exploitation of a variety of ecological zones. Hitchcock (1982:228) saw these arguments reflected in mobility reduction research in both the Old and New Worlds. According to Sauer (1961:263-264), sedentism and utilisation of aquatic resources were correlated because fish and shellfish are both more abundant and predictable than terrestrial food resources.
The resource abundance argument is not restricted to aquatic resources. Birdsell (1968:239) and Bray (1976:83) pointed to many other situations where food resources were concentrated, citing the availability of acorns in California and dense stands of cereal grasses in Southwest Asia. Bender (1975:4, 7, 30) associated sedentism with “optimal environments” (i.e., zones of resource concentration) while Harris (1977:410) and Watanabe (1977:27) spoke of sites that provided access to resources sufficiently rich
and diverse within a small area to allow or encourage year-round occupation, ecotones with a number of different ecological zones in close proximity. Criticisms include first the question of why sedentism only emerged following the Pleistocene and not before during equally favourable environmental conditions and resource availability; second, as argued by Binford and Chasko (1976:139) and Schalk (1977:231), the availability of nucleated resources in large quantities was insufficient in itself to promote sedentism and must be coupled with storage in order for groups to remain residentially stable. Bender (1975:7) argued that food production replaced these most favourable conditions with another set and/or created one where it had not previously existed, extending the
potential for permanent settlement. As noted earlier, however, there were fully sedentary communities in regions without domestic plants and animals, and where nomadic groups persisted in spite of domesticated foods.
demographic This relates to characteristics of population that affect major
organisational change in subsistence and settlement systems: essentially in terms of food availability in response to environmental change on the one hand; and demographic structure resulting in impingement of one group on the territory of another on the other. Binford (1968a:330-336; Binford and Chasko 1976:137) has noted correlation between sedentism, population size and population density. Harris (1977:410) saw territorial confinement as a result either of environmental factors or of intergroup hostility as a possible factor in the emergence of sedentism. Similarly, Cohen (1977:83) argued that territorial impingement and resource depletion are factors. Flannery (1969:75, 78; 1972a:26) pointed out that at the time food production and settled life occurred in Southwest Asia, population was higher than ever before. One of the main criticisms of the population hypothesis is that population growth was regulated in every society and might have been expected to always stabilise at a level below that which would result in pressure on resources (Rafferty 1985:121).
social causality It is increasingly asserted that social motivation may have been the impetus for economic intensification rather than optimisation of ecological, demographic or utilitarian considerations. Of particular importance is Flannery's (1969) contention, as noted above, that, in the context of increasing population, differential access to strategic resources, including the means of production, was at the heart of ranked or stratified society, not agricultural success and a surplus.
Flannery (1972a:234-249) saw sedentism possibly beginning in response to changes in sociopolitical organisation. This was supported by Bender (1978b:204-213) who considered too much attention had been paid to technology and demography. She
suggested that the establishment and maintenance of social alliances was crucial to an understanding of systemic change, pointing outthat they served to maintain social relations and also both economic and political ends. Alliances, in turn, made demands on production, and in order for people to keep up reciprocal obligations they must produce foods and goods over and above their own needs. There is thus a direct link between evolving social institutions and increasing pressure on production. Furthermore, producing a surplus can involve delay in return, promoting sedentism since this encourages stability and investment in permanent facilities. Group cohesion was also engendered that required leadership to mediate in social conflicts. Community leaders often had a monopoly of social knowledge, including alliances rules, and were able to reinforce their own positions: “[t]he leader both promotes and permits sedentism”.
Bender (1985a:22) also saw “the internal potential for change present in all societies”. She has suggested that success might lie more in the ability of certain individuals to accumulate and transform food surplus into more valued items, such as rare stones and metals. Agriculture is thus viewed as a solution to a social problem. In support, Bruton (1975) cited the Trobriands who have neither exceptional population density nor agricultural production, viewing participation in a closed system of kula exchange as limiting the range of people who can effectively compete for leadership. Hayden (1990) argued specifically that the driving force behind food production was the competitive and feasting aspects of big-men rivalry, this resulting in the emergence of a few who
encouraged the creation of surplus.
A number of earlier researchers saw sedentism as the preferred way of life for human populations. Braidwood’s (1960:134) view was that once man became sufficiently familiar with his environment, he was able to settle down and produce food “there was no need to complicate the story with extraneous causes”. MacNeish (1972:88) added that over time people were able to accumulate more knowledge of the food potential of their environment. This increased familiarity with local habitats, supposedly allowing people to “settle into” their environments “with relatively greater intensity”. Later he spoke (1992:3-4) in terms of generalisations or laws being derived about the development of agriculture and the “concomitant evolution” of settled life. Binford (1968a:322, 328) termed such arguments “vitalist” in nature. He commented that they were orthogenetic in character and dependent upon “emergent human properties”, and considered the simple citing of human tendencies insufficient as an explanation for change. In his opinion, change such as food production and sedentism did not come about because people wanted them, but rather in response to particular pressures
necessitating such behavioural shifts. Certain conditions obtained during the terminal phase of the Pleistocene that differentially favoured increased use of resources such as anadromous fish, sea mammals, waterfowl and migratory herd mammals. These nucleated resources promoted a tendency toward reduced mobility in certain areas.
Beardsley et al. (1956:134) accepted that “in general, sedentary life has more survival value than wandering life to the human race; and that, other things being equal, whenever there is an opportunity to make the transition, it will be made”. This implies that humans necessarily recognise the best strategies and will always initiate changes to enhance their survival. From an evolutionary standpoint, however, it is clear that while natural
selection operates on choices made by groups, these were not always successful. Bender (1978b:207) saw cultural systems not dying but responding to changing circumstances through self-transforming properties “because variability is not geared simply to adaptive functioning. A given structure can have internal properties which are only resolved over time. Rather than societies being in equilibrium, they are always in a state of becoming”. Similarly, Joyce and Winter (1996) considered it crucial to understand the relationship social and cultural conditions. Theirs was a response to the perceived tendency to ignore the goal-driven behaviour of individuals as dynamic actors in a social process and the intersocietal conflict among them.
As noted, social causality has its critics. Those who consider societal evolution as being dependent on the interaction of many variables see in such models a general failure to confront this fact and explain relationships among them (e.g., Hitchcock 1982; Redman 1977; Harris 1977). A further problem for proposers of single-factor hypotheses is that while they have been able to cite evidence from particular locations, none find
widespread support. Hence the view that sedentism cannot be accounted for in terms of general theory, and that each case must be considered in terms of its particular locational nature. Such criticism is not surprising from researchers perceiving relationships between variables they regard as relevant. Harris (1977: 401-417) saw development of more complex societies as dependent on the interaction of a number of variables (i.e., population, environment, resource use and mobility). His principal concern was the circumstances under which the demographic equilibrium of a long-sustained pattern of hunter-gatherer mobility and population regulation broke down sufficiently to initiate evolutionary trends towards greater complexity of socioeconomic organisation. The MacNeish (1972:67-93) view was that in the Tehuacan Valley the transition to complex societies was due to multicausal factors, and occurred in a very definite sequence but seemed to have been a slow process. Hitchcock’s criticism (1982:227) of the social
causality approach was that it could lead to complacency, “lulling us into thinking that organisational changes are not in need of explanation”.