Grant Lee states that though stateless, he is unsure whether they (say traditional Australian) were egalitarian or marketless. He also points out they had landed property.
However it is a point of view based on missing the theoretical meanings of the terms being used. Sydney aboriginals had estates to which they belonged (not the other way round - Tench 1788 merely inteprets Bennalong in terms of his own understanding), what is being actually stated is that he is an owner of some isalnds where he has the right to perform its ceremeonies (he has its dreaming), there would be another person who is the manager of the same estate (who has the right to organise such ceremonies). Economic access to the land was based on kinship and invitation, while taboos applied to some uses depending on various relationships, seasons and other signs. The right may well be shared by a number of related individuals (brothers and sisters) who may well lay well outside a biological family. In no way can this be viewed as property as we know it - it could not be used, abused or alienated at will, in fact everything to do with the land was regulated by custom and the who! le was finely balanced to ensure relative plenty.
As for being marketless, for a market to function some form of surplus is required. Barter of goods, exchanges via gift were the very oil that lubricated such societies - but no surplus was produced merely the exchange of equal amounts of necessary labour-time. The confusion here arises because this is the foundation for a market, but barter (which still takes place all around the world) is merely a means for supporting a division of labour - only when the exchange produces surplus is there a market.
As far as being elegatiarian, aboriginal society was strictly divided, but as no-one benefited from a surplus all enjoyed the fruits of the collective labour - by definition this is egalitarianism the fact that individuals did not have the same role is not the point, age, sex and kin were vital defining points as to the division of labour. The fact that things were complex does not equate to them being non-egalitarian.
Greg Schofield Perth Australia
--- Message Received --- From: "Grant Lee" <grantlee at iinet.net.au> To: "LBO-Talk" <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Date: Wed, 21 Nov 2001 10:54:28 +0800 Subject: Re: Pre-historic human societies Brett:
They certainly were "stateless", but I'm not sure about "egalitarian" or "marketless".
I think there is a lot of evidence suggesting cultural hierarchies based on gender, age and heredity -- apart from the implications of individual physical strength.
The predominant forms of exchange may have been non-market, but exchange did occur. Moreover, forms like potlatch have a clear potential for petty accumulation.
Apart from these, there were also forms of "landed property"; the notion that hunter gatherers were "propertyless" was certainly convenient for settlers in the Americas, Africa and the South Pacific. However studies of Australian hunter-gatherers have shown inequalties in access to hunting grounds/animal populations/foraging areas, based on heredity.
When the English diarist Watkin Tench met the famous Aboriginal leader, Bennelong sometime around 1790, Bennelong pointed out the islands that he _and_he_alone_ owned in Sydney Harbour. "They have their real estates", Tench commented.
I also think you're quite right about the "quality of life" indicators like life expectancy, diet, lesiure time and so on, in comparison to Europeans of the early modern era, anyway.