Primitive war: concepts and historical contexts

Anthropology

Marvin Harris on the Cultural Materialist explanation for warfare ("Primitive War" in Cows, Pigs, Wars, & Witches)

American anthropologist Marvin Harris discusses the cultural materialist perspective of anthropology in explaining the occurrence of warfare among primitive societies in "Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches." In his exploration and study of different cultures in the world such as India, Brazil, Venezuela, among others, he emphasizes the role the structure and mode of production plays in the prevalence of warfare and the dominance of males within these societies (that is, the development of a patriarchal society).

Cultural materialism stems from Karl Marx's study of the political economies of industrial societies. Marvin Harris, following this Marxian tradition, intends to explain cultures in the world as dependent on their respective histories and economies. Cultural materialism posits that social activity is largely derived from structures within society (of which the terms "infrastructure," "structure," and "superstructure" are used to distinguish among the levels extant in a society). Structures determine the norms, ideas, and values held important by the society, which also largely determines the rituals and activities that they conduct in everyday life.

Another important aspect of cultural materialism is determining the mode of production in a society. In identifying the mode of production, it is essential to identify what is the basic economic resource of a society, who cultivates and produces these resources, and who controls the tools or materials in which these economic resources are produced. Evidently, identifying the mode of production also leads the researcher to identify who is in control or power in the society and it is usually the owners or controllers of the mode of production that dominates in it (society).

The same principle applies in Harris' discussion of warfare among primitive societies. He states that warfare is a social activity that has the objective of decreasing and redistributing the population. This is in the context where hunter-gathering societies evolve to become sedentary and agricultural, wherein the increase in population necessitates an increase in food production. However, an increase in food production is not always possible or is sometimes not agreeable to the environmental condition, and warfare becomes the solution through which societies are able to have just the sufficient number of people (or population) for the limited food supply available.