SPECIAL FEATURE: PERSPECTIVE PERSPECTIVE SPECIAL FEATURE: Theories of ethnicity and the dynamics of ethnic change in multiethnic societies Richard E. Blanton1 Department of Anthropology, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907 Edited by Linda R. Manzanilla, Universidad Nacional Autonóma de México, Mexico, D.F., Mexico, and approved February 13, 2015 (received for review November 7, 2014) I modify Fredrik Barth’s approach, which sees ethnic group building as a signaling system, to place it within a framework that draws from collective action and costly signaling theories. From these perspectives, ethnic signaling, although representing a costly penalty to group members, is one effective form of communication that facilitates collective management of resources. I then identify three contexts in which the benefits of ethnic group building are likely to outweigh its signaling costs: in politically chaotic refuge and periphery zones; in the context of long-distance specialist trading groups; and within the territorial scope of failed states. I point to selected data from the Mughal and Aztec polities to illustrate how a combination of effective public goods management, in highly collective states, and the growth of highly integrated commercial economies will render ethnic group building superfluous. ethnicity | collective action | costly signaling Early in the 20th century, anthropologists tures or regions are understood to reflect to such evolution” (ref.8,p.108).Thekey turned to a focus on culture as a challenge to the distribution of a people and thus are problem, Geertz argues, is found in the fact thebiologicallyreductionistracethinkingof ethnically labeled, for example, as “Sumerian” that, within the boundaries of the new states, 19th century evolutionists. This strong cul- and “Akkadian” in early Mesopotamia, or there are groups in which attachment to tural program, promoted by Franz Boas and “Zapotec” or “Mixtec” in the pre-Hispanic one’s culture can be understood to constitute his followers, was influenced by a German Valley of Oaxaca, despite evidence for im- a “natural” or “primordial” state of human tradition tracing its origins to Romanticists, migration and ethnic pluralism [early Mes- experience. Local attachments persist de- such as Johann Gottfried Herder, and their opotamian city-states were demonstrably spite nation-building projects, he argues, “Aufklärer” followers of the 19th century (1). pluralistic according to Yoffee (ref. 3, p. 49); because such attachments are more natural This group opposed ideas of British Enlight- Blanton et al. (ref. 4, p. 41) and Flannery and than national-scale attachments owing to enment authors, such as John Locke, who Marcus (5) point to the possibility for im- the “great extent to which a peoples’ sense of argued that a society, as a commonwealth, migration and pluralism in the Valley of self remains bound up in the gross actualities ideally is the product of socially purposed Oaxaca]. In this regard, it is also worth men- of blood, race, language, locality, religion, institution building. In the Romantic re- tioning how episodes of social and cultural or tradition.... To subordinate these specific action, society is understood less in terms change have been understood as the result of and familiar identifications in favor of a of rational social action and institution large-scale invasions of new dominant cul- generalized commitment to an overarching building and more in terms of a people’s tural groups. For example, we see this device and somewhat alien civil order is to risk a shared origins and history, and an emo- in the Mesopotamian historical and archae- loss of definition as an autonomous person, tional attachment to their culture, language, ological literatures when change episodes are either through absorption into a culturally and local territory (2). Boasians drew inspi- attributed to invasions by various groups, undifferentiated mass or, what is even worse, ration from Romanticism to make the argu- including Amorites, Canaanites, and Hyksos, through domination by some other rival ment that even though there might some an approach critiqued by Kamp and Yoffee ethnic, racial, or linguistic community that is diffusion of culture traits across societal (ref. 6, p. 97). And Cohen (ref. 7, p. 381) able to imbue that order with the temper of boundaries, still, each cultural unit or “tribe” finds, in other branches of anthropology, its own personality” (ref.8,pp.108–109). (in the case of smaller scale societies) was a tendency toward overly simplistic ethnic There are instances in which belonging is understood to develop a distinct social, lin- labeling that ignores ethnic plurality. couched in the language of blood and kin guistic, and cultural configuration shared by The strong cultural program is on full (e.g., ref. 9, p. 27). However, does a primor- its members. What I call a strong cultural view in the theory of state dynamics de- dial sensibility preclude rational social action? program proved to be a source of disciplinary veloped by Clifford Geertz (8). Here, he In the case of Geertz’s sense of primordialism, unity for decades but eventually proved to be addresses the role played by local tribal cul- theanswerseemstobeyes,buthisviewis problematic in the way it ignored the role of tures in the dynamics of postcolonial states problematic in identifying distinct categories human agency in social group building. inAfricaandinSouthandSoutheastAsia. of persons I roughly label as “rational” and As he argues, a tension between cultural “tribal.” On the rational side, the goal of The Strong Cultural Program in heterogeneity, counted as regionalism, re- Archaeology and in Theories of State- ligion, language, or tribe, on the one hand, Building and the need for a civil order, on the other, is Author contributions: R.E.B. wrote the paper. We can see the impact of the strong cultural “one of the central driving forces in the na- The author declares no conflict of interest. program on 20th century archaeological prac- tional evolution of the new states; as it is, at This article is a PNAS Direct Submission. tice, for example, when archaeological cul- thesametime,oneofthegreatestobstacles 1Email: [email protected]. www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1421406112 PNAS Early Edition | 1of6 Downloaded by guest on September 28, 2021 social actors is to construct civil order but behavior that illustrates a selfish disre- signaling is productively understood as one based on notions of democratic modernity. gard for collective benefit is also rational. As form of “costly signaling” (e.g., ref. 21) or The tribal peoples, by contrast, mired in Mancur Olson (14) pointed out, humans “reputational signaling,” notions that pro- primordial emotional attachments to “the have difficulty cooperating because rational vide us with one way to understand how gross actualities of blood, race, language, individuals may not act in the common in- signals may be evaluated in terms of their locality religion, or tradition” seem to be terest (15) and, as a result, to construct a probable validity and thus enhance trust. lacking in rational social agency. I also socially purposed cooperative group entails This idea, first proposed by Zahavi (22), suggest that Geertz’sschemeerrsinviewing problem-solving strategies of institution points out that signals that are costly to the postcolonial state building in terms of a sin- building with the goal to foster cooperative signaler (i.e., that are a handicap) will be gular notion of political modernity, when, in behavior. perceived as having more reliability and reality, state building, whether modern or From this perspective, ethnic construction thus are more likely to enhance trust than premodern, exhibits a wide range of varia- can be considered as one possible institutional lower cost signals. Ethnic signaling also is tion in form, function, political goals, and the strategy suited to the establishment of a so- an ideal form of intragroup communication ability to enact goals (10). I return to that cially purposed cooperative group. Accord- and trust building because ethnically based point below in Ethnicity Within the Fabric ing to collective action theory, organizing signals, especially when considering such of a Complex Society. for common defense and for the cooperative factors as language competency, are difficult management of resources will be the most to fake. A person who obviously has made Fredrik Barth and the Critique of the pressing problems requiring institution the kind of deep commitment to a way of Strong Cultural Program building. Resource management might in- living is likely to be understood as a person The key turning point in anthropological clude the goal to maintain control over and who also embraces those moral values of thinking about culture and ethnicity came sustainably manage finite “common pool” a group that undergird cooperation. from Fredrik Barth’s brief but very useful resources, as in the case of the nomadic An approach that emphasizes signaling introduction to “Ethnic Groups and Bound- pastoralist Pathan tribes Barth studied (16), and, especially, the cost of signaling has two aries” (11). Barth proposed that we rethink or to manage a “public goods” system where advantages for understanding ethnic group culture from the vantage point of how social the cooperative goal is to gain mutual benefit building. First, there is a material dimension action drives the formation of ethnic groups from jointly produced resources. In both to signaling (Wobst’s stylistic messaging), that are aimed to “organize interaction” for cases, because mutual benefits are gained which is suited to archaeological methodol- a social purpose (ref. 11, p. 10). Typically, in from the devoted efforts of other group ogy (ref. 23, pp. 173–195). Second, to evalu- ethnic groups, a sense of belonging is created members in tandem with one’s own efforts, ate cost raises an important question for through the symbolism of blood relations a group’s members will make mutual claims consideration: Under what social conditions andsharedhistory.However,toBarth,sym- of accountability with respect to each other.