Primitive communism

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Primitive communism is a way of describing the

Ely S. Parker

Lewis H. Morgan

The original idea of primitive communism is rooted in the idea of the noble savage present in the works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau^[4] and the early anthropological work of Morgan and Ely S. Parker.^[5][6][7] Engels was the first to write about primitive communism in detail, with the 1884 publication of The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State.^[5][8] Engels categorised primitive communist societies into two phases: the "wild" (hunter-gatherer) phase that lacked permanent superstructure and had close relationships with the natural world, and the "barbarian" phase which held a superstructure like that of the ancient Germanic populations beyond the borders of the Roman Empire^[6] and the Indigenous peoples of North America before colonisation by Europeans,^[9] being intra-communally egalitarian and matrilineal within the community.^[6]

Marx and Engels used the term more broadly than Marxists did later, and applied it not only to hunter-gatherers but also to some communities that engaged in

Anarchists, including Peter Kropotkin and Élisée Reclus, believed that societies that exemplified primitive communism were also examples of anarchist society before industrialisation.^[14] An example of this is Kropotkin's anthropological work on anarchism and gift economies, Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution, which uses a study of the San people of southern Africa for its thesis.^[15]

There was little development in the research of "primitive communism" among Marxist scholars beyond Engels' study until the 20th and 21st centuries when

From the 20th century onward, sociologists and archaeologists have looked at the application of the term of primitive communism to hunter-gatherer societies of the paleolithic through to horticultural societies of the Chalcolithic,^[28][29] including Paleo-American societies from the lithic stage through the archaic period.^[30] Soviet archaeologists, influenced by Morgan's and Engels' works, interpreted the various paleolithic cultures that created Venus figures, many of which were found in the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 1930s, as evidence of the societies being primitive communist and matriarchal in nature.^[31][32][33] The psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich concluded in 1931^[34][35] the existence of an early communism from the information in Bronisław Malinowski's work.^[36] However, Malinowski and the philosopher Erich Fromm did not consider this conclusion to be compelling.^[37] Ernest Borneman supported Reich's ideas in his 1975 work Das Patriarchat.^[38][39]

Primitive communist societies

Characteristics

In a primitive communist society, the

Papers have argued that the depiction of hunter-gatherers as egalitarian is misleading. According to one paper published in Current Anthropology, while levels of inequality were low, they were still present, with the average hunter-gatherer group having a Gini coefficient of 0.25 (for comparison, this was attained by the nation of Denmark in 2007).^[61] This argument is in part supported by Alain Testart and others, who have said that a society without property is not free from problems of exploitation,^[62] domination^[63] or wars.^[64] Marx and Engels, however, did not argue that communism brought about equality, as according to them equality was a concept without connection in physical reality.^[65] Testart does support Engels' observations that societies without surplus are economically egalitarian and conversely that societies with surplus are unequal.^[66][67][68]

Due to the strong evidence of an egalitarian society, lack of hierarchy, and lack of economic inequality, historian

The Indian communist politician Shripad Amrit Dange considered ancient Indian society to be of a primitive communist nature.^[83] Other communists within India have also labelled the societies of current indigenous groups, such as the Adivasi, as examples of primitive communism.^[84] In Alfred Radcliffe-Brown's study of the Andamanese at the beginning of the 20th century he comments that they have "customs which result in an approach to communism" and "their domestic policy may be described as a communism".^[85]

Alexander Mikhailovich Zolotarev [ru], in his 1960 work on the development of religious cult communities from tribal communities in the Balkans, spoke of the primitive communism of the "archaic form of the tribal system".^[86]

Rolf Jensen in the 1980s conducted a historical study of Wolof society in west Africa looking at the development of class antagonisms from a primitive communist society.^[87] Also in the 1980s, Bourgeault looked at the forceful transition of indigenous societies in Canada from their traditional structures, which were anarchist and communistic in nature, into capitalist exploitation due to encroaching imperialism and colonialism.^[88][18][89] Such an area of interest has been a common topic of research for many fields beyond just Marxist scholars.^[90] Some anthropologists, such as John H. Moore, have continued to argue that societies such as those of Native Americans constitute primitive communist societies, whilst acknowledging and incorporating the research showing the complexity and diversity in native American societies.^[91][92]

James Connolly believed that "Gaelic primitive communism" existed in remnants in Irish society after it "had almost entirely disappeared" from much of western Europe.^[93] The agrarian communes of the rundale system in Ireland have subsequently been assessed using a framework of primitive communism, where the system fits Marx and Engels' definition.^[94]

Soviet theorists and anthropologists, such as

Criticism of the idea of primitive communism relates to definitions of property, where anthropologists such as Margaret Mead argue that private property exists in hunter-gatherer and other "primitive societies" but provide examples that Marx and subsequent theorists label as personal property, not private property.^[98][99] Similar arguments have been made by other academics, such as the economist Richard Pipes.^[42] The idea has also been critiqued by other anthropologists for being based on Morgan's evolutionary model of society and for romanticising non‐Western societies.^[100]

Western and non-Western Scholars have criticised applying models that are too ethnocentrically European to non-European societies.^[101][44] Western scholars, including Leacock, have also criticised the ethnocentric point of view and biases in previous ethnographic research into hunter-gatherer societies.^[82] This is similar to criticism of adhering to stadialism in analysing cultures.^[102] Feminist scholars have criticised the idea of the lack of subjugation of women as suggested from the works of Engels,^[82][5] while Marxist feminists have been critical of and have reassessed Engels' ideas and suggestions in The Origin of the Family related to the development of women's subjugation in the transition from primitive communism to class society.^[103]

The Marxian economist Ernest Mandel criticised the research of Soviet scholars on primitive communism due to the influence of "Soviet-Marxist ideology" in their social sciences work.^[44][104]

David Graeber and David Wengrow's The Dawn of Everything challenges the notion that humans ever lived in precarious, small scale societies with little or no surplus. While they provide examples of sharing egalitarian societies in pre-history they claim that a huge variety of complex societies (some with large cities) existed long before the supposed agricultural and then urban revolutions proposed by V. Gordon Childe.^[72] Graeber and Wengrow's understanding of hunter-gatherer societies has, however, been questioned by other anthropologists.^{[105][106][107][108]}

Anthropologist Manvir Singh argued that while some indigenous groups, such as the Aché of Paraguay, exemplified primitive communism, this did not apply to all indigenous groups, such as the Hiwi, using the example of the unequal distribution of meat from hunting. Singh asserts that many hunter gatherers, including the Andaman Islanders and Northern Paiute, recognized private ownership over land and trees, and claims that all hunter gatherers had private property, but provides examples that Marx and subsequent theorists label as personal property, not private property, such as personal "bows, arrows, axes and cooking implements".^[109]

The use of the term "communism" to describe these societies has been questioned when put in comparison with a future post-industrial communism, particularly in relation to the difference in scale from small communal groups to the size of modern nation-states.^[110][111]

Use of the term "primitive"

"Primitive" in recent anthropological and social studies has begun to fall out of use due to racial stereotypes surrounding the ideas of what is primitive.^[112] Such a move has been supported by indigenous peoples who have faced racial stereotyping and violence due to being viewed as "primitive".^[113][114] Due to this, the term "primitive communism" may be replaced by terms such as Pre-Marxist communism.^[115]

Alain Testart and others have said that anthropologists should be careful when using research on current hunter-gatherer societies to determine the structure of societies in the paleolithic, where viewing current hunter-gatherer communities as "the most ancient of so-called primitive societies" is likely due to appearances and perceptions and does not reflect the progress and development that such societies have undergone in the past 10,000 years.^[116]

There have been Marxist historians criticised for their comments on the "primitivism" and "barbarism" of societies prior to their contact with European empires, such as the comments of Endre Sík. Such views on "primitivism" and "barbarism" are also prevalent in the works of their non-Marxist contemporaries.^{[117][118][119]} Marxist anthropologists have criticised and denounced Soviet anthropologists and historians for declaring indigenous communities they were studying for primitive communism as "degenerate".^[44]

See also

References