Economies and
Their Modes of
Production
Modes of Production
Cross-Culturally
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Examines society’s way of
producing goods, food, and
services.
Also examines the rules about
ownership and control of
resources.
2 major elements to examining
production:
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Ownership/control rules.
Type of technology used.
Modes of Production
Foraging: aka hunting and gathering
Horticulture, aka swidden farming
Pastoralism
Agriculture: Intensive
Industrialism
SummaryReasons for Production
Foraging
Horticulture
Production for use
Pastoralism
Agriculture
Industrialism
Production for profit
Division of Labour
Family based
Class based
Property Relations
Egalitarian/collective
Stratified/private
Resource Use
Extensive/temporary
Intensive/expanding
Sustainability
High degree
Low degree
Foraging, or hunting &
gathering
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Based on using food provided by nature
– gathering, fishing, hunting
– emerged at least 300 000 years ago
– Major mode of production for 95% of human history.
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Maintains balance between resources and
lifestyle
Often nomadic, as people move to follow food
resources.
Relies upon large areas of land and spatial
mobility.
Usually egalitarian, since property cannot be
accumulated and stored.
Overturning old biases:
the myth of hunting scarcity
• Until the 1960s, many anthropologists assumed
that foragers lived insecure lives, since they
had been pushed onto marginal environments.
• Lee: overturned 3 major assumptions:
– i. that hunting provided the major source of food.
– Ii. that ‘hunters’ had to spend the majority of their
time securing food.
– Iii. That women were not involved in subsistence
activities.
The Dobe !Kung in the
1960s-1970s
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Inhabit the semi-arid northwest region of the Kalahari desert in nw Botswana.
14 camps, each linked to a waterhole, consisting of 466 people.
Even during a drought year, subsistence was secure.
Vegetable foods, esp. mongongo nuts, provide 60-80% of their diet.
Women mainly gathered, hence provided the major food inputs for the group.
Hunted game animals were less secure, but more highly valued.
Average work week was 2.5 days.
Children, adolescents and the elderly did not work. 10% of the population were
elderly.
Caloric and protein intakes were comparable to diets in richer, industrialized
countries.
Average distance for gathering and/or hunting was 6 miles.
Regular rhythms of work and leisure.
Men often did not hunt for weeks, but spent their time as ritual specialists, esp.
organizing trance dances, a major form of healing.
“Man the Hunter”
versus
“Woman the Gatherer”
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Many early anthropologists emphasized the role of males
as the dominant provider in foraging groups.
However most everyday food is gathered by women
(Slocum 1975), i.e. women provide the staple food.
– Women are also involved in important band decisions.
Both women and men are involved in child-rearing.
However, in situations where the !Kung have taken up
farming, women become much more confined to the
home and to domestic activities.
Horticulture, also called swidden
or slash and burn agriculture
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Emerged about 14,000 bp
Defined as the cultivation of domesticated crops in gardens using
hand tools
May also involve domesticated animals.
– Domestication: the process by which the reproduction of plants
or animals becomes dependent on human intervention.
Crop yields can support denser populations than foraging, typically
associated with villages of between 500-2,000 people.
Constrained by time required for fallowing, swidden cultivation is
ecologically sound only when forests are left fallow to regenerate
their nutrients.
Found in many highland, tropical jungles, e.g. mesoamerica, south
america, india and southeast asia, parts of africa.
horticulture and social
organization
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An extended family forms the core work group.
Property in land is held usually by a kinship group,
e.g. a lineage or clan.
Kinship relations become dominant, unilineal
descent groups are common.
Technology involves gardening tools, plus
domestication, but not draught animals.
Work input increases in comparison with foraging;
and children work more in horticultural groups than
in foraging.
Pastoralism
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Based on the domestication of
animal herds and the use of their
products
Existed in Europe, Africa and Asia
Provides over 50% of group’s diet
– Pastoralists trade with other groups
to secure food and goods they can’t
produce
– Usually patrilineal.
Intensive Agriculture
Intensive strategy of production: defined by the use of draught animals
for ploughing, and irrigation.
– more labour, use of fertilizers, control of water supply, use of
animals
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Permanent settlements and wealth accumulation.
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Produce large surpluses, e.g. rice cultivation can produce 5X the
amount needed by a family.
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Heavy work input during peak periods of ploughing and harvesting.
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Associated with the emergence of individual property in land.
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Also linked to the rise of a complex division of labour, with artisans,
craftspeople, emerging to service the agricultural economy, paid in
kind or in cash by landowners.
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Differentiated from industrial farming, in that intensive agriculture
does not use mechanized inputs, e.g. tractors.
Main Types of
Agriculture
Peasant Farming
Plantations
Industrial
•1billion people
are involved in
family farming
•Used to grow tea,
coffee, rubber
•Capital-intensive
•Family based
•Clear gender
roles
•Large families
•More rigid class
distinctions
•Land rights can
be bought or sold
•Concentrated
ownership of land
•Hired labour
•Severe inequality
•Dominant in
former colonies
•Poor social
welfare for
workers
•Uses machines
instead of human
labour
•Used in
industrialized
countries
•Uses more
energy
•Decline of the
family farm
Intensive Agriculture - a good
move?
“Progressive” - Most Euro-Americans
think that agriculture is a major
advance in cultural evolution.
“Revisionist” - agriculture may be “the
worst mistake in the history of the
human race”
Industrialism
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The production of goods through mass
employment in business and commercial
operations
Capital-intensive; can be either privately or
state-owned.
Complex division of labour, goods are
produced for sale.
Employment increases in manufacturing
and service sectors
Formal and informal sections