Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States - Paperback

$35.80

Availability: 27 left in stock

by James C. Scott (Author)

An account of all the new and surprising evidence now available that contradicts the standard narrative for the beginnings of the earliest civilizations

An Economist Best History Book 2017

"Scott is one of those rare academics whose writing is a thing of beauty."--Rana Dasgupta, The Week

"Scott hits the nail squarely on the head by exposing the staggering price our ancestors paid for civilization and political order."--Walter Scheidel, Financial Times

Why did humans abandon hunting and gathering for sedentary communities dependent on livestock and cereal grains, and governed by precursors of today's states? Most people believe that plant and animal domestication allowed humans, finally, to settle down and form agricultural villages, towns, and states, which made possible civilization, law, public order, and a presumably secure way of living. But archaeological and historical evidence challenges this narrative. The first agrarian states, says James C. Scott, were born of accumulations of domestications: first fire, then plants, livestock, subjects of the state, captives, and finally women in the patriarchal family--all of which can be viewed as a way of gaining control over reproduction.

Scott explores why we avoided sedentism and plow agriculture, the advantages of mobile subsistence, the unforeseeable disease epidemics arising from crowding plants, animals, and grain, and why all early states are based on millets and cereal grains and unfree labor. He also discusses the "barbarians" who long evaded state control, as a way of understanding continuing tension between states and nonsubject peoples.

Author Biography

James C. Scott (1936-2024) was Sterling Professor of Political Science and codirector of the Agrarian Studies Program at Yale University. His previous books include Domination and the Arts of Resistance, Seeing Like a State, and The Art of Not Being Governed.

Number of Pages: 336

Dimensions: 0.9 x 8.2 x 5.5 IN

Publication Date: July 24, 2018