Societies Past and Present

This global and comparative history examines the evolution of human societies over many millennia, illuminating patterns within societies today. It shows how the original human groups, bands of hunter-gatherers, grew over time into larger and more complex societies through three major transformations: settlement and domestication, the development of complexity and inequality, and industrial globalization. The book describes how each of these major changes in economy and political structure created new types of societies: villages; chiefdoms and other complex societies; agrarian states and empires; and today’s global social system. It therefore shows how different types of societies came to co-exist and interact on Earth.

The book compares societies along seven aspects: their economies, political systems, cultural patterns, inequalities, family structures, demographics, and environmental patterns. It shows that even societies that shared similar basic features still exhibited great variety. The comparative framework presented here helps readers develop a conceptual vocabulary for understanding societies, the larger social systems within which they exist, and the major social changes that led to this continuing expansion.