This 1982 collection of eight original anthropological essays provides
an exciting synthesis of theory and practice in one of the key issues of
contemporary cultural evolutionary thought. The contributors ask why
complex, highly stratified societies emerged at several locations in the
New World at the same point in prehistory. Focusing primarily on the
initial centers of civilization in Mesoamerica and the Andean region,
they consider the sociopolitical, environmental and ideological factors
in state formation. The essays discuss the prehistoric conditions and
processes that simulated the development of the first state-level
societies in Mesoamerica and Peru, and explore the difficulties
archaeologists must face in their direct analysis of physical remains.
In general, the contributors recognize a growing need for better
archaeological solutions to the question of state origin and for more
sensitivity to the problems as well as to the possibilities of
ethnographic analogy.