ArticleHuman nature (Hawthorne, N.Y.)2020
Why Class Formation Occurs in Humans but Not among Other Primates : A Primate Coalitions Model.
Article in Human nature (Hawthorne, N.Y.), 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 18 citations in OpenAlex.
- Gendered motives for group formidability among children and adults.Nature human behaviour · 2026Article
- Models of animal coalitions and their implications for human evolution.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2024Article
- Whither dominance? An enduring evolutionary legacy of primate sociality.Personality neuroscience · 2024Review
- Modelling the role of environmental circumscription in the evolution of inequality.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Validating the dual evolutionary foundations of political values in a US sample.Frontiers in psychology · 2023Article
- Gains to cooperation drive the evolution of egalitarianism.Nature human behaviour · 2021Article
- Coalitions and conflict: A longitudinal analysis of men's politics.Evolutionary human sciences · 2021Article
- The Marginal Utility of Inequality : A Global Examination across Ethnographic Societies.Human nature (Hawthorne, N.Y.) · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Most human societies exhibit a distinct class structure, with an elite, middle classes, and a bottom class, whereas animals form simple dominance hierarchies in which individuals with higher fighting ability do not appear to form coalitions to "oppress" weaker individuals. Here, we extend our model of primate coalitions and find that a division into a bottom class and an upper class is inevitable whenever fitness-enhancing resources, such as food or real estate, are exploitable or tradable and the members of the bottom class cannot easily leave the group. The model predicts that the bottom class has a near flat, low payoff and always comprises at least half the society. The upper class may subdivide into one or more middle class(es), resulting in improved payoff for the topmost members (elite). The model predicts that the bottom class on its own is incapable of mounting effective counter-coalitions against the upper class, except when receiving support from dissatisfied members of the middle class(es). Such counter-coalitions can be prevented by keeping the payoff to the lowest-ranked members of the middle classes (through concessions) well above that of the bottom class. This simple model explains why classes are also absent in nomadic hunter-gatherers and predominate in (though are not limited to) societies that produce and store food. Its results also agree well with various other known features of societies with classes.
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