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Decentralized Complexity: The Case of Bronze Age Northern Europe

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Pathways to Power

Part of the book series: Fundamental Issues in Archaeology ((FIAR))

Abstract

The concept of complexity demands theoretical elaboration, especially in regard to decentralized social formations such as the Bronze Age chiefdoms of northern Europe (Artursson 2008, Goldhahn 2005, Gröhn 2004, Kristiansen 2007, Kristiansen and Larsson 2005, Ling 2007, Nordenborg Myhre 2004). I propose that analysis of their political economy will help us understand how complex power structures operate in a decentralized social and economic environment that lacks many of the attributes of more clear-cut stratified, or complex, societies. These more complex groups normally evolve in environments where high productivity in nodal areas can be controlled and monopolized, whereas decentralized complexity normally operates in environments where productive resources are widespread and difficult to control from a single center.

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  1. University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

    Kristian Kristiansen

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  1. Kristian Kristiansen
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  1. Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1180 Observatory Drive Social Science Building, Madison, Wisconsin, 53706, USA

    T. Douglas Price

  2. Department of Anthropology, Field Museum, 1400 S. Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois, 60605-2496, USA

    Gary M. Feinman

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Kristiansen, K. (2010). Decentralized Complexity: The Case of Bronze Age Northern Europe. In: Price, T.D., Feinman, G.M. (eds) Pathways to Power. Fundamental Issues in Archaeology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-6300-0_7

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