Cliodynamics

The article is an experience of theoretical reconstruction of the origin of the state as a natural phenomenon of evolution in general and social evolution in particular, under the formation of necessary and sufficient conditions. The analysis of R. Carneiro's criticism of M. Weber's classical definition, as well as the discussion of M. Berent's original concept of the non-state status of the ancient Greek polis, allow to formulate a new synthetic definition of the state. We add a new feature to the known characteristics: a formal structure of managerial positions reproduced across generations and independent of kinship relations. The conceptual scheme of the general evolutionary mechanism of the emergence of new structures combines classical ideas (from C. Darwin to A. Toynbee), as well as models of such anthropologists and sociologists (R. Carneiro, A. Stinchcombe, R. Collins, etc.). The scheme includes the following concepts: concerns, challenges-threats and challenges-opportunities, ingredients, response attempts, fixation mechanisms, providing structures, the most flexible and polyfunctional of which were called magic wands. The application of this construct to the theory of the origin of the state raises the question of the ingredients of the processes of formation of the first states. The ideas and results of the work of anthropologists and historical sociologists have made it possible to visualize the trends in the development of barbarian societies that led to the ingredients sought. Such reasoning not only reinforces R. Carneiro's classical theory, but also complements it with a general evolutionary mechanism. The first states emerged in response to historical challenges and concerns related to the economic, military and social development of barbarian societies, and then became the main magic wands in the political evolution of all world civilizations.

Social evolutionary theory seeks to explain increases in the scale and complexity of human societies, from origins to present. Over the course of the twentieth century, social evolutionary theory largely fell out of favor as a way of investigating human history, just when advances in complex systems science and computer science saw the emergence of powerful new conceptions of complex systems, and in particular new methods of measuring complexity. We propose that these advances in our understanding of complex systems and computer science should be brought to bear on our investigations into human history. To that end, we present a new framework for modeling how human societies co-evolve with their biotic environments, recognizing that both a society and its environment are computers. This leads us to model the dynamics of each of those two systems using the same, new kind of computational machine, which we define here. For simplicity, we construe a society as a set of interacting occupations and technologies. Similarly, under such a model, a biotic environment is a set of interacting distinct ecological and environmental processes. This provides novel ways to characterize social complexity, which we hope will cast new light on the archaeological and historical records. Our framework also provides a natural way to formalize both the energetic (thermodynamic) costs required by a society as it runs, and the ways it can extract thermodynamic resources from the environment in order to pay for those costs — and perhaps to grow with any left-over resources.

In the study of the causes of the Russian Revolution, the problem of the standard of living of the population plays an important role. This problem, in turn, is linked to the question of agricultural productivity. In modern historiography, both domestic and foreign, the thesis of the growing productivity of Russian agriculture in the post-reform period is considered proven - and in particular the increase in grain yields. This thesis is based on the well-known works of V.G. Mikhailovsky, V.M. Obukhov and A.S. Nifontov, in which time series of grain yields in European Russia were constructed on the basis of official statistics. Meanwhile, the opinion of the experts of the 1901 Commission is well known, who believed that the increase in yields recorded in official statistics was explained by the improvement in the system of collecting harvest data. Reforms to improve the survey system were carried out in 1870, 1883 and 1893. The author examines the dynamics of 4-year averages and shows that when 4-year periods containing the years indicated are excluded from consideration, the yield in the remaining time intervals does not increase. In other words, the increase in yield in the time series shown was explained by more detailed accounting.

    The period 1893-1914 is considered separately, when it is assumed that the yield data were quite accurate and no new reforms were made in the field of their collection. Previously it was assumed that the yield, calculated by the regression coefficient of the linear model, increased by 12% during this period. The author conducts a more detailed analysis and shows that the regression coefficient used previously is statistically insignificant. Thus, the claim of an increase in returns over this period cannot be statistically substantiated. Perhaps the return was a random variable independent of time.

The paper also examines the dynamics of gross cereal yields per capita and shows that average per capita yields did not increase between 1893 and 1914.

       Thus, the prevailing opinion about the growth of agricultural productivity in Russia in the post-reform period needs to be revised