theory and evidence vis a vis hierarchy

I just ran across an amazing piece of research relevant to both the recent
discussion of hierarchy and to my ongoing attempts to promote discussion
of Boswell & Chase-Dunn's "The Spiral of Capitalism and Socialism":

Cioffi-Revilla, Claudio and Todd Landman.  1999.  "Evolution of Maya
        Polities in the Ancient Mesoamerican System."  International Studies
        Quarterly 43/4 (December):  559-598.

The authors use a comprehensive data base of 72 Maya polities, and carry
out an event history analysis with the variables a) duration, b) system
size, or # of polities, c) hazard rate, and d) stability.

Here are some excerpts from their findings:

"Most of the Maya political system collapsed around A.D. 800 -- as opposed
to earlier or later -- because it failed to develop a pan-Maya political
integration or unification that would have been necessary to sustain the
growing number of polities already containing millions of inhabitants.  
Instead, the Maya political system remained a set of numerous independent
polities -- some large, most small -- that fluctuated between multipolar
aggregation into a few powerful regional states...and disintegration into
small local polities.  Warfare played a central role throughout these
pulsating cycles...According to the new data we report, just before the
beginning of the collapse in A.D. 800 the system was growing at a rate of
at least approximately one new polity every two decades, growing in
interaction complexity from 600 possible dyads in A.D. 300 to 2,000 by
A.D. 800... This booming growth could not be sustained indefinitely
without a reorganization of government on a larger and more complex
imperial scale, even discounting for remote, noncontiguous polities and
relations."

[The authors compare the Maya to Mesopotamia, Egypt, China and other
comparable systems which succeeded in moving to a higher level
integration.]

"Therefore, we propose a new and opposite explanation to the current
view:  failure to achieve some form of pan-Maya political integration, a
system of governance capable of significant economics of scale that would
sustain an expanding population base with many separate hierarchical
polities (a complex state), was the root cause of the multifaceted
disaster that manifested itself in the areas of agriculture, ecology,
warfare, and religion.  This means that...the traditionally alleged causes
of the collapse were actually the secondary effects of failed political
integration..." (585)

*** *** *** *** ***

I think the basic point is made, though it barely does justice to the
article.

The relevance of this for 2001 seems obvious enough -- without successful
global political integration we are now faced on a planetary scale with
the threats of ecological devastation and nuclear war.

If it is the capitalists who pioneer this level of integration, so be it,
but the fight for democracy must move to the planetary level.  A
clear-sighted strategy will be based only on the recognition of multiple
levels of system reality, not on an idealist (in the bad sense of the
word, meaning not in touch with reality) attempt to bring about a pure,
non-hierarchical movement or end-state.  That remains a utopian goal,
which can motivate action, but cannot be the recipe for praxis.

For the future, RH