Were there World-Systems during the Bronze Age?

Abstract

The birth of the state in regions benefiting from particular geographical and demographic assets (such as Mesopotamia, Susiana, Egypt, and later the Indus and China) was a period during which a partial break occurred from the mode of accumulation inscribed in kinship relationships. Public and private accumulation of capital appeared, along with a new ideology, techniques of power (Mann 1986) – with writing, and the blossoming of institutions linked to the religious sphere – and new forms of labor mobilization, implying tributes and taxes, and servile or hired labor.