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Hunter-gatherer societies are not perfectly equal. A 2025 review published in Behavioral and Brain Sciences argues that communities described as egalitarian can still contain differences in influence, status, access to resources and personal autonomy. Its central distinction is that egalitarianism is better understood as a set of social processes that can limit domination and help most people secure access—not as identical outcomes for everyone.
What the review means by egalitarianism
In “Egalitarianism is not equality: Moving from outcome to process in the study of human political organisation,” Duncan N. E. Stibbard-Hawkes and Christopher R. von Rueden challenge the idea that egalitarian societies must have no inequality. The review’s abstract describes people in such groups as not necessarily having strong preferences for equal outcomes. Instead, it proposes asking whether social and ecological conditions let most people secure resources, social standing and autonomy. Cambridge University Press’ article record identifies it as a target article published online November 18, 2025, in volume 49 (2026), article e421.
This shifts the question from “Does everyone have the same?” to “Can anyone turn an advantage into lasting control over others, and can other people contest that control?” A group may share food widely while still having unequal access to land or knowledge. Its members may have different levels of influence, yet use collective practices to constrain a would-be dominant person. Those conditions are compatible with relative egalitarianism, but not with perfect equality.
Seven areas where inequality can occur
The review organizes inequalities into seven interconnected domains. They are lenses for examining a society, not a checklist that every community experiences identically or to the same degree.
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| Domain | What may differ |
|---|---|
| Embodied capital | Physical capacities, health and learned skills that can affect production or influence. |
| Social capital | Networks, kinship ties and relationships that shape access and influence. |
| Leadership | Informal influence can develop even where formal offices or coercive authority are limited. |
| Gender | Divisions in work, parenting, decision-making and particular food practices. |
| Age and knowledge | Older people may hold knowledge or influence younger relatives’ choices. |
| Material capital and land tenure | Control of valuable possessions or territories may differ even when possessions are modest and food is shared. |
| Reproduction | Marriage and other social arrangements can distribute autonomy and outcomes unequally. |
The point is not that every difference amounts to the same kind of power. Health, kinship networks, leadership, control of territory and influence over marriage operate differently. The review treats them as connected ways advantage or constraint can arise, rather than reducing inequality to who owns the most material wealth.
Examples show why sharing does not settle the question
The authors’ public-facing account uses ethnographic examples to illustrate how unequal access can coexist with practices that distribute resources or limit dominance. The examples are specific to the cases described; they should not be taken as universal rules about the named peoples.
- Hadza food sharing: Kudu meat may be shared among families after other families make forceful requests. That pattern can distribute food without requiring the hunter’s family to be motivated by an abstract commitment to equal shares.
- Ju/’Hoansi land access: The account pairs little property and widespread food sharing with some families’ control of valuable hunting territory around waterholes. Shared food alone, therefore, does not show that land access is equal.
- Bayaka ritual knowledge: Ritual knowledge may be bought, sold or hoarded, even where material inequality is relatively limited. Knowledge can be a resource and a source of influence.
- Agta marriage arrangements: The authors’ account says adults arranged children’s marriages and that orphans could be disadvantaged. This is an example from their discussion, not a claim about all Agta communities.
- Gender and age: The account describes some meat cuts reserved for older Hadza men, greater respect for better hunters, and women taking a more direct role in parenting across the societies discussed. It also describes older men in some Australian societies controlling ritual knowledge or marriage choices.
Together, these cases illustrate why “little property” or “food is shared” cannot stand in for a complete account of who has influence, knowledge, autonomy or access to land.
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How egalitarian processes can limit domination
The review’s abstract names several mechanisms that may help people contest unequal access or prevent authority from becoming entrenched: demand-sharing, risk-pooling, status-leveling, reputation-building through prosocial behavior, consensus-based collective decisions and residential mobility. The authors’ account also describes requests and complaints over food, ridicule of people who are stingy or boastful, and cooperation that can spread status through a community.
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These practices do not guarantee that everyone gives equally or receives the same. They matter because they can make it harder for one person to monopolize resources, prestige or decision-making. A person who can leave, make demands, enlist others’ cooperation or face social disapproval may retain more autonomy than someone with no way to challenge control.
Such mechanisms need not stem from universal altruism. People can pursue their own food, standing and freedom while their actions collectively constrain another person’s ability to dominate. In this account, self-interest and egalitarian outcomes are not opposites: contests over autonomy and access can help maintain a relatively egalitarian political order.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What the review establishes—and what it does not
The authors describe drawing on hundreds of sources spanning more than a century of ethnography. Those phrases communicate the review’s breadth, not an exact count of studies or a standardized measurement. The accessible abstract and summary do not provide a complete search protocol, a pooled inequality statistic or comparable numerical scores for the societies discussed.
Accordingly, the review supports a conceptual argument and a range of illustrations, not a quantitative ranking of hunter-gatherer societies. Its examples show different ways inequality may appear; they do not establish that every group has every listed inequality, or that any one mechanism works the same way everywhere. The Cambridge article record provides the abstract and bibliographic details, while the authors’ summary offers the examples described here.
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