A central issue in anthropology is the process through which political organization (sometimes referred to as cultural complexity) evolves: competing models typically argue for either incremental increases in complexity or larger, non-sequential increases in complexity. Here, the authors evaluate six different models of political evolution, utilizing a phylogenetic approach to analyze the evolution of 84 Austronesian-speaking societies.

Using phylogenetic modeling, the researchers test hypotheses for different sequences of political complexity among South-East Asian and Pacific Austronesian-speaking cultures. The research adds to an existing debate between sequential, incremental political evolution models and non-sequential models with larger increases in complexity. The results suggest support for a more sequential unilinear model.

Using data from 97 Austronesian-speaking societies, this paper asks two research questions: 1) have religious and political authority co-evolved and 2) have the two institutions tended to become differentiated or unified? By applying phylogenetic methods, the findings show that in Austronesian societies, religious and political authorities are mutually interdependent; however, there is insufficient evidence to support any differentiation or unification of the two over time.

This article investigates a cultural patterning of altered states of consciousness. The authors use an ordinal variable for a society's trance type; its four levels are 1) trance, 2) trance and possession trance, 3) possession trance, and 4) neither type. Results suggest that trance type is associated with measures of societal complexity and subsistence economy. Regional differences and the effects of diffusion are also examined.

The authors investigate whether moralizing high gods and, more generally, supernatural punishment precede, sustain, or follow political complexity. The cultural traits at hand are mapped onto phylogenetic trees representing the descent and relatedness of 96 Austronesian cultures.

The present study examines 70 Austronesian cultures to test whether political hierarchy, population size, and social inequality have been influential in the conversion of populations to Christianity. Cultural isolation and year of missionary arrival are control variables. Using phylogenetic generalized least squares (PGLS), the researchers test the effect of the three predictor variables on conversion to Christianity and also conduct a multivariate analysis with all variables. The results do not offer support for what is expected by top-down and bottom-up theories of conversion but instead for the general dynamics of cultural transmission.

This article takes a materialist approach to the evolution of ideology in human culture.This article examines the possible coevolution of sociocultural subsystems. The author emphasizes ideological variables and their relationship to technological and social-structural subsystems. Analysis supports a process of coevolution, which the author suggests refutes broad claims of cultural particularism.

The authors examine correlations between slavery and variables that can potentially be detected archaeologically. The authors do not test specific hypotheses, but aim to explore the variables in a broader sense. As such, the authors use a grounded theory approach to data analysis in order to examine trends that emerge from the data itself.

The author examines modes of marriage and societal organization from a functionalist (general evolutionary) perspective. He focuses on the relationships of subsistence (economic) patterns, settlement patterns, and social complexity to predicting modes of marriage, with particular emphasis on the importance of subsistence as an underlying structural influence upon social patterns.

This paper examines diverging devolution—the transmission of property to both males and females—and its predictors and consequences. Particular attention is paid to kinship terminology and control of women’s marriage. Multiple hypotheses are supported.