Hierarchy and Value

Jason Hickel is an anthropologist at Goldsmiths, University of London. His research spans several related themes, including political conflict, inequality, postdevelopment, and ecological economics. He is the author of Democracy as Death: The Moral Order of Anti-Liberal Politics in South Africa (University of California Press, 2015) and The Divide: A Brief Guide to Global Inequality and its Solutions (Penguin, 2017). He writes a column on political economy for The Guardian and Al Jazeera, sits on the executive board of Academics Stand Against Poverty, and serves as Policy Director for The Rules collective. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Introduction: Hierarchy and Value

Naomi Haynes and Jason Hickel



Chapter 1. Battle of Cosmologies: The Catholic Church, Adat, and ‘Inculturation’ among Northern Lio, Indonesia

Signe Howell



Chapter 2. Vertical Love: Forms of Submission and Top-Down Power in Orthodox Ethiopia

Diego Maria Malara and Tom Boylston



Chapter 3. The Good, the Bad, and the Dead: The Place of Destruction in the Organization of Social Life, Which Means Hierarchy

Frederick H. Damon



Chapter 4. Civilization, Hierarchy, and Political-Economic Inequality

Stephan Feuchtwang



Chapter 5. Islam and Pious Sociality: The Ethics of Hierarchy in the Tablighi Jamaat in Pakistan

Arsalan Khan



Chapter 6. Demotion as Value: Rank Infraction among the Ngadha in Flores, Indonesia

Olaf H. Smedal



Afterword: The Rise of Hierarchy

David Graeber