There is also a demographic oddity about this era. We have seen that, despite
improved forms of agriculture and irrigation, populations grew no faster
in the later Agrarian era than in the early Agrarian era. Indeed, in the 1st
millennium C.E. there appears to
have been hardly any growth at all in
Afro-Eurasia. What factors checked
population growth?
One of the curiosities of the later
Agrarian era is that the same factors
that stimulated innovation could
also check growth. The political
structures of tribute-taking states could certainly encourage growth in some
areas, but they also stiÀ ed growth in many subtle and not-so-subtle ways.
Normally, tribute-taking rulers were more interested in capturing wealth than
in producing it. A successful war could generate wealth much more quickly
than investment in infrastructure. Seeing themselves as capturers rather than
producers of wealth, tribute-taking elites generally despised producers and
merchants and took limited interest in how goods were produced and traded.
Such activities discouraged policies that actively supported production and
commerce. The structures of tributary power also stiÀ ed growth in subtler
ways. As Marx pointed out, tribute-taking states had to ensure that peasants
had access to land. However, this limited wage-earning employment. It also
deprived peasants of any incentive to raise productivity, as they knew that
any surpluses would be skimmed by their overlords. In summary, those who
produced society’s wealth generally lacked the education, the capital, and the
incentive to innovate; while the elites, who had the education and the wealth,
generally despised productive or commercial activities and preferred to take
wealth rather than to generate it. Outside the specialist domains of warfare
and administration, tribute-taking rulers took little interest in improved
ef¿ ciency or innovation.
Patterns of disease frequently checked population growth. Two factors stand
out, both closely linked to factors that, in other ways, could stimulate growth.
While cities could stimulate growth by encouraging commerce, they could
also stiÀ e demographic growth (itself a key driver of growth, as we have
seen) by creating lethal disease environments, so urban populations had to
There was plenty of innovation
in this era, but it was never
rapid enough to keep pace
with population growth.