FINITE HUMAN CAPACITIES AND THE PATTERN OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION IN A KNOWLEDGE SOCIETY

MICHAEL HAMMOND University of Toronto

Many theorists considering the emergence of a knowledge society tend to share certain assumptions about human nature and the relationship be­tween knowledge, social scale, and social inequality. For instance, despite their many other differences, writers from the functionalist tradition, such as Daniel Bell and Talcott Parsons, and writers from the structural con­flict tradition, such as Gerhard Lenski, assume that there is an innately expansive need for the goods and services that only larger scale societies can provide (1). Since specialized knowledge, both instrumental and theo­retical, becomes increasingly crucial at higher and higher levels of eco­nomic productivity and political organization, this expansive need tends to promote a growing role for knowledge, which is circularly reinforcing since increased knowledge makes possible in turn growing scale and pro­ductivity. Similarly, both functionalists and non-functionalists (e.g. Alvin Gouldner) (2) assume that individuals possessing such knowledge will in­exorably attempt to translate this capital into an unequal share of other social resources, such as income, power, or prestige. Thus, if any historical change increases the social dependency on one or another form of knowl­edge, then there is something about human nature that means that this knowledge will become a part of social inequality.

Such assumptions are however a fragile basis upon which to construct a theoretical model of long-term social change. As Anthony Giddens has recently argued (3), the pre-industrial historical evidence calls into ques­tion any model dependent upon a general pattern to social change. The historical variability is simply too great to be contained within the tradi­tional assumptions about universal species characteristics that could lead to such a pattern. Many theories of the evolution of knowledge and social structures are open to the same criticism. Although contemp~rary, high

31 G. Bo/:lme and N. Stehr (eds.), The Knowledge Society, 31-50. © 1986 by D. Reidel Publishing Company.

32 Michael Hammond

density industrial societies do seem to exhibit expansive and inequality producing needs, recent restudies of low scale hunting and gathering soci­eties, both in the present and prehistoric times, directly challenge the idea that such needs are universal (4).

Clearly then, to fill in the missing links at the deepest levels in the the­oretical models analyzing the knowledge society, there must be some scale dependent principle that can account for the emergent needs in economic production and social differentiation that make knowledge such a key fac­tor in social change. Rather than utilize quasi-instinctual assumptions about innate human needs, one path of analysis in this regard has focused upon the role of physiologically finite human capacities in information processing. This is a most interesting perspective, but as we shall see in the following section, it too has to utilize further assumptions which point to another finite human resource, affectivity. This is ironic of course be­cause so often emotion and knowledge, especially in its specialized scien­tific form, have been considered antithetical to one another. However, it is the dynamics created by the affective problematic in our species that cre­ate the preconditions that are central to the historical emergence of knowledge as an increasingly important social resource. Thus, the histori­cal fates of emotion and knowledge are closely bound together. To develop the logic in this linkage, we must first consider the cognitive model, and then turn to the affective alternative.

Finite Cognitive Capacities, Social Scale, and Knowledge

Information theory has long been interested in the relationship between expanding knowledge and the physiologically limited capacities of individ­uals, either singly or in groups, to handle that information (5). As a result of these finite capacities, certain information comes to be ranked as not only different from, but more important than other data, and scarce cog­nitive resources can be focused upon information ranked hierarchically higher. Hierarchical classification therefore reduces information complex­ity, and given the existence of finite cognitive capacities, the more elabo­rate the information that is available or necessary, the more elaborate the hierarchical structure.

This has been an appealing metaphor for social scientists, since it seems so symmetrical with the hierarchical structural differentiation so

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 33

often seen historically tied to growing social scale. However, the logic in the leap from social differentiation, based upon growing knowledge and the limited capacities of any individual or group to master that knowl­edge, to social stratification, in which resources like prestige, power, and wealth are unequally distributed in terms of a knowledge hierarchy, must be explained. That is, it is easy to see how growing informational complex­ity can produce differentiation in which that knowledge is divided up and reduced to smaller sub-units. It is not as easy to see how this process might lead to changes in social inequality.

One line of argument in this regard has been in terms of the increased social scale that a growing knowledge base makes possible. From the point of view of information theory, it is possible to look upon other human beings as bundles of capacities. After all, information may be seen in terms of other individuals who are constantly broadcasting data about themselves as part of the basic interaction process. If too many individuals are co-present and trying to interact, for instance, in a decision making process, then cognitive overload soon appears. This is the basis of the clas­sic inverted-U curve that describes the operation of a crucial but physio­logically limited resource. For a given task of some interesting degree of difficulty, if too few individuals, and hence too little information, are pre­sent, then the effective completion of the task is likely to be hindered, but if too many are present, the task performance is also compromised.

Thus, as scale increases in terms of the number of individuals, stress appears, and this stress is normally handled by hierarchical differentia­tion. As Gregory Johnson notes in summarizing this research (6), small group studies indicate that the magic number for the emergence of a hier­archy as a response to scalar stress is about 6-7 individuals. This number is of course reminiscent of Miller's classic study of the finite human abili­ties to immediately handle chunks of information (7). Johnson argues that "there appear, then, to be rather severe limits on the maximum size of task-oriented groups that are organized horizontally (non-hierarchically), and these limits may be related to individual information-processing ca­pacity" (8). The same magic number often appears also in span of control studies. In Johnson's words, "Span of control refers to the number of individuals or organizational units directly subordinate to a given individ­ual or organizational unit within a hierarchical structure. Span is said to range from narrow, with few subordinates, to wide, with many~ Studies of

34 Michael Hammond

a wide variety of organizations have produced the empirical generaliza­tion that the range of variation in observed span of control is narrow, and that an optimum span may be somewhere around the interesting figure of six" (9). Once again, as the size of a system increases, the span of control limitation leads to growing hierarchical differentiation. For our purposes, the exact numbers are not important, other than to note that they are small. The basic rule is that as information increases, because of the num­ber of individuals present and/or because of the total amount of data available to those individuals, then a hierarchical response becomes more and more likely.

However, this process generates only a temporary form of inequality in regard to information loaded processes such as decision making. As critics of these attempts to tie cognitive constraints to more permanent distribution inequalites have noted (10), simply rotating decision making roles or arranging them sequentially produces a long-term tendency towards equality. At any given point in time, cognitive limits might gener­ate some inequality, but over time, these can be cancelled or leveled through relatively simple organizational arrangements. Why then are these alternative organizational patterns so rarely successful? What aspects of finite cognitive capacities might generate more lasting inequali­ties?

Niklas Luhmann has made one attempt to link cognitive limitations directly to social inequalities in increasingly complex social worlds. Com­plexity reduction has long been the major theme in Luhmann's work. He posits that the "mirror image of the problem of complexity" is the "inade­quate capacities of human beings", that is, "man's limited capacity for processing information, his limited potential for grasping and reducing complex situations" (11). As social scale begins to grow historically, grad­ually excluding face-to-face interaction on a regular basis among all members of a culture, patterns of stratification emerge in order to avoid the information chaos that scalar stress might produce for cognitively lim­ited individuals. Thus, due ultimately to finite capacities, the communica­tion of information among individuals must somehow be limited in order to avoid communication stress (12); and among other social configura­tions, inequality accomplishes this information reduction. For Luhmann, hierarchies become a means to limit communication chances, for these structures selectively intensify certain information and exclude informa-

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 35

tion from other sources (13). This social distance magnifies differences among individuals, but without such aids, individuals would be overwhelmed by the avalanche of information that accompanies each in­crease in scale. There is of course a highly arbitrary element in this form of complexity reduction, but due to our finite capacities, it is an anthropo­logical necessity.

This analysis would seem to imply that as the total amount of knowl­edge in a system increases, so too would the probability of communication stress, which in turn would guarantee some degree of social inequality as a means to reduce this knowledge complexity. However, Luhmann also argues that in advanced industrial societies, the level of complexity be­comes so great that it is increasingly unlikely that any cognitively finite individual, or small group of finite individuals, can control monopolisti­cally such a system for any length of time (14). This in turn effects the unequal 'distribution of social resources, which tends to become more dis­persed, reflecting the dispersal of power in such complex social worlds, al­though of course it is still unequally distributed. Thus, for Luhmann, the level of complexity in late industrial cultures decreases the likelihood of either radical egalitarianism or extreme inegalitarianism in the distribu­tion of key social resources.

From the complexity reduction paradigm, Luhmann can link physio­logical principles of cognitive limitations to social inequality. This is a most interesting argument concerning the pre-conscious operation of physiological capacities in shaping the emergence of certain social phe­nomena, but there remain a number of problems. For example, if informa­tion flow is the primary problem, and if a hierarchy more effectively copes with this problem, then positions on a hierarchy should be seen as essen­tially interchangeable. That is, it should not really make any difference to individuals whether or not they occupy higher or lower positions, as long as each position avoids information overload. However, there is little evi­dence that individuals actually view hierarchies in this manner, suggesting that something other than a subconscious response to cognitive constraints is operating in the formation of hierarchies. Furthermore, individuals often seem to seek higher positions in a hierarchy, even though these posi­tions threaten information overload. Rather than reducing cognitive com­plexity, the pursuit of inequality seems to be tied to increasing the risk of cognitive overload, and a model of cognitive constraints cannot explain

36 Michael Hammond

why individuals should press their finite capacities in such a manner. If an emphasis on finite cognitive capacities produces an interesting

but incomplete model, what other human quality might add theoretical power to this type of argument? My suggestion is human affectivity, the physiological capacities to generate emotions. Like our cognitive capacit­ies, affectivity is a crucial but finite resource that leads to the emergence of certain social phenomena under conditions of growing social complex­ity. However, unlike cognitive limitations, the problems in allocating af­fective resources can be directly linked to the emergence and development of social inequality. I have developed this position elsewhere in detail (15), but the affective allocation paradigm has the following basic logic.

Affective Arousal and Human Social Life

The declining instinctual influence that marks the long evolutionary his­tory of our species has given us much of the flexibility that has been cen­tral to our appearance as a world dominant species, at least for the mo­ment. But this instinctual poverty does create certain problems. What quality of the species could forge the many different ties between adults of both sexes and between adults and children that would be a part of the so­cial life of a primate so dependent upon a group for survival itself? Such behavior patterns, and many more like them, could be provided instinctually, but when combined with sophisticated cognitive skills, they could also be fabricated by weighting such bonds with affective additions. Moreover, affectivity, the physiological capacities to generate emotions, might also be central to confronting another problem rooted in instinctual poverty. Innate behavior rules provide means and ends for actions, and differentiate behaviors as more or less appropriate and important. Without instincts, what quality of our species could structure actions in this way and not expose individuals to the behavioral chaos that could ac­company this paucity of instincts? The key quality is, once again, the

human capacity to attach affective weight to actions. Be it in terms of attraction or repulsion, the addition of strong and re­

peated aff~ctive arousal to certain actions, and the denial of these addi­tions to other possible actions, can provide a basis for ordering actions in terms of differential affective arousal. By drawing upon the wide spec-

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 37

trum of emotions, from the negative/unpleasant ones such as fear or hatred to the positive/pleasant states of love and ecstasy, this differential arousal can give physiological authenticity to behavior that lacks the in­trinsic authenticity of innately guided actions. Of course, not all arousal concerns these existential questions; but some strong arousal is the physio­logical substratum of meaning, which from this perspective is some sense of the relative importance of different actions among the vast spectrum of behavioral possibilities for a cognitively skilled and instinctually weak spe­cies.

However, in regard to affectivity, one key problem is that the range of potential affective foci is always greater than the physiological capacities of individuals to provide affective additions. Paralleling the decline of instinctually fixed behavior was the evolutionary growth of our awesome cognitive skills, but combined with instinctual poverty, the very richness of human capabilities in memory, foresight, and imagination means that there is an almost infinite range of potentially arousing objects and situa­tions. However, individuals have the physiological capacities to forge af­fective links to only a small part of this range, and hence, these scarce af­fective resources must be maldistributed among potential affective foci.

The study of affective physiology is marked by many active contro­versies concerning the exact relationship between instincts, cognition, and emotions in both human and non-human species (16). However, there is little disagreement about one aspect of affective physiology that is most important sociologically, namely that strong arousal has a wide variety of physiologically debilitating consequences if prolonged or spread over too many objects in too many situations. There is a classic and ever growing literature clearly demonstrating the physiological erosion that can occur when too many interactions are too arousing (17).

Emotions are a combination of evaluation and somatic change, mixing cognitive capacities with other physiological changes (18). Not all judge­ments are emotions, since many may occur without variations in heartbeat, pulse rate, respiratory rate, facial flush, perspiration, or any other of a host of physiological changes. Similarly, these somatic changes are not always symptomatic of emotions, since they can occur for other reasons. Nonetheless, the physiological changes linked to appraisals in emotion set parameters for the extent of affective arousal likely to occur in social interaction, because many of these physiological changes, if pre-

38 Michael Hammond

sent too often, will lead to the physical deterioration of the body. Some ex­amples of this relationship are well known. Fear involves adrenaline secre­tion and the sympathetic nervous system, and chronic fear has a number of undesirable effects on the body. But this physical debilitation is not simply limited to classic emergency responses such as fear and anger. Al­though the nature of the debilitation varies in relation to the different physiological changes that are a part of different emotions, bodily erosion occurs with emotions labelled either as positive/pleasant or negative/unpleasant. Naturally, this erosion could be eliminated by sim­ply avoiding strong affective arousal, but as we have seen, for an instinctually poor species, some such arousal is central to the fabrication of human social worlds, and the negative consequences of avoiding arousal are far greater. Thus, human beings are constantly faced with the two-sided labor of seeking arousal and distancing alternative affective foci for which the affective resources simply do not exist.

The combination of instinctual poverty and affective openness with physiologically constrained tools creates a number of dimensions along which affective difficulties can emerge. If too many ties are too arousing, there can be affective overload, which can be countered by decreasing the number of arousing linkages or the affective costs in such ties. Along an­other plane, there is the possibility of affective diffusion, in which so many situations involve some arousal that insufficient affective resources remain to provide strong attachments to a few affective focal points. Nonetheless, by unequally distributing their affective resources in a mixture of stronger, weaker, and even affectively neutral linkages, most individuals keep these allocation difficulties at bay. However, such potential difficul­ties make it clear how essential are distancing frameworks are differential affective commitments.

It is also clear that not all allocation strategies will be equally pre­ferred. Many psychological studies of attachment indicate that there is a distinct preference for an allocation pattern marked by a small number of stronger ties, even though these are affectively costly and decrease the number of less affectively laden linkages that an individual might forge. The evolutionary origin of this preference is probably rooted in the fact that strong ties provide better existential anchors for an instinctually weak species, and in the role of such differential affective commitments in the care and nurturing of infants through their long growth and maturation

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 39

period. Most of the research in this regard has focused upon the attach­ment preferences of children, but this pattern continues in its general form throughout an individual's life (19).

Thus, there are two basic senses in which we can speak of the unequal distribution of affective resources. First of all, for an instinctually impov­erished species such as ours, there are always a greater number of poten­tial objects for attachment than there are affective resources available. Some potential affective foci must be denied affective additions, and this denial is one sense in which affective resources are maldistributed. Sec­ondly, even among those objects that are selected for affective additions, there is an unequal distribution, since human beings are predisposed to prefer an affective allocation pattern marked by some strong attachments, which are affectively quite costly, and which limit the affective resources available to other ties.

Affective Allocation and the Distribution of Social Resources Such as Knowledge

How then to draw boundaries for affective allocation? Social hierarchies are one of the most important aids in this task. Their structure is similar to the general pattern of affective allocation, and this symmetry provides an invaluable framework for affective focusing and distancing.

As we have seen, from the point of view of the individual, affective ad­ditions must be unequally distributed, with a few ties receiving a dispro­portionate share of affective additions. Of what social phenomena is such a distribution reminiscent? Social inequality marked by some version of the pyramidal or truncated diamond distributions of resources such as knowledge, power, prestige, or wealth. In these most common patterns of a social hierarchy, a few positions stand out by virtue of the unequal share of social resources focused in the upper reaches of the hierarchy, and many other positions are pushed some distance down the hierarchy. The symmetry between affective maldistribution and social hierarchy is more than coincidental. The emer- gence of such hierarchies is ultimately rooted in the dynamics of affective allocation, for they provide a means to facilitate allocation by setting apart some foci for affective additions and distancing alternative foci.

First of all, the dynamics of affective allocation predispose individuals

40 Michael Hammond

to rank affective foci. It makes little difference if the ranking proceeds and directs the allocation, or is produced afterwards as a result of the af­fective commitment. With such evaluative classifications, the range of af­fective foci that might be pursued is decreased, since some ties will be de­fined as more or less likely to succeed, and as more or less important, in­teresting, exciting, or whatever. Without such a ranking, individuals are likely to be overwhelmed by the presence of alternative foci all classified as equal in terms of their potential for affective ties. Affective scarcity is not the only source of ranking, but it is an especially important one be­cause, as we shall see, it is sensitive to changes in social scale.

A hierarchical sense of the self does not automatically translate itself into social hierarchies marked by the unequal distribution of social re­sources. In terms of generating social distance, individuals might use vari­ous rankings, but these need not in every case be strengthened even fur­ther by the mal distribution of social resources. For instance, differences could be highlighted and ranked, but these differences could be seen as ultimately complementary and of equal value. One person might be a bet­ter hunter, another a better healer, a third a better father, a fourth a bet­ter lover, and so on throughout the population. Each of these differences could be affectively appealing, and provide some basis to differentially distribute affective bonds. However, if all these evaluations are seen as equally important to the population as a whole, then these differences can­cel each other out, and provide little basis to unequally distribute social resources. Thus, multiple complementary rankings could be paired with minimal inequality in social resource allocation. Or, non-complementary rankings might be used by an individual or group, but simply no efforts di­rected towards reinforcing this evaluation by the unequal distribution of social resources.

The likelihood of such strategies is directly related to social scale. If the scale is small, as in foraging societies, this may well be the case, be­cause at such a density the key measure of potential affective foci, the number of individuals in physical proximity, is so low. Also, given the de­gree of face-to-face interaction possible on an almost daily basis with that minimal range, individual differences and ranking classifications can be known to all without having to magnify these. However, as the scale grows, even if a small group within an expanded population might con­tinue to use an equal allocation of social resources, this is more and more

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 41

likely to be mixed with a hierarchical classification in regard to other groups in the population, and with unequally distributed social resources to embody this boundary.

In the face of post-foraging social scales, the radical affective mal- dis­tribution that is a part of everyday life for a species unsupported by instinctual guidelines can be most fragile without some means to give this affective inequality a visible and tangible aspect. In contrast, unequally distributed social resources can give a manifest and solid quality to a clas­sification, and boundaries marked by social inequality are more likely to at least partially check and even disguise the precariousness at the core of human social life based upon non-instinctual bonds.

In addition, embodied hierarchies are generally more effective in af­fective allocation because the maldistributed social resources in these hierarchies can themselves become the focus of affective attention. Hierarchies place different concentrations of social resources at different strata, and the pursuit of those resources can be affectively appealing in terms of fixing affective resources upon a specific goal, and distancing other possible considerations in the pursuit of that goal. In an extreme case, such as in the quest for a special share of unequally distributed eco­nomic resources, this pursuit might become an end in itself, reducing other individuals to means to acquire these ends. But even in less extreme cases, an attachment to such inequality can focus scarce affective re­sources by serving either as an affectively appealing goal in itself, or as a means to pursue some other affectively loaded goal, such as supporting other personal commitments to individuals, accumulating political power, creating new knowledge, or whatever. In any case, an individual does not have to come out on top of an embodied social hierarchy in order to be able to use its rankings for affective allocation. Many positions fall some­where between the very top and the very bottom, and each level provides another basis for affective focusing and distancing by creating and magni­fying differences among potential affective foci.

Even if some hierarchies framed by social inequality are likely to emerge from the dynamics of affective allocation, there is still the possi­bility that such hierarchies might be limited to unequal distributions of the more benign social resources, such as status or prestige in terms of a knowledge hierarchy. Most of the historical tragedy associated with em­bodied hierarchies is rooted in the unequal distribution of ecop,omic and

42 Michael Hammond

political resources, such as wealth and power. Why then cannot these hierarchies avoid the more dangerous inequalities, and thereby contain some of the potential negative consequences of the human attraction to embodied hierarchies? The answer to this question is found in a consider­ation of social density, which is an indicator of the historical differences in fhe size of one of the most important arenas for potential affective ties, the presence of other human beings.

Social Scale and the Pattern of Hierarchical Differentiation

The nature of allocation hierarchies is directly related to the degree of so­cial density, because social density is a measure of how often and how much social distance must be invoked by an individual in distributing scarce affective resources. Since different types and degrees of social dis­tance are created by different hierarchical structures of social inequality, these inequality producing structures evolve as social densities change. The basic historical rule is that anything that increases the number of so­cial linkages by making extended patterns of interaction more and more difficult to avoid changes the nature of the inequality systems that are likely to appear.

Why precisely are changes in social density problematic in terms of affective allocation? Since other human beings are the most likely source of affective ties, the simplest definition of social density would be in terms of how many human beings are concentrated together in settlements of what size. The greater the social density, the greater the potential range of affective foci, either for an initial bond or as a replacement for a tie that is eroding or has disappeared. Thus, simply increasing the number of other individuals present in a social universe increases the potential range of both affective stimuli and foci. Affective focusing then involves distancing more and more affective alternatives.

Secondly, and more importantly, growing density increases not only the number of potential associations, but also the number of actual associ­ations. Growth in settlement size, economic differentiation, and a host of other changes generally linked to increasing social density all increase the chances that the life of anyone individual will cross paths with a wider range of other individuals, ideas, or whatever. For an instinctually weak and affectively open species, each association, be it in passing or other-

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 43

wise, carries with it some likelihood of affective costs, either in terms of affective demands made by others or in terms of affective additions sought by an individual. This can create a number of additional problems for allocating a scarce resource like affectivity.

For instance, increasing social scale means that on the average less time is spent with more people, and unless the probability and strength of arousal is altered as scale changes, then there is a drift towards affective diffusion, in which scarce affective resources are too thinly spread, or af­fective overload in which an attempt is made to forge an increased num­ber of stronger ties even though there is less interaction time. Growing density therefore increases the need for social boundaries to control the af­fective costs of inter- action by shaping the amount of interaction time, the likelihood of arousal of interaction, and the probable strength of arousal. Since hierarchies can both increase the costs in regard to certain ties and decrease them in relation to other ties, they too spread as density grows.

Thirdly, increasing density shapes affective allocation because it tends to erode the allocation usefulness of previously existent categories by in­creasing the number in that category, and thereby making allocation more and more problematic. For instance, in a small population, only a handful of individuals might possess a particular type of knowledge, such as the ability to read or write, and this knowledge differential could easily be used for affective focusing and distancing. But increasing density is likely to increase the number of individuals with this knowledge, and in so far as these individuals come into contact with one another, to erode its usefulness in social differentiation. The normal historical solution is of course to sub-divide the original knowledge category, for instance into those who can read or write at different levels of sophistication, and in this way reduce the sub-density in any particular category. With higher and higher densities, even sub-categories can become densely packed, and gen­erate still more differentiation.

This not only means that growing densities tend to generate more and more social boundaries for affective allocation, but also that the nature of some of these boundaries changes. For instance, with the high degree of almost daily face-to-face contact possible for a population only with ex­tremely low social density, social boundaries can be created and recreated without requiring much external scaffolding, such as with economic re-

44 Michael Hammond

sources. But in the face of growing density, subtle status boundaries that require a great deal of close contact are more and more difficult to rely upon exclusively. What is often needed are boundaries with a type of so­cial shorthand that makes them readily visible in creating and maintain­ing social differences. Post-subsistence economic goods and services pro­vide just such a shorthand in quickly outlining goods and services, as well as becoming a focus themselves for affective allocation. Thus, it is likely that growing social scale will produce a growing need for material goods and services; and this in turn increases the social dependence upon knowl­edge, which in both its instrumental and theoretical forms can be critical to meeting such a growing need. The historical appearance of a need for more such goods has nothing to do with an instinct for such behavior, or with the idea that human needs are somehow intrinsically elastic and al­ways expand to meet or surpass the supply of goods available. Instead, such a need should be seen as the emergent by-product of the affective allocation dilemmas of individuals facing increasing social scale.

Similarly, the dynamics of affective allocation in the face of growing density underlie the increasing appeal of boundaries marked by the differ­ential distribution of power and formal authority. Once again, the growth of political inequality is not due to an innate expansive need for power or for more formal organizational structures, but rather to the role such in­equality can play in affective allocation. It provides some quite rare con­centrations of social resources that can be very attractive in themselves and as means to fabricate distancing boundaries. These walls can make possible interaction with a larger number of individuals and at the same time limit through social distance the affective costs that are likely to mark this interaction. Thus, with extremel¥ small densities, the appeal of such positions might be minimal, since at this scale, the basic allocation range represented by other individuals in the population is also at an his­torical minimum, but at higher density levels, boundaries fortified by the unequal distribution of political resources become more and more likely to emerge.

Of course, these affective dynamics do not only make rare concentra­tions of unequally distributed social resources appealing, but they also make rarity in general increasingly attractive as social scale grows and creates so many problems in affective allocation. The statistically rare activities of creating a new idea, or a new cultural artifact, or a new be-

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 45

havior pattern can also arouse and focus affective resources, while dis­tancing alternative actions in terms of their affective appeal. Thus, in­creasing scale not only generates a growing need for economic and politi­cal resources to embody social boundaries, and a need for an unequal share of such resources, but also increases the appeal of the new, be it in terms of ideas or whatever. Increasing scale does not just make such crea­tivity possible in many cases, such a density change makes it almost neces­sary. High density cultures cannot be static, for the underlying affective problematic makes repetition from generation to generation increasingly impossible to maintain.

Affective Dynamics and the Social Structure of a Knowledge Society

What has all of this to do with a knowledge society? A great deal, because these affective dynamics effect the extrinsic and intrinsic appeal and power of highly specialized knowledge, both in its instrumental and theo­retical forms. The emergence of knowledge as a major social force in con­temporary high density and high production societies is inextricably tied to these affective allocation problems.

For example, the likelihood that the possessor of some special techni­cal knowledge can translate this knowledge into a significant, and even an unequal share, of social resources such as wealth or authority is directly related to the level of economic productivity of a society. The greater the per capita income for the population as a whole, the greater the leverage of those with the instrumental knowledge crucial to the higher levels of production. With physiologically finite cognitive capacities that limit the rate and amount of knowledge that anyone person can attain, the more elaborate the production system, the more difficult it is for anyone person or small group to have knowledge control of that production and the more likely their dependence upon a wider and wider number of other individ­uals possessing parts of production knowledge. If, because of the affective dynamics outlined here, increasing social density tends to create through­out the population a need for the products of intensified economic produc­tion, then knowledge-possessing individuals will in all likelihood seek to trade their skills for an increased share of that productive output. These individuals are after all faced with the basic allocation problematic, and will attempt to partially resolve that problematic with social boundaries

46 Michael Hammond

embodied with the products of the economic system. If most or all individuals have some familiarity with the basic produc­

tion knowledge, as in hunting and gathering societies, then an egalitarian distribution pattern of economic goods and services is not unlikely. If there is some degree of knowledge specialization, but it is still relatively restricted, as in agrarian cultures, we would expect the most skewed eco­nomic distributions, because of the monopolistic potential of those having special knowledge, or of the control of that knowledge bearing group by a small elite. However, as the spread of knowledge specialization expands with every increase in the complexity of the production system, so too should there emerge increasing diversity in the mal distribution of eco­nomic resources. Thus, highly knowledge dependent societies are unlikely to be either extremely egalitarian or monopolistic in terms of the distribu­tion of key social resources such as economic goods and services, which are central to social boundary formation in affective allocation. In these conditions, knowledge specialists are unlikely to embrace radical egalitar­ianism, which introduces such awesome affective allocation difficulties in a high density social world, and there is a structural tendency to move away from the distribution extremes of radical equality or inequality.

In addition to the external rewards likely to attach themselves to in­strumental knowledBe possession, there are certain characteristics of highly specialized knowledge, both instrumental and non-instrumental, which are intrinsically appealing in terms of affective allocation.

Specialized knowledge can be affectively appealing because of its rar­ity. Since human capacities to process and store information are also fi­nite, even a simple competence in a complex field requires years of study for amassing statistically rare skills, that can then be transformed into so­cial boundaries, with individuals existentially defining themselves in rela­tion to other individuals who share or do not share a specialized vocabu­lary, skills, or whatever. There is also an intrinsic rarity in terms of the possibility of making a new contribution to an area. The creation of new knowledge provides again an ideal basis for hierarchical differentiation in terms of rarefied pursuits that tend to facilitate affective focusing. With this underlying affective appeal, it is no wonder that knowledge societies, and the knowledge producers within these social worlds, are so often ob­sessed with the generation of new knowledge. Of course, this is reflected in the massively unequal distribution of status, as well as the slightly more

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 47

modest mal distributions of other rewards, that are directed to those suc­cessful in this endeavor.

Such a pattern is what should be expected if the affective dynamics suggested here did in fact underplay a part of the social actions of a scien­tific community. Indeed, the pursuit of doubly rarefied goals, such as the manufacture of new knowledge in an already elaborate and esoteric knowledge community, is useful because this is a rarity that consistently renews itself as the production of new knowledge only creates opportuni­ties for yet more knowledge to be created. That is, there is a tangible means to pursue the new, and then to have those successful pursuits be­come the means to further efforts, and to the affective and other rewards that might attach themselves to these activities. In high density social worlds which tend to create a fascination with the new rooted in the prob­lematic of affective focusing and distancing, specialized knowledge has an enormous appeal built into it.

Furthermore, as noted earlier, information theorists have argued that increasingly complex knowledge systems tend to be hierarchically differ­entiated. Such hierarchies are an ideal vehicle for transformation through affective additions into a framework for the manufacture of social dis­tance. Information theorists have also shown that growing information complexity in decision making processes produces at least a temporary hierarchical organizational pattern, that once again sets the stage for the transformation of such boundaries into more permanent arrangements to create social distance. Thus, affective dynamics do not have to generate hierarchical classifications de novo, because they are in part regularly provided by cognitive limitations. Elaborate knowledge bases can not only promote the intensification of economic production and the manufacture of social resources to embody social boundaries in all sectors of a society, but they can be in themselves a useful framework for social organization based upon hierarchical distancing. Not surprisingly, the shape of scien­tific communities comes to have a hierarchical structure symmetrical with the shape of scientific knowledge itself; and equally un surprising is that more and more groups try to emulate science, such that as social densities increase, we find the attempted and often successful scientification of more and more aspects of our culture.

There is one last way in which the combination of finite cognitive and affective capacities might effect the shape of differentiation in increas-

48 Michael Hammond

ingly knowledge dependent societies. It could be argued that although in­dividual cognitive capacities are finite, they are differentially finite. If we permit the assumption that there are significant innate natural differences in individual capacities to process information, then some individuals will be able to do more such tasks in less time, and a social hierarchy that re­flected these natural differences might be seen as more effective than one that did not make such a recognition. This is of course the first half of the meritocracy argument in the functionalist theory of stratification and that knowledge society theorists like Bell essentially adopt (20).

The functionalist theory of stratification has generated a large critical literature, for it is an argument with a number of hidden assumptions con­cerning the role of unequal rewards in motivating individuals. The affec­tive paradigm provides some more depth in regard to such assumptions, for it can at least partially specify the historical conditions under which different kinds of rewards are more or less likely to be attractive in terms of their role in affective allocation. If high density societies predispose in­dividuals to manufacture or magnify differences among themselves, then even small natural differences in capacities to process information could become most important, and indeed come to replace traditional biological differences, such as race, or sex, that have been used for many thousands of years to provide some means of hierarchical differentiation. These dif­ferences are not in themselves sufficient to explain the appearance of in­equalities in the distribution of social rewards, but combined with some­thing like affective dynamics which make such inequalities appealing, a growing reliance on increasingly complex knowledge is likely to shift at least somewhat the unequal distribution of social rewards in terms of these differences.

Conclusion

The main purpose of this article has been to try to confront some theoreti­cal problems concerning the relationship between knowledge, social scale, and social inequality. The analysis has centered upon the possibilities of using bioconstraint principles of cognition and affectivity in an effort to direct attention to the deepest assumptions about the underlying dynamics of human social life. So much sociological theory hesitates to probe exten-

Finite Human Capacities and the Pattern of Social Stratification 49

sively its existential scaffolding, and theories concerning the knowledge society must aspire to be an exception to this rule.

The role of affectivity has been stressed because knowledge and affectivity are intimately linked in a circularly reinforcing manner. As so­cial scale and the dependency upon specialized knowledge increase, more resources are likely to flow into the production of knowledge, which in turn makes possible growing social density and expands the double role of knowledge as an element in both hierarchical social organization and in the manufacture of other distancing social resources. Thus, the linkage between science and society tends to feed upon itself. The problems inher­ent in affective allocation create expansive needs for goods and services, and these needs tend to be reflected in the creation of more knowledge, which directly or indirectly increases again the production of goods and services. At the same time, the affective problematic in the face of grow­ing social density creates a growing need for social boundaries marked by hierarchical differentiation, and specialized knowledge is an ideal veaicle for such differentiation. Although science and emotion are often viewed as antithetical, their respective historical fates are therefore closely bound together. It is still far too early to determine if as Bell suggested, knowl­~dge will become the axial principle for structuring a new social world, but the underlying dynamics of affective allocation provide some push in that direction.

Notes and References I. Daniel Bell, The Coming of Post-Industrial Society. New York: Basic Books, 1973;

Talcott Parsons, The Evolution of Society. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1977; Gerhard Lenski, Human Societies. New York: McGraw Hill, 1974.

2. Alvin Gouldner, The Future of Intellectuals and the Rise of the New Class. New York: Macmillan, 1979.

3. Anthony Giddens, The Constitution of Society. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.

4. Richard Lee, The Kung San. Cambridge: University Press, 1979; Marshall Sahlins, Stone Age Economics. Chicago: Aldine, 1974.

5. H. Schroder, M. Driver, and S. Streufert, Human Information Processing. New York: Rinehart, Holt, and Winston, 1967; Herbert Simon, The Sciences of the Artificial. Cam­bridge: Harvard University Press, 1969.

6. Gregory Johnson, 'Organizational Structure and Scalar Stress', in C. Renfrew (ed.), Theory and Explanation in Archaeology, New York: Academic Press, 1982, pp. 392-393.

50 Michael Hammond

7. G. Miller, "The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our Capac­ity for Processing Information," Psychological Review 63 (1956) 81-97.

8. Johnson, op cit., note 6, p. 394.

9. Ibid., p. 410.

10. E. Gross, 'Mayhew and Levinger's Use of Random Models,' American Journal of Sociol­ogy 83 (1978) 161-163; J. Logan and G. Zeitz, 'Mathematical Models in the Study of Power,' American Journal of Sociology 83 (1978) 164-173; C. Harris, 'Comment on Oligarchy in Human Interaction,' American Journal of Sociology 83 (1978) 173-178.

11. Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power. New York: Wiley, 1979, p. 9; The Differentiation of Society. New York: Columbia University Press, 1982, p. 92.

12. R. Meier, 'Communication Stress,' Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 3 (1972) 289-314.

13. Luhmann, op. cit., 1982, note 11, pp. 234-235.

14. Ibid., pp. xv, 353, 355.

15. Michael Hammond, 'The Sociology of Emotions and the History of Social Differentia­tion,' in R. Collins (ed.), Sociological Theory. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1983, pp. 90-119; 'Affectivity and Stratification,' in P. Barchas (ed.), Social Cohesion: Essays Toward a Sociophysiological Perspective. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1984, pp. 121-138; 'Affective Scarcity and the Emergence of Social Stratification,' presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association, San Antonio, 1984.

16. Theodore Kemper, A Social Interactional Theory of Emotions. New York: Wiley, 1978.

17. T. Cox, Stress. New York: Macmillan, 1978; J. Edwards and A. Gab, Physiological Cor­relates of Human Behavior. London: Academic Press, 1983.

18. W. Grings and M. Dawson, Emotions and Bodily Response. New York: Academic Press, 1978.

19. C. Parkes and J. Stevenson-Hinde, The Place of Attachment in Human Behavior, London: Tavistock, 1982.

20. Bell, op. cit., 1973, note 1, pp. 445-455.