COMMUNISM, PRIMITIVE. Many societies which are classified as primitive or as belonging to the lower culture, ex hibit features which have given rise to the view that communistic principles regulate their economic system. Thus, among the Lhota Nagas of Assam "land can be held either by the village, a morung—men's house—a clan, or an individual. The land close to a village is usually waste land and common property, as are the rights of `poisoning' in certain pools. Every morung owns land which is the property of the morung as a whole and not of any individuals in it. It is worked by the boys of the morung. . . . A very large proportion of the land in the Lhota country is clan land, which is held in common by all members of that par ticular clan in the village. . . . Heirlooms such as the ancient doos and spears which a Lhota so prizes are held in trust by the senior member of the clan in the village" (J. P. Mills, Lhota Nagas, 1922, p. 97). Corporate ownership by clans or morungs, and common rights over waste land cannot fairly be called com munistic. They indicate—what is already true of the majority of lower culture societies—that the kindred, or biologic, groups of which those societies are composed (see TRIBE and CLAN) have economic functions in the sum of social life. It is asserted em phatically by Rivers (History of Melanesian Society, 1914, vol.
ii. p. 146 seq.) that "it is clear that definite communism of prop erty still flourishes in one form or another throughout Melanesia." He states in support of this that "at Pentecost, not long ago, all property was owned by the verana or social group within the moiety, and that this communistic ownership still persists in the case of canoes." He saw in certain features of ceremonial in the Banks Islands survivals of communism, and found at Eddystone "a large degree of community in the ownership of land" which "belongs to a group of persons brought into relationship with one another by kinship." In a later chapter (ibid. p. 384 seq.) he argued that a communistic people would need money, not for internal economic functions, but only for external transactions, and associated the use of money with the disappearance of com munism. In elaborating the theory of culture movements in Polynesia he found that the communism in Polynesia was char acteristic of the earlier settlers, who accepted the later immi grants as chiefs—"endowed with Divine attributes" and "able to obtain all they needed for the asking." People enjoying these ample privileges would need no money. The picture is incomplete because it raises the suspicion that the chiefs—licensed plunderers —kept their booty to themselves.
The intimate investigations made by Malinowski in the Tro briands, disclose facts which warrant the conclusion that "there is a strict definition in the rights of everyone, and this makes ownership anything but communistic" (Crime and Custom, 1926, p. 1 q) . Clearly, therefore, we must distinguish between control, exploitation, utilization and ownership—and we must be prepared to find that social groupings which sometimes coincide and are identical with, and at other times cut right across, biologic group ings such as the clan, are endowed with economic functions which constitute their unity and give them their value. That primitive ownership, as we now know it, is tempered by rights of others, is hardly a proof of prior communism. Among the Ba-Ila (Ila speaking Peoples, vol. i., p. 339) , "My collateral grandfather's property is mine potentially. I may enter my grandfather's brother's village, spear his oxen, or rob his fields with impunity." Elsewhere, in the Torres Straits (Report, vol. v., p. 146), "The nephew, even if quite a small boy, could take, lose, spoil or de stroy anything belonging to his (maternal) uncle and the uncle would utter no word of reproach or anger." The fact is that "reciprocity, the give and take principle, reigns supreme also within the clan, nay within the nearest group of kinsmen. As we have seen already, the relation between the maternal uncle and his nephews, the relations between brothers, nay the most unselfish relation, that between a man and his sister, are one and all founded in mutuality and the repayment of services." (B. Ma linowski, Crime and Custom, 1926, P. 47.) It is suggestive of the difficulties of this topic, some of which are, perhaps, due to awkward uses of a terminology which has specialized connotations, that in his account of the Andaman islanders (1922, p. 41) Prof. Radcliffe Brown states that "The economic life of the local group, though in effect it approaches to a sort of Communism, is yet based on the notion of private property." Land is sometimes in common, but there is private ownership of trees of economic value. Priority of labour entails ownership, but the custom of constantly exchanging presents, and the strong feeling that no request should be refused, result in the constant circulation of "almost every object" which they possess. Every man is expected to do his share in providing both himself and others with food, and in its distribution regard is had to seniority. E. T. Man (Andaman Islanders, 188o, p. 29) records that the oko-pai-ads, dreamers of dreams, who are credited with the possession of supernatural powers, often arrange with those who lavish gifts upon them to keep available for them articles not immediately needed, which are thereby bespoken and not available as gifts to others. Therefore, at a low level of culture, individual ownership is recognized but is tempered by the sense of solidarity and mutuality, which places generosity high as a virtue. Here, too, as throughout the lower culture, when viewed closely, personality and individuality are factors in the economic as in all other aspects of social life. The subjective character of the lower culture attitude towards property finds its expression in the sentimental value attached by modern communities to the old and venerable. The economic attitudes of the lower culture comprise respect of heirlooms, but in their normal working ex hibit the principle of reciprocity of service—a far different thing from Communism, however defined—just as the social order of lower culture groups is based on the ultimate facts of inequality of men, leaving theories of equality and rights to purblind theorists. (See works quoted in text.)