ABSTRACT
Morton Fried was pretty firmly in the materialist camp when it came to accounting for cultural evolution. Nonetheless, he took a very jaundiced view of warfare as a factor in the rise of chiefdoms. A little more guarded, perhaps, and less heterodox in his interpretation of social causation, Maurice Godelier maintained that "religious ideology is not merely the superficial, phantasmic reflection of social relations. Marxist anthropologists in general have often appeared to be uncomfortable with evolution, expressing this discomfort in a variety of ways. In Stanley Diamond's writings, people see "the trajectory of Marxist anthropology, veering away from the positivist path that had previously characterized it. Uncomfortable with the notion of "impersonal forces" driving evolution forward, some anthropologists have sought refuge in agency theory. Marxist anthropologists in general have often appeared to be uncomfortable with evolution, expressing this discomfort in a variety of ways.
