ABSTRACT
Elite is a modern term which is applied to groups in power who have been selected either by birth-a hereditaxy nobility-or by their capacity of success at the expense of others. Elites usually invoke racial ethnocentrism, class doctrines, and ideology to maintain their specific character. Ideology in precapitalistic societies manifests itself in mythic and religious forms which are sometimes personified in a royal despot or in imaginary gods. This chapter considers the core Casas Grandes region in Chihuahua where a long sequence has been established. Archaeologists have adapted and applied Service's evolutionary model to the mesoamerican cultural area; original foraging bands progressed through time to a tribal-agricultural status, and thereon to chiefdoms, and later to civilized or state levels. William E. Doolittle undertook a very interesting demographic and ecological study along this same section of the Sonora River. He discovered a network of sites controlled by regional centers.
