ABSTRACT
This chapter refines selectively extant theoretical ideas and starts to build an overarching conceptual platform that serves to frame questions concerning comparative relationships between collapse and ritual, such as why shifts in ritual activities so often accompany episodes of political and societal upheaval. Such assessments involve not merely the scale and complexity of those extant institutions but also consideration of the means of governance, autocratic or more collective in nature. Human affiliative arrangements of similar scale and hierarchical complexities may be characterized by markedly different interpersonal interconnections and modes of interaction between those who wield power and authority and those who do not. Human affiliations often are multiplex, and even when macropolitical affiliations are severed people remain invested in more local social networks. After all, resilient communities continued to face issues of cooperation and coordination, and rituals serve as one means to foster those interests.
