The Tribal Imagination Quotes

“The whole premise of this book has been that the default system of human nature, and hence of human society, is the tribal system; unquestionably Closed. However we change and develop-however Open we become, it is always with us in one form or another. I am therefore, in this scheme, less interested in any kind of choice to be made between forms of society or mentality than in trying to understand the interaction between the tribal default system and the civilized structures we have erected on it or over it. This does not mean that we cannot prefer the Open to the Closed form of society and defend the former against a recursion to the latter. We shall certainly do so. But it does mean that this
cannot be done without understanding the nature of the interaction between them and, what is equally important, how we should go about studying this interaction. With this in mind, let us reflect on Popper, tribalism, and the idea of culture, and so come full circle back to the issues that launched this enterprise.”
― Robin Fox, The Tribal Imagination: Civilization and the Savage Mind