The notion that all human history – and all human societies – can be shoehorned into a simple binary scheme is not new – for example, tradition/modernity, civilisation/barbarism and now Michele Gelfand’s loose/tight dichotomy (Here’s the science behind Brexit and Trump’s rise, 17 September). But it is always simplistic, ahistorical, and therefore wrong.
And in this case, it does not inspire confidence that Gelfand thinks the Aztec and Inca polities were “nation-states” (they were loose multi-ethnic empires) and that Athens was “loose” because – according to her passe-partout explanation – it lacked external threats (there is the small matter of the Persian empire, not to mention Sparta, which, though it occupied the same time, place and culture, was about as “tight” as you can get).
Alan Knight
Emeritus professor of history, St Antony’s College, Oxford University
• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com
• Read more Guardian letters – click here to visit gu.com/letters
• Do you have a photo you’d like to share with Guardian readers? Click here to upload it and we’ll publish the best submissions in the letters spread of our print edition
