Nightmares (un‐)limited: segmentary egalitarianism in northeast highland Georgia

This article demonstrates that while egalitarianism has long remained a social goal for many, the social costs are often high. The case material stems from highland northeast Georgia before the region's integration into the Russian Empire in the nineteenth century. Based on an analysis of the interplay between religion and everyday politics, it shows how egalitarian relationships among men were directly contingent on affirmations of hierarchy, evidenced in the exclusion of superiors and inferiors. The superiors were metahuman beings who ruled like feudal lords in a region that had protected itself against ‘real’ feudal domination for centuries. However, the power of these metahumans was spatially and temporally restricted. The excluded inferiors were women who were declared dangerous to men and metahumans alike due to menstruation. Such ‘segmentary egalitarianism’ entails both an emancipatory and an oppressive component. The emancipatory element takes off from the revolt against victimhood and is inherent to the restriction of metahuman governance. The oppressive moment replicates hierarchy in egalitarianism by excluding and suppressing people who are perceived as similar, but sufficiently different.