01866nas a2200157   4500008004100000245014000041210006900181260003400250300001200284490000600296520128800302100001601590700002301606700002601629856005301655       2014                        eng d00aCan Government Be Self-Organized? A Mathematical Model of the Collective Social Organization of Ancient {Teotihuacan}, Central {Mexico}0 aCan Government Be SelfOrganized A Mathematical Model of the Coll  bPublic Library of Sciencec10  ae1099660 v93 a<p>Teotihuacan was the first urban civilization of Mesoamerica and one of the largest of the ancient world. Following a tradition in archaeology to equate social complexity with centralized hierarchy, it is widely believed that the city's origin and growth was controlled by a lineage of powerful individuals. However, much data is indicative of a government of co-rulers, and artistic traditions expressed an egalitarian ideology. Yet this alternative keeps being marginalized because the problems of collective action make it difficult to conceive how such a coalition could have functioned in principle. We therefore devised a mathematical model of the city's hypothetical network of representatives as a formal proof of concept that widespread cooperation was realizable in a fully distributed manner. In the model, decisions become self-organized into globally optimal configurations even though local representatives behave and modify their relations in a rational and selfish manner. This self-optimization crucially depends on occasional communal interruptions of normal activity, and it is impeded when sections of the network are too independent. We relate these insights to theories about community-wide rituals at Teotihuacan and the city's eventual disintegration.</p>
1 aFroese, Tom1 aGershenson, Carlos1 aManzanilla, Linda, R.  uhttp://dx.doi.org/10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0109966