Affluence Without Abundance: What We Can Learn from the World's Most Successful Civilisation Hardcover – Illustrated, July 11, 2017

This is a very informative book and, at the same time, one that is easy and enjoyable to read. Suzman's main thesis is that the San, or Bushmen (or, to use his click-sensitive term, the Ju'/hoansi) were traditional hunting-gathering people whose environment provided them with all they needed to survive. They owned no more property than they could carry and yet they felt no need to acquire more than what they had - hence, affluence without abundance.This point has been made by other anthropologists, but Suzman makes it particularly well. His book also brings us up to date about current San circumstances and the picture he draws is not at all pretty. As the fingers of the urban-industrial world have groped their way into the once barely accessible back country of southern Africa, most of the more or less contented nomadic San have been become marginalized and demoralized.I say "more or less" contented San because, as the author makes clear, the well-known egalitarianism of these people was sustained not only by an ethic of sharing, but also by readily expressed jealousy. It's hard to accumulate wealth when all around you are accusing you of being a selfish, anti-social jerk.I have read quite a few accounts of the San, but this is the best I have read in quite a while, and certainly the most informative about relatively recent social changes. And it is full of thought-provoking observations. One that I remember particularly well is that our genetic selves may have evolved in the Paleolithic hunting-gathering context, but much of our current way of thinking and behaving is rooted in our more recent Neolithic past, when our ancestors took to plant cultivation and animal domestication.

Of course I was interested in this topic, otherwise I would have not bought it. What was unexpected was that I could not put this book down. It is very easy to read, entertaining, well researched/reported and thorough. It gives an overview over the history, transition times and the nowadays of the lives of the Bushmen of the Kalahari. The part of the diet was very interesting. This book also opened up new perspectives on hunting in general, but especially that state of oneness they seem to be in when hunting the traditional way, but also big game hunting for fees. It was interesting to read how the San managed to keep an egalitarian society, how their society worked, their relationship to time. The way they lived does seem close to paradise abundance. The book also gives an account of the way and effects of Western colonization as well as the various waves of African herders and their influence. I appreciate the detailed info, maps, language tips. I got to be close to a world I know I will not visit myself in this lifetime, let alone spend 25 years studying. Much gratitude to the author.

I read this book last year in hardcover (library) and bought the paperback as soon as it came out. I'm looking forward to rereading it. I'm 64, a Ph.D. from U.C. Berkeley (humanities), with a lifelong interest in anthropology and a new interest in the last decade in economics; this books deals thoroughly with both. The observations of the "Bushmen" are informed, educated, and serious, based on decades of sympathetic but scientific observation; there's no romanticism here. But what stands out--besides the horrific tragedy of the end of their way of life--is how satisfying that way of life was. As Harari notes in "Sapiens", we traded a life rich in interest and meaning as hunter-gatherers for a life of taking care of (boring) wheat. This book makes me miss being a part of a hunter-gatherer society; it helps me understand why I am crazy in this capitalistic, foolish world, even though I am materially successful. I think it's the single most important book I've read yet.

I was forever changed when I read "The Harmless People" by Elizabeth Marshall Thomas about her family's time spent living with the San Bushmen in the early 1950's. I also read some of her later books on the San after their culture and way of life was devastated by modern people. I am so glad that I read her earlier book first to give an accurate view of the amazing first ancestors of ours and their amazing intelligence learned from thousands of years because it helped me to have more empathy for them and understand how devastating the bombardment of the modern world has been to their way of life and culture. Another indigenous culture robbed by modern humans. Please read this book by James Suzman, also a great book and he has so much understanding of what modern societies have done to rob a former egalitarian society of people of their rights and land. Thank you so much to these two authors for writing these books.

This book is endlessly fascinating. It seems like a simple concept -- talk to some Bushmen and analyze how they perceive the world differently. But the implications of viewing the world through hunter-gatherer eyes, where striving to acquire more is neither necessary nor helpful (since it will be wasted anyway), on ideas like time and value are mind-bogglingly interesting.

Definitely an enjoyable read.What interested me most was the similarities between the "Bushmen" and other hunter gatherer societies in So. and Central America. Their conceptions of the world in which they live, their understanding of time, how they share and exchange valued items and food, and the assertive egalitarianism reminds me of published missionary anthropologists' studies about Western Hemisphere contacts with the more isolated indigenous people groups.Sadly, these indigenous peoples will lose, or have already lost, their bearings in the world as they understood it. And they are woefully unprepared for the marginalized life imposed on them by the majority in their societies.

Gran libro y llegó antes de lo esperado

Great lessons in African spirituality or "ubuntu" ("I am who I am because of who we are"). The book guides the reader on how to take only what you need from your life source and to give up the balance to your community or to nature. It shows how self-respect is about respecting the needs of your community and natural environment. So much wisdom and so many important lessons from these ancient people.

The narrative is easy, understandable and maintains a scientific language.

I didn't have much more than a passing knowledge of the San but this book sorted that out. It is partly a local history but also part personal history or memoir. Very readable and beautifully packaged.

A brilliant and profoundly important book. Very well written, eye opening and informative. The story of the bushman seems to say as much about us and where we have gone so wrong with our modern lives as it does about the bushmen. There’s so much to consider with this story of the first people in this excellent book.