General Comparison of Primitive and Civilized Family Sys-
tems. -- America's material culture is far more advanced and complex
than that of the Trobriands. Also, a description of the American eco-
nomic system would require much more space than a description of
the Trobriand economic system. Yet, in comparing family systems,
America does not seem to require a much greater space than does
the more primitive people. Family systems in general have a certain
complexity, a certain wealth of detail in their pattern, which is much
the same in civilized as in primitive societies. Civilization does not
elaborate the family system as it does the material culture and the
economic organization. In some respects many primitive family sys-
tems are more complicated than our own. On the other hand, it
cannot be said that the family system as a whole tends to become
more impoverished as civilization advances. It grows thinner in spots,
but more elaborate elsewhere.

We are not sure whether or not the family culture permits wider
latitude of personal behavior as civilization advances. It may perhaps
do so in the most modern, liberal civilizations. Rousseau held that
primitive man was free and "natural" in his behavior. He inaugu-
rated the doctrine of the "happy savage." Later, Spencer, Wester-
marck, and others, who studied primitive life in the concrete, came
to the opposite conclusion. Namely, they asserted that primitive man
was the slave of custom, enjoying less personal freedom than do we.
Primitive customs were different from ours, but they had to be obeyed
more strictly than we obey ours. The most recent view of primitive

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