Chapter 6 of Joannes’ book deals with the agricultural motive for more economical efficiency and profit. The involvement of the temple in such matters is centralized, and offers a possibility for an evolution of economical efficiency. More complex roles in society emerge from the natural selection of economical competition within an empire. The temple’s centralized role allows for it to be exempt from such survival of the fittest, since it can profit from both successes and failures of citizens. Those who fail to sustain themselves in the race for economical efficiency can offer their lives and labor to the temple. People who are able to find profit must offer a portion to the temple for redistribution.
Some of the emerging roles of society result from the adaptation of the economical environment. Some people pursued temple positions in order to ensure the safety of inheritable income for later generations. Merchants and larger organizations of trade could expand, as long as the temple received a percentage of profits. This further opens possibilities for evolution of roles in society due to the contact with foreign lands and goods. The competition for profit had small produces in a disadvantage (compared to larger farms) when it came to transporting their goods. Iddin-Marduk helped close the gap on this stratification through creating an efficient mode of transport that both the smaller and larger producers could utilize, and as the central administration he profited from doing this. Thus the advent of the businessman who “builds his wealth on the existence of a relatively large market or farm produce” emerged (158). The smaller farmers became able to have better chances against the overpowering competition, and it kept monopolization at bay.
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