CARLETON S. COON 
and muezzins call the faithful to prayer through loud-speakers. 
The principal technical vehicle through which institutions 
are able to grow to immense populations is that of communica- 
tion. From smoke signals and message sticks to post-horse 
couriers, to trains and telegraph clickers and television sets, 
is a familiar progression. In times of crisis monarchs, pre- 
sidents, and prime ministers are seen and heard by entire 
nations, just as the members of a Neolithic village used to see 
and hear their chief. 
During the course of history the numbers of institutions have 
increased more rapidly than the numbers of people concerned 
because each person comes to participate in an increasing 
number of institutions. On the other hand there is also an 
opposite tendency for the number of nations to decrease just 
as the number of separate languages decreases. But this second 
change does not work as a simple progression. Empires break 
up under the impact of new media of communication and 
dozens of small states temporarily arise. Nationalism is appa- 
rently a necessary prelude to internationalism, or decay, or 
whatever is in store for the new nations which now outnumber 
the old in the United Nations. 
A further stage is seen in the efforts of the old European 
nations to unite, and to create a powerful third force between 
the American and Russian colossi, which grew up essentially 
through the occupation of previously nearly empty spaces. 
CONTROL OF SOCIAL EQUILIBRIUM 
Whole societies, whatever their sizes and degrees of com- 
plexity, need controls to ensure the maintenance of equilibrium, 
and control comes in several forms. One is ritual, the repeated 
use of symbols and symbolic procedures in any type of activity. 
Without ritual there would be little discipline in an army, and 
the public appearances of heads of state are usually shrouded 
in ritual. Ritual also creeps into industry, as when a retiring 
employee is given a gold watch in the presence of his fellows, 
and ritual is of course the chief business of the religious insti- 
tution. 
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