Beginning six thousand years ago, intermediate categories of socioeconomic status formed for the first time in cities as entrepreneurial individuals and households engaged in scaled-up manufacturing activities and in new types of “white collar” work, such as accounting, writing, and middle management. Knowledge workers were indispensable not only for the production and trade activities that characterized ancient cities, but also for the growth and management of religious institutions and the development of political authority. Archaeological and textual data provide evidence for a middle producer-consumer stratum in both tangible possessions (real estate, dwellings, material goods) and intangible investments (schooling, language, and mannerisms). Using information from Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, Rome, and Mesoamerica, the article assesses how strategies of resource management and risk-taking utilized by the middle class also resulted in generative political relationships to address middle-class anxieties through the development of law codes, insurance, and formal systems of professional advancement.
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