# kaal:claim:3782193-004

**Claim.** The unusual multi-millennial stability of Ancient Egypt and Imperial China, despite their strong political hierarchies, is explained by protocol decentralization rather than by any feature of their political centralization.

**Type.** mechanism  **Support.** argued

**Holds when.**

- comparison against contemporaneous civilizations that rose and fell

**Source quote.**

> Ancient Egypt and Imperial China were relatively stable for millennia despite strong political hierarchies. What distinguished these civilizations from the many others that rose and fell around them? Their stability was due to protocol decentralization.

**From.** Craig Calcaterra, Wulf A. Kaal, *Historical Sketches of Centralization vs. Decentralization* (2021), Chapter 9. Historical sketches of centralization vs. decentralization, page 3

**Cite as.** Craig Calcaterra, Wulf A. Kaal, Historical Sketches of Centralization vs. Decentralization (2021). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3782193

**Verify.** sha256 of source PDF `74df9cc9a19a098bdacd0424a4174795f6e184f7a31c8ee7541195186701ebd2` at https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wulfkaal/Academic-Papers/main/papers/pdf/Calcaterra%20and%20Kaal%20-%202021%20-%20Historical%20Sketches%20of%20Centralization%20vs.%20Decentralization.pdf

**Topics.** decentralization, governance-design

**Keywords.** protocol-decentralization, ancient-egypt, imperial-china, stability, governance

**Related claims.**

- restates: https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3782192-029

**Canonical form.** This markdown file is the canonical hashed representation of the claim. Its sha256 is the content hash used for attestation.