Oppenheimer wrote the book in Frankfurt am Main during 1907, as a fragment of the four-volume System of Sociology, an intended interpretative framework for the understanding of social evolution on which he laboured from the 1890s until the end of his life.

It was well received by—and influential on—as diverse an audience as Zionist settlers in Palestine (halutzim), American and Slavic communitarians, West German Chancellor Ludwig Erhard, and anarcho-capitalists like Murray Rothbard.

A direct junction between the two was achieved through Lorenz Stein, who became the leading German teacher of administrative law and influenced generations of thinkers.

The chapter argues against the theory that all human political organizations must gradually become a class-state due to inherent tendencies of development.

[4] On the other hand, peasants live in liberty, scattered over the country in separated curtilages, perhaps in villages, split up due to quarrels about district or farm boundaries.

[4] The introduction of slavery into the tribal economy of herdsmen completed the essential elements of the state, and a social separation into three distinct classes – nobility, common freemen, and slaves – exists.

[4] The text also explains how herdsmen gradually become accustomed to earning their livelihood through warfare and exploiting men as servile labor motors, leading to the development of professional fighters.

The author argues that the fundamental basis of civilization is the same all over the world, its development being consistent and regular under the most varied economic and geographical conditions.

[4] If the country is not adapted to herding cattle on a large scale or where a less unwarlike population might make attempts at insurrection, the crowd of lords becomes more or less permanently settled, taking either steep places or strategically important points for their camps, castles, or towns.

"[4] In the same measure, the feeling of belonging to another grows stronger, and "the spirit of fraternity and of equity, which formerly existed only within the horde and which never ceased to hold sway within the association of nobles, takes root everywhere, and more and more finds its place in the relations between the lords and their subjects.

Oppenheimer describes the ruling class psychology, including their "aristocrat's pride" and contempt for the lower laboring strata.

"The object of the contest remains always the same, the produce of the economic means of the working classes, such as loot, tribute, taxes and ground rent.

[4] Section (a), titled "Traffic in Prehistoric Times", explains that "the history of primitive peoples shows that the desire to trade and barter is a universal human characteristic".

Also, "the exchange of women is observed universally, and doubtless exerts an extraordinarily strong influence in the development of peaceable intercourse between neighboring tribes, and in the preparation for barter of merchandise.

"[4] Section (b), titled "Trade and the Primitive State" explains that the robber-warrior cannot "unduly interfere with such markets and fairs as he may find within his conquered domain", due to "superstitious fear that the godhead will avenge a breach of the peace", besides economic reasons.

[4] For example, herdsman's need for slaves is limited by the size of their herds, and they are likely to exchange their surplus for other valuable items such as salt, ornaments, arms, metals, woven materials, utensils, etc.

Similarly, sea nomads are coerced to preserve or create marketplaces for the transportation of loot, especially of herds and slaves, is difficult and dangerous on the trails across the desert or the steppes.

"[4] He explains that "maritime states or cities, in the strict sense, came into being not only through warlike conquest, but also through peaceable beginnings, by a more or less mixed pénétration pacifique.

[4] It describes the differentiation of wealth in the primitive feudal state and how private ownership of lands created a sharper contrast of social rank.

[4] The princes of the noble clans received more land and peasants than the common freemen due to their position as patriarchs, warlords, and captains maintaining their warlike suites of half-free persons, servants, clients, or refugees.

The section also discusses how "the power of the head of the state is frequently increased enormously by the trading monopoly, a function exercised by the primitive chieftains as a natural consequence of the peaceful barter of guest-gifts.

The more the state expanded, the more the official power had to be delegated to representatives on the borders and marches, who were constantly threatened by wars and insurrections.

[4] Then, he explains that the last nail in the coffin of the common freemen is when the patriarch's right of disposition of unoccupied lands passes to the territorial magnate with the remaining royal privileges.

"[4] "The holder of the central power or some local potentate, taking the rank of a prince, requires more supple tools for his dominion than are to be found among his 'peers.'"

Finally, he mentions the Fulbe, who confide positions at court and the defense of the country to their slaves rather than their own kinsmen or free associates of their tribe.

The chapter argues that in a developed feudal state, the services required of peasants must be limited, and all surplus belongs to the landlord.

[4] The industrial city is the place of economic means, or the exchange and interchange for equivalent values between rural production and manufacture.

The introduction of the system of money economy results in the central government becoming "almost omnipotent, while the local powers are reduced to complete impotence."

"[4] Oppenheimer argues that there is still a remnant of the antique law of war in the form of the ownership of large estates, which has survived because of its disguise as an economic right.

[4] The surplus supply of "free laborers" in the capitalist system is a consequence of the right of holding landed property in large estates.