Ritual as resource management

This paper argues that rituals are mechanisms of resource management. The argument is based on four observations: (i) over the course of hominin evolution, fitness became contingent on psychological states; (ii) these psychological states can be understood as ‘resources’, not unlike material resources such as energy, food or fuel; (iii) ritual ‘manages’ these psychological resources—meaning that it cultivates, builds and directs them; and (iv) ritual management can be analytically decomposed, providing a new descriptive tool for understanding rituals and predictions about ritual survival. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Ritual renaissance: new insights into the most human of behaviours’.