Societies of the eastern highlands were marked by residential instability perhaps as late as the historic period. A mixed economy of hunting, collecting and supplemental agriculture precluded permanent sedentism until the innovations of sweet potato agriculture became apparent, were taken up, and then assumed dominance in subsistence. This process, too, occurred relatively late compared to societies westward, as the prehistoric and other related material presented earlier amply demonstrates. With this lack of residential continuity and impermanence of settlement, small populations rarely interacted, they were adequately spaced on the landscape in relation to each other, and any mechanisms to deal with intragroup or intergroup problems or disputes were unnecessary. Individuals, disadvantaged or threatened, could simply break away from larger groups; groups themselves could stay well clear of each other, for the economy was ‘extensive’ and the perception was likely to have been that land was plentiful relative to people and economic practice, and avoidance, when trouble occurred, offered the path of least resistance. In western highlands societies, the prevailing conditions at that time were just the reverse.