I'll pile on with the folks who have already called out the white-patriarchal-nonsense, provably mistaken statement that "For 99% of our evolutionary history as a species, we lived in small hunter-gatherer groups with an alpha member at the apex. Like all group animals, we’re adapted to follow the leader because in nearly every situation our ancestors faced it was better to follow a mediocre leader than to stand around attempting to debate what ought to be done."

Anyone who cares to understand dimensions of humanness more fully could for example talk to members of still-persisting indigenous cultures in various parts of the world about their complex, multi-faceted social systems and how those systems balance authority with accountability, and how they apply collective intelligence. One can also peruse systemic, contemporary research by anthropologists, archaeologists, and paleontologists (even some white male ones) re-presenting such cultures past and present.

The assumptions presented here are relics of 19th and early 20th century patriarchal colonizer cultures unable to allow that any society organized differently than theirs was worthy of respect.

Here's one small excerpt from one relatively ordinary anthropology paper: "Demand sharing is widely recognised as a core value and practice of egalitarian hunter-gatherers. In contrast to the donor-organised sharing familiar to most people, where the person owning the resource dispenses it according to their choice, demand-sharing is recipient controlled. Potential recipients constantly demand shares of things they suspect may be around. It is the possessor’s duty to give whatever is requested of them, rather than being entitled to refuse the request. For most material items, need determines who can claim them, especially when they are consumable. Possessing something here is more like a guardianship or caretaker role until someone else needs it." Full paper: https://core.ac.uk/reader/79498300 For a drastically more comprehensive view on a larger scale, try something like "The Biggest Estate on Earth: How Aborigines Made Australia" by Bill Gammage.

And by the way it should almost always be "gatherer-hunter," because except in far northern latitudes, and specific locales elsewhere (often seasonally), "gathering" (mostly by women and children) through some combination of foraging and horticulture was the primary source of sustenance.

What this piece does illustrate is that "how we do what we do is who we are becoming," to quote neurobiologist and ontologist Humberto Maturana. If one can sufficiently convince enough people that "this is how it is," then those people will live as if that is how it is - because it becomes how it is through their living that way. Even though countless other "how it is" are possible. The "appeal" of tyranny is generated primarily by those who want to be tyrants, at whatever level of society. Arguing that tyranny is "how it is" is active support of and advocacy for tyranny. This is well demonstrated by the very shifts in political culture mentioned. But such shifts have nothing to do with being "hardwired" for tyranny, which is a mistaken understanding of relevant science. Our "problematic" neurobiology in this domain is fundamentally our ability to manipulate others via fear. This has potential to enable tyrannical power structures among humans, but only when manipulation by fear is allowed, accepted, or even encouraged - normalized - in a given society (as in most "contemporary" societies).