>It begins with by questioning "why did Rousseau wrote about inequality if 100 years before no one in western culture cared about it"?

I really hope he doesn't say that because Rousseau is just the high point of a debate about luxury and sociability that runs throughout the whole eighteenth century. He and others like him were influenced by travelogues from the New World describing natives as living simply and equitably. But he was equally influenced by the objective conditions of early modern capitalism, ancient Stoicism, and Christian writings about greed and pride. He wrote his own 'Confessions' in tribute to St.Augustine, after all.

I like Graeber, and he has a truly original mind, but he doesn't have the best reputation in academia for being 100% scholarly.