Usually these kinds of articles avoid the obvious fact, that ancient civilizations were based on plunder and exploitation, and that eventually you run out of places to plunder or your victims adapt and fight back. This was surprising because it seems like that wasn’t the case.
From the article I doubt that this population was based on "plunder and exploitation".
Apparently the scientists reconstructed their diet from skeletal remains, and you'd expect your standard marauder types to feed more on meat, since meat packs more calories (and satisfaction) per kilo.
The scientists say they didn't find many signs of violent deaths (in contrast to South American sites) and collapsed without signs of an exodus. Also the location of the island can't have been that convenient for seafarers of the period. On top of that, they didn't do much fishing at all, further pointing to a lack of maritime ambition.
I'd say the onset of civilization is marked by the ability to organize politically and amass resources without resorting to whole-sale plunder.
What makes the Maltese Temple Culture a "Civilization" is the higher population density and their efforts to bend the land to their will, leaving traces that endure for millenia.
That's the case for some ancient civilizations (it's definitely one of the more plausible entries on the great big list of reasons Rome fell, say), but not all.
