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Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes

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Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes was a very disturbing book to read. Perhaps this is because of the way Franz de Waal chose to end the book. The story about how Luit finished his reign as "alpha male" was extremely upsetting.

One of the key themes in the book is that so called political behavior is rooted at a level of development that is below cognitive and is as much instinctive as it is learned. Learning about the male chimpanzee's quest for dominance, it makes one wonder how much our behavior is motivated by inherent drives that are not only irrelevant in modern cultures, but are unknowable by those who experience the motivation.

This book has changed the way I look at and understand the word around me.

I strongly recommend this book, but it is not for the faint-hearted.

excellent book. de waal's thesis, as i understand it, is finding and exposing analogies to human behavior among other animals in order to better understand human behavior (a thesis he extends in _good natured_ to show that our "animal" behaviors are also behaviors of kindness and compassion) _chimpanzee politics_ reads like a novel as it follows chronicles the group dynamics of a chimpanzee colony over several years; and in those group dynamics we see enough sex, scheming, and politics to fuel a soap opera or election campaign. the mirror that de waal holds up to us through this book is at once funny, fascinating, and humbling. if one reason you read novels is to appreciate the universality of the human condition (that is, that you like to live vicariously in other times or places to experience conditions as other humans do), then get this book and prepare yourself to appreciate just how universal much of our condition really is. you might be surprised at just how easily you vicariously experience life as chimpanzees do.

This a a book that has gotten more attention for what people have said about it than for what is actually inside. Though there are some graphs and tables, don't let them scare you away: the text reads like a novel and certainly isn't overly technical or formally scientific. The story is a fascinating recollection principally about the sex and power struggles among a group of chimpanzees that lived in a zoo in the Netherlands in the mid 1970's.

Some have claimed that the author has advocated using the complexities of chimpanzee social structure to shed light on human politics, but, if anything, the exact opposite is true: de Waal says very little abut non-chimpanzee societies until the last chapter and, throughout the book, freely and unapologetically employs human intentions, actions, and emotions to shed light on chimp culture.

If you're prepared to cast aside any preconceived notions you may have, this book makes an enjoyable introduction to pop-sci primatology.

Frans de Waal is one of the most prominent primatologists writing about non-human primates today. Unlike Jane Goodall, who studies chimpanzees in the wild, de Waal observes captive chimp behavior at the Yerkes Regional Primate Research Center in Georgia. Although de Waal's strength lies in his ability to find echoes of human behavior in chimpanzee interactions (a stance that is still controversial in some circles), he is careful not to read absolutes into his observations. He is keenly aware that the species are not identical, only closely related.

CHIMPANZEE POLITICS begins by introducing the highly individualized personalities of the chimpanzees de Waal studied, and then progresses to specific examples of political behavior: power plays, diplomacy, perks at the various levels of the hierarchy, and the traits that give rise to this complicated chimpanzee social structure. Photographs, both black-and-white and color, serve to further document de Waal's observations. Although many people have made much of how this work illuminates human behavior, it is ultimately about chimps, not people.

This book was written for the layman, and its ease of reading makes it accessible to a wide range of readers. Highly readable and insightful, CHIMPANZEE POLITICS would make a strong addition to the libraries of those interested in the nature of primates, both human and non-human.

Chimps, it is said, are not able to perform cognitive tasks that a three-year-old human could master with ease. THis book shows how tricky it is to compare human and chimpanzee intelligence: the machiavellian chimpanzee princes in this gripping saga may not read or write, but appear to grasp the long-term consequences of their day-to-day activities, and plot deviously to gain power in the quicksand of shifting alliances. No three year old child has this kind of concentration and determination, to my knowledge! It makes for gripping reading, and raises fascinating questions about the evolution of our own intelligence, social hierarchies and power-seeking instincts. You'll want to read it again as soon as you've finished...

In the year I was born the Dutch primatologist Frans de Waal delivered a highly popular and influential book about the chimpanzees of Arnhem Zoo, the Netherland facility housing the largest captive population of the apes in the world. At first such a book might not have seemed so exciting, the well-known studies of Jane Goodall or Diane Fossey among apes in Africa making a group of chimpanzees in a zoo seem bland by comparison, but de Waal took advantage of the opportunities for detailed observation the captive setting provided and painted a vivid picture of the complex social life of chimpanzees in Chimpanzee Politics. Twenty-five years after its first publication, the book has recently been updated with new information about the chimpanzees of Arnhem and a selection of color photographs, the supplemental materials adding to what was already an excellent book.

The true strength of Chimpanzee Politics lies in de Waal's ability to guide the reader step-by-step through the complex social interactions of the chimpanzees, the story of the various dominance shifts and reconciliations being fairly easy to follow. Even when some of the interactions become a little confusing, the book includes a smattering of diagrams that help to show how the groups feelings toward a certain member oscillated back and forth over time, for example. These are especially helpful as de Waal shows that while physical strength or the ability to beat another chimpanzee in a one-to-one confrontation is important, coalitions and support from other members of the group can make or break dominance hierarchies in ways that we might not expect. Indeed, the males Luit, Nikki, and Yeroen are the main "characters" of this tale, each having their time at the top (but only through cooperation and coalitions). Ultimately, as reported by de Waal in the paper "The Brutal Elimination of a Rival Among Captive Male Chimpanzees" published in 1986, Luit was fatally injured by Nikki and Yeroen, a fact that is included in the epilouge as de Waal admits he did not want to initially end his book on a dark note.

The power shifts between the three males don't make sense without an understanding of the females in the group, however, and de Waal does spend some time describing the behaviors and social habits of the females. A little more explanation and detail in this area would have strengthened the book, especially since female chimpanzees in the wild disperse from their home populations and are not constantly in close contact with each other, but de Waal does spend some time talking about the rough time the male chimpanzees received when introduced to the group when it was dominated by a female named Mama. Eventually the males achieved dominance, but even so they still relied on the support of females during the periods when one male was on his way to displacing the dominant male as the alpha, so females are not merely relegated to the objects of the males sexual desires and nothing else. In fact, the younger sexually-mature females were sometimes so amorous that they "wore out" the adult males, the interactions between the sexes being just as compelling as the chapters featuring power struggles.

Given the close resemblances, both physical and social, between chimpanzees and our own species it is easy to draw comparisons between the two, but de Waal remains careful not to extend his observations of chimpanzees too far. Even when his writings might land on the anthropomorphic side of the fence, de Waal usually admits that he is doing so up front. Indeed, de Waal's unapologetic attitude for attributing names and personalities to each animal and up-front honesty in making the occasional comparison to human behavior makes Chimpanzee Politics a refreshing read, de Waal overcoming preconceptions that captive chimpanzees are not worth the time spent studying them. While it was right on-time to signal a changing view of primatology when it was first published, Chimpanzee Politics is just as fresh and thought-provoking in 2008 as it was in 1983.

DeWaal deftly narrates three changes in leadership among the colony of chimps in a zoo in the Netherlands (not Yerkes in GA, as another reviewer claims). Unlike many animals, chimpanzees can not dominate one another by use of brute force. No chimp is so strong that a coalition of two other males (or a coalition of females) can not successfully challenge his dominate position. This means that the dominate (male) chimp can only remain dominate if he succedes in coalition building.

Each of the "coups" DeWaal describes took place either because the dominate male became too greedy, or because another male built a stronger coalition. Similarly, the dominant make needs the cooperation (or at least neutrality) of most of the (more numerous, but weaker individually) females of the colony.

The comparison to human politics is right on the money. While chimpanzee politics does not have the veneer of ideology that covers the nitty gritty of human politics, I strongly suspect that the type of favors, distribution of goodies, and raw sex that DeWaal describes as the "currency" of chimpanzee politics is much closer to the way human politicians actually operate than most of us would like to admit.

If a Martian were to observe the functioning of the U.S. Sentate--without being able to understand a word anyone says, but with the ability to observe every transaction, day and night, over a period of sereral years, I suspect that the Martian's description of our politics would read very similarly to that of DeWaal's. Of course, for all we know, chimps too have a "language" which permits them to cover what appears to us to be raw politics with "political platforms".

One final note--the chimp need for coalitions to maintain primacy has obvious conotations for international relations in our world, where ideology plays less of a role, and coalitions have, at least since the end of WWII, been the key to maintaining a stable heirarchy of nations. Is the US now in danger of becoming the over confident "alpha" male that DeWaals describes?

Chimpanzee Politics tells the story of a colony of chimps in captivity. Frans De Waal observed them for years and soon saw that each chimp had a personality and that there was a definite pattern to their behavior. He shows that they have innate desires and goals and that they act politically to attain them. The astounding thing is that the chimps were seemingly very human in their actions.

This book is very accessible and engaging. From the perspective of evolutionary psychology, De Waal shows an unquestionable chimp nature at work. It is then not much of a leap to suggest that there is a human nature and that, like the chimps, we act predictably and politically in pursuit of our goals.

I would recommend this book to anyone interested in human behavior or evolutionary psychology. It is a great piece of popular science writing that is nevertheless very serious.

This is a revised version of Frans de Waal's widely read work "Chimpanzee Politics." At the outset, de Waal notes that he uses the term "politics" very consciously. He says: "If we follow Harold Lasswell's famous definition of politics as a social process determining 'who gets what, when, how,' there can be little doubt that chimpanzees engage in it. The events depicted in this volume come from the Arnhem Zoo chimpanzee colony. That itself is problematic, since chimpanzees (and other animals) in artificial environments can have their behavior altered thereby (still, similar things have happened in "the wild," so de Waal's work is probably of value and relevance).

One of the threads of this work is the ongoing triangular relationship among three adult males--Luit, Yeroen, and Nikkie. The record of their shifting alliances and the gruesome murder of one of these three later on makes telling and chilling reading.

The arc of the trio's relationship begins with Yeroen as the dominant (alpha) male. Over time, Luit began to ally with Nikkie to undermine Yeroen's authority. Finally, the coalition of Luit and Nikkie prevailed and Yeroen was dislodged as the top male in the troop. However, with time, Yeroen and Nikkie began to explore an alliance and, in the end, the two united to "overthrow" Luit, with a ghastly ending.

There is much more to this book than the slow dance among the three males, but that tale typifies the calculated behavior of chimpanzees. This is a well written and even compelling read. The problems with the artificial setting and de Waal's treatment of the chimpanzees as cost-benefit calculators may give them too-human qualities. But the arc of this book is fascinating and still worth reading years after the first version was published.

In this classic work, Frans de Waal introduces us to the social life of chimpanzees. It's based on his studies of a large band in the Arnhem Zoo, which has a very large enclosure in which (we hope) chimpanzees behave fairly naturally. Chimp social life is dominated by social relationships, hierarchies, food, and sex. This book enjoys its lasting popularity to the fact that many humans apparently believe that these same factors dominate human social life.

By all measures, it's one of those rare books that makes a scientific contribution while being accessible to lay persons. I'm one of those lay persons and found the book very interesting. It's mostly about chimps, though you'll be tempted to draw parallels with humans at various times.

This 25th anniversary edition is a trade paperback, with lots of black and white pictures throughout the text and about a dozen color plates in the middle.