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Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex Among Apes [Paperback]

Frans de Waal (Author)

4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)

Price:	CDN$ 27.08 & this item ships for FREE with Super Saver Shipping. Details
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Product Details

Paperback: 235 pages
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press; 25th anniversary ed edition (September 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0801886562
ISBN-13: 978-0801886560
Product Dimensions: 24.6 x 17.3 x 2 cm
Shipping Weight: 544 g

Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)

Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #122,813 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #15 in Books > Science > Biological Sciences > Zoology > Primatology
- #17 in Books > Science > Biological Sciences > Animals > Apes & Monkeys
- #44 in Books > Nonfiction > Social Sciences > Anthropology > Physical

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Product Description

From Amazon.com

The great apes, like humans, can recognize themselves in mirrors. They communicate by sound and gesture, form bands along what can only be called political lines, and sometimes engage in what is very clearly organized warfare. (Less frequently, too, they practice cannibalism.) In Chimpanzee Politics Frans de Waal, a longtime student of simian behavior, analyzes the behavior of a captive tribe of chimpanzees, comparing its actions with those of ape societies in the wild. What he finds is often not pleasant: chimps seem capable of astonishing deviousness and savagery, which has obvious implications for the behavior their human cousins sometimes exhibit. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

An excellent book... Just as fresh and thought-provoking in 2008 as it was in 1983. Laelaps 2008

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First Sentence
CHIMPANZEES HAVE OUTSPOKEN PERSONALITIES. Read the first page

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5 Reviews

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Average Customer Review

4.6 out of 5 stars (5 customer reviews)

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4.0 out of 5 stars Recommended for lovers of nature and politics (human) alike, Jan 11 2004

Alan Mills (Chicago, Illinois USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

This review is from: Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes (Paperback)

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?

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5.0 out of 5 stars Reveals how human-like chimp behavior can be, Oct 27 2002

Bradd E. Libby (Amherst, MA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

This review is from: Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes (Paperback)

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.

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5.0 out of 5 stars machiavellian intelligence, Dec 18 2001

Njugka Hills (UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes (Paperback)

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...

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Most recent customer reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Anthropoligical hogwash
The premise of this book is that it is possible to gain an understanding of human behavior by understanding the behavior of chimpanzee's since human beings are really just... Read more

Published on April 3 2001

5.0 out of 5 stars a survival guide for corporate america
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... Read more

Published on Mar 26 2001 by J. R. Derry