While competition for limited breeding positions is a common feature of group life, species vary widely in the extent to which reproduction is shared among females (‘reproductive skew’). In recent years, there has been considerable debate over the mechanisms that generate variation in reproductive skew, with most evidence suggesting that subordinates breed when dominants are unable to prevent them from doing so. Here, we suggest that viviparity reduces the ability of dominant females to control subordinate reproduction and that, as a result, dominant female birds are more able than their mammal counterparts to prevent subordinates from breeding. Empirical data support this assertion. This perspective may increase our understanding of how cooperative groups form and are stabilized in nature.
No abstract is provided for this article.
Group-living primates and other animals use postaggression (PA) behavioural strategies to reduce the social costs of aggression. However, the relative frequency with which individuals use these conflict management strategies is unclear in many species, and functional analyses of these behaviours are rare. We observed aggression by dominant individuals against group members in cooperatively breeding meerkats, Suricata suricatta, and examined the incidents and effects of PA affiliation between the opponents (reconciliation), avoidance and submission. Aggression had a negative effect on the social relationship between opponents because of an elevated probability of aggression occurrence and an increased time interval until the first nonagonistic PA encounter compared to nonagonistic (control) encounters. The probability of aggression reoccurrence did not decrease with increasing time interval until the first PA encounter, indicating that aggression had long-lasting negative effects on social relationships. Evidence of reconciliation following aggression was not confirmed in this species. Avoidance and submission by the victim characterized the social behaviour following aggression. Although avoidance by victims in the first PA encounter reduced the probability of aggression reoccurrence, submission during aggression neither reduced the probability of aggression reoccurrence nor shortened the time interval until the first PA encounter. These results suggest that avoidance is the only behavioural option for victims of aggression to deal with PA hostility. Reconciliation and other forms of conflict management may be more important in species with low reproductive skew and with opportunities for negotiating relationships between group members than in despotic singular cooperative breeders.
No abstract is provided for this article.
No abstract is provided for this article.
Despite Japan's military defeat in 1945, Japanese economic interests returned to South East Asia remarkably rapidly in the post-war era. Backed by the United States, Japanese economic expansionism represented a new threat to British commercial and financial interests in a region much coveted by British policy-makers. Yet, notwithstanding doubts and fears expressed by some British business leaders and public servants, British policy played an important role in the re-emergence of Japan as an economic force in South East Asia. Although emphasis was placed on controlling the process, the logic behind the Anglo-American coalition in the Cold War pointed towards the need to build up Japan as a counterweight to communist China. At the same time, it was appreciated that Japanese trade and investment would benefit the sterling area as well as the economic development (and, hence, political management) of South East Asia. The resurrection of Japanese economic activity in South East Asia was also a side-effect of British decolonization policy. As this was increasingly fulfilled, indigenous political and business leaders welcomed economic links with the ‘new’ Japan.
