ABSTRACT
Analogies are often drawn between human and ant societies. The political process, the process of redistributing control over resources among the individuals of a group, is, in evolutionary terms, a breeding process. The political system is a breeding system. Competition for scarce resources, food, nest sites, mates, is the basis of society and the stuff of politics. But the simple nest-site competition is not very complex; no really ingenious political system can be seen to come out of it. Human political systems are based on hierarchy and competition for status; it remains an ardently sought political ideal to divorce ascribed or inherited status from control over resources. The symbolic processes enabled the evolving hominid hunters to create political structures that overstepped the boundaries of the troop even as they continued to use the same raw material. The primate political system is based on ruthless but ritualized competition for power.
