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Social
Rankings Of The Wolf Pack: Further Understanding Of Our Dog's Ancestors
It is
often suggested that members of the pack selflessly subordinate their
own interests to the greater interests of the group, but this is really
not an honest description of the evolutionary forces or motives at
work. In wolf packs the males and females of the group each establish
their own social rankings.
The top male and top female furiously
disrupt any attempts by their inferiors to breed. These rankings are
often stable for long periods, and when this is the case the
lower-ranking animals readily give way to their superiors without a
fight. The alpha male is greeted with fawning, even puppy-like,
submissive gestures of face licking.
If an inferior ranking male is
challenged by the alpha, he will roll over on his belly and submit. All
members of the group, male and female, participate in the care and
rearing of the young, regurgitating food for the puppies and being
generally solicitous of them.
Why do the inferiors put up with this role? The honest answer is really
that it is just an expedient. The group would erupt in constant
aggression, and quickly disintegrate, if the pack did not acquiesce to
the demands of the most assertive members among them. Yet if all that
inferior wolves got in the bargain was room and board and the chance to
play nanny for someone else's children, evolutionary logic would bridle
at the arrangement.
All wolves are offspring of alpha wolves. The
instinct for submission must serve some purpose that helps a wolf not
only eat but also reproduce - at least eventually. For how else would
the instinct for submission ever be passed on to the next generation?
The evolutionary calculus, then, is not that subordinate wolves are
naturally peaceful, selfless caregivers; they are rather just biding
their time.
Subordination is a way to avoid getting killed or driven
off by a larger or stronger or older and more experienced member of the
group while awaiting one's turn to challenge him.
It is a very good strategy to play the fawning courtier until one is
strong enough to depose the king. It is a very bad strategy to be
obnoxious or hostile to the king before the moment to strike has come.
The acceptance of social rank is thus a way to avoid constant fighting,
and it is something built into every wolf, and dog.
Wolves understand
social rank, and accept it, and it is the source of long periods of
stability in wolf society. Dominant and subordinate wolves go for
months enjoying friendly relations, with no overt righting, and indeed
few overt signs of hostility. Subordinate animals have an endless
capacity to deflect incipient aggression by their superiors by
submitting to their will and temporarily repressing their own
self-interested drives. It is no coincidence that wolves became house
pets but raccoons did not.
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Social Rankings
Of The Wolf Pack: Further Understanding Of Our Dog's Ancestors
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