Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T15:57:54.851Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

2 - Red (and not so red) in tooth and claw

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 January 2010

Timothy L. Fort
Affiliation:
George Washington University, Washington DC
Get access

Summary

In a 2006 article in Foreign Affairs, Robert Sapolsky related the story of “The Forest Troop”, a group of baboons in a national park in Kenya. A tourist lodge expanded into their territory and with that expansion came a great deal of leftover food in the garbage dump. The baboons feasted on this. The males, who grabbed the spoils each morning, were very combative and not interested in socializing. Then tuberculosis broke out, killing most of the troop's members and all of the scavenging males. The remaining population was comprised of less aggressive males and a higher ratio of females to males. Socially, there was less harassment of subordinates and greater incidents of socialization. These attributes continued even after the remaining males left the troop, as baboons apparently do, and new males arrived. Even though the new males did not necessarily share the less aggressive nature of the surviving males, they continued the less violent culture and practices. As Sapolsky puts it, “Forest Troop's low aggression/high affiliation society constitutes nothing less than a multigenerational benign culture.” In short, cultures can change. That is true of our primate cousins, the baboons, and it is true of nations such as Germany, Japan, and Sweden. And so, the question is, if baboons can do it, why can't companies?

This is not to say that human nature is fully malleable. It is not. It has biological constraints. Nor is it to equate baboons with nation-states or corporations.

Type
Chapter
Information
Business, Integrity, and Peace
Beyond Geopolitical and Disciplinary Boundaries
, pp. 35 - 76
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2007

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×