Chimpanzee Politics

  • Frans de Waal
John Hopkins University Press, £20.50

Screaming, hooting, scheming and arguments — no, it's not the House of Commons, but all part of the power struggles of the chimpanzee colony at Arnhem Zoo in The Netherlands.

The revised edition of Frans de Waal's Chimpanzee Politics (John Hopkins University Press, £20.50) expands and updates the story of the colony, now more than 25 years old, and reveals that the social gap between humans and chimpanzees is surprisingly small. Small wonder that US politician Newt Gingrich put the first edition on his reading list for members of Congress.