victory follows another
the belief in superiority grows. People in an expanding empire or
burgeoning civilization are obviously better survivors than their less
successful competitors.

Competitive survival struggle modifies the cultures of both victors and
vanquished. The dispersal and adoption of culture traits, supplemented
by negotiation and accommodation, broaden the geographical area of the
victors, increasing the population and adding to the material resources,
the wealth and income of the enlarged group. It may also involve the
corresponding decrease of the geographical area, population, wealth and
income of the vanquished.

In order to protect itself, preserve itself, to enlarge itself and,
where possible, to improve itself, each competing groups aims to set up
standards of ideas and conduct to which all living members of the group
are presumed to agree and to which they must adhere. When new members
enter the group, by birth or adoption, they are duly indoctrinated with
the group ideology. Early in their history the individuals and
sub-groups composing every civilization adopted such standards and
promulgated them by the decree of a leader or by the common consent of
associated groups, as the outcome of negotiation, discussion, give and
take. During the history of every civilization such agreements were
reached and recorded in compacts, treaties, laws, constitutions,
specifying the nature and limits of the collective cultural uniformity
at which the community aimed.

The struggle for collective uniformity was long and often bitter.
Individuals and factions resented and resisted the imposition of group
authority. Internal conflict led to civil wars in the course of which
the group was divided or the solidarity of the group was reaffirmed
despite hardships imposed on disagreeing, divergent minorities.

Closely paralleling the group need for survival and uniformity
(solidarity) was the need for group expansion, or extension. In the
competitive struggle for survival which played such an important role in
the life of pre-civilized communities, strategic geographic location was
often decisive. Soil fertility, mineral deposits, timber reserves,
access to waterways, location on trade routes all played a part in
community survival, stability and growth.

Such geographical advantages are few and far between. Often they are
already occupied and defended by stable communities. Their control and
utilization are basi