"The life of wild animals is a struggle for life," wrote Charles Darwin in The Origin of Species. Any living creature needs a territory, a place to live, a theatre to perform the story of its life. To protect one's home and to expel hostile intruders from one's territory is therefore a quite natural act. However waging and winning territorial fights is not the only possible strategy to survive and prosper. Another strategy, that in the long run succeeds better than fighting, is cooperation. The international division of labour and the resulting international trade are examples of cooperation, which yield huge benefits to the parties involved. When countries, companies or individuals opt for cooperation, they tend to treat the other parties as partners, not as hostile forces. They do not fight or expel them, but they engage in patient negotiation. When problems arise, they always try to find a solution that honestly takes into account the interest of all partners.
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