Egalitarian decision-making without equality: Lessons from need-based leadership and consensus in animal societies

Abstract Drawing on formal models and empirical studies of collective decision-making in animal groups, we show that egalitarian systems can emerge and remain stable despite persistent individual inequalities in needs, information, and social position. Egalitarianism is best understood as a dynamic regulation of influence under heterogeneous conditions, where leadership is conditional, distributed, and reversible rather than fixed or coercive.