The Concept Of Strategy

Competition existed long before strategy. Competition began with life itself. The first one-cell organisms required certain resources for maintenance of life. When those resources were adequate, then each generation became greater in number than the preceding one. If there had been no limitation on required resources, then exponential growth would have led to infinite numbers.
But as life evolved, the single-cell life form became a food resource for more complex life. With increasing complexity, each level became the resource for the next higher level. When two competitors were in perpetual competition, one inevitably displaced the other, unless something prevented it. In the absence of some counterbalancing force to maintain a stable equilibrium between the two competitors by giving each an advantage in its own territory, only one competitor survived. More...