The formation and maintenance of valuable (i.e., fitness-generating) relationships (Silk et al. 2003) are critical factors influencing individual strategy and decision making in primates (Cords 1997). Here I briefly explain the strategic use of social behavior to cultivate and maintain valuable relationships in Japanese macaques (Macaca fuscata) and suggest the possibility of applying "complex adaptive systems" theory to aid our understanding of complex social dynamics in this species. Valuable

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... relationships, which are characterized at the level of social interaction by frequent association, proximity, co-feeding, and grooming, are not distributed randomly within a group, but are clearly dependent on the sex combination of dyads. Valuable relationships are relatively rare between males but common between females, reflecting a social system with male dispersal and female philopatry. Valuable relationships usually occur among related females, leading to the assumption that the ultimate background of such relationships is nepotism (Kurland 1977) . However, careful consideration of the payoffs involved in social behavior suggests that relatedness is not the sole and consistent factor shaping valuable relationships, and that the mutualism has been underestimated in valuable relationships (Chapais 2006).