Abstract
Abstract An important point in understanding the function and evolution of social insects lies in understanding how the workers can increase their own fitness.. In the first chapter we already learnt that workers can play an active role in the evolution of social life, and when doing this they can run into conflicts with the queens, at least in the eusocial Hymenoptera. In order to study the role played by different parties in the conflicts, we have to quantify their evolutionary successes and this is done using the inclusive fitness. An individual can increase its inclusive fitness either directly by producing its own offspring or indirectly by helping a relative to reproduce. The inclusive fitness of an individual depends on the number of offspring raised, on the genetic relatednesses and the reproductive values of the offspring produced, and on the mating successes of females and males in the population.
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