The differences among the four types of oligarchy described in this study reflect the changing nature of the threats oligarchs face to their property and wealth, and how they act to solve these wealth defense challenges. It matters enormously whether the primary threats are from the have-nots “below,” laterally from other oligarchs, from a sultanistic ruler or state from “above,” or from some combination of these. The nature of the responses is as important as the sources of the threats. Oligarchs can defend their property and wealth either separately or collectively. As they do so, they can be fully armed, hire coercive capacities and partially disarm, or exchange full disarmament for reliable guarantees of wealth and property provided by a higher authority. Chapter 2 examined these factors and variables in the context of warring oligarchies.

The focus in this chapter is on ruling oligarchies. The key difference between a warring oligarchy and a ruling oligarchy is the higher degree of cooperation among oligarchs in the latter. When successful, such cooperation is closely related to modifications in the role oligarchs play in the provision of coercion for wealth defense, which reduce one of the greatest dangers oligarchs have faced since the emergence of the earliest stratified societies – lateral attacks from each other, whether by individual predatory oligarchs locally or collectivities of oligarchs attacking from abroad.