Pecking orders

[Lizzy Liz]

an informal social system in which some people or groups know they are more or less important than others:

[Kit]

the order of importance of people in a group:

[Gregory]

1 : the basic pattern of social organization within a flock of poultry in which each bird pecks another lower in the scale without fear of retaliation and submits to pecking by one of higher rank broadly : a dominance hierarchy in a group of social animals. 2 : a social hierarchy.