A Mote In God's Eye by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
This is a 1970's science fiction book about humanity's first contact with a race of aliens called "moties". Moties are asymmetrical mammaloids that have several genetic subcastes (masters, doctors, engineers, mediators, watchmakers, soldiers, etc.) which form clans of related individuals, and while clan members do not have a hivemind, all caste members of a clan are instinctively subservient to a "master".
Motie castes are highly-specialized and very good at what they do. However, their civilization has a very serious problem stemming from their biology. Female moties must breed or die from the hormonal stresses that being in heat for a prolonged period of time places on their bodies, much like real-life animals like ferrets. Because of this, moties are trapped in an endless cycle of their civilization rising, becoming technologically-advanced, and then collapsing from the resource wars that follow from overpopulation on their planet of Mote Prime. This has led to a very fatalistic outlook in motie culture in general, and they even have an allegorical figure in their folktales called "crazy Eddie" (Eddie being loan name borrowed from humans when moties were explaining the mythos to human listeners) a tragic figure who has good intentions but impractical solutions and always ends up causing disaster as a result.
When moties encounter humans, they are not hostile, but very guarded and secretive about the nature of their reproductive biology and neither the moties or humans want to eliminate each other but feel they might not have much choice because of the inadvertent danger both species pose to each other.
It is a very good and well thought-out science fiction book and it is considered a classic by many serious readers.