Tropical forest succession and associated changes in community
composition are driven by species' demographic rates, but how
demographic strategies shift during succession remains unclear. To
identify generalities in demographic trade-offs and successional shifts
in demographic strategies, we quantified demographic rates of 787 tree
species from two wet and two dry Neotropical forests. Across all
forests, we found two demographic trade-offs -- the growth--survival and
the stature--recruitment trade-off -- enabling the data-driven
assignment of species to five demographic strategies. Fast species
dominated early in succession and were then replaced by long-lived
pioneers in three forests. Intermediate and slow species increased in
basal area over succession but in contrast to the current conceptual
model, long-lived pioneers continued to dominate until the old-growth
stage in all forests. The basal area of short-lived breeders was low
across all successional stages. These results increase the mechanistic
understanding and predictability of Neotropical forest succession.