Social Darwinism is a phrase coined in the late 19th century referring to the application of Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection on humans. It relates the biological field of evolution to human relations and culture, where only the strong survive. Although the theory gained traction in the 1870’s, it invokes the ideas of Thomas Robert Malthus in his “Essay on the principle of population.” However, Charles Darwin from whose name Social Darwinism comes from, is credited as the father for his ideas in “The Descent of Man.” The book is highly criticized for rationalizing capitalism, imperialism and racism. Herbert Spencer, an English sociologist, helped the theory in Europe by his argument that it was only through competition that social evolution would produce unparalleled personal liberty and prosperity. Spencer’s ideas elicited support even in the United States, where William Sumner advocated a dog-eat=dog society.
The theory states that the natural selection process, when allowed to act on the population without interruption, would result in a population improvement as only the strongest competitors would survive. It was used to support laissez-faire capitalism and imperialism. Social stratification of class was justified because the control of the property was correlate of an individual’s inherent attributes of frugality, temperance, and industriousness. For this reason, state intervention in the running of the economy was unnecessary as it would interfere with the biological process of natural selection. According to social Darwinism, the poor and weak were unfit to live and should not be helped. Social Darwinism was thus used to promote capitalism and reduced government intervention in society.
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Social Darwinism began to wane in the 20th century as expanded knowledge on social and cultural phenomena seemed to undermine it. Russian aristocrat Pyotr Kropotkin argued in his book that cooperation results in more evolution than does competition . Social Darwinism later gained renewed support in the 1960’s with the description of the DNA molecule. DNA studies revealed that the characteristics of mate selection, aggression and territoriality were inherent in people as well as animals . However, social Darwinism has increasingly declined as other social theories have continually been advanced.
