Social darwinism
biological concepts of natural selection & survival fitness re-imagined socio-politically / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Social darwinism is a term used for different movements. Charles Darwin was the main proposer of evolution. Evolution is a concept from biology that explains how different life-forms change over time. Most offspring are not exactly like their parents. Some of the children will have different features (or traits). These features may mean that some children are better adapted to the place where they live. If so, the children will have a better chance to survive and reproduce.
Social darwinism theories try to use these ideas from biology for human society. They talk about a Struggle for survival of human societies. During the era of Nazi ideologies, the idea of Survival of the fittest combined with racism. They claimed the Aryan race was better than all the other races and therefore needed more space to live. This space was to be provided in the east (where mostly Slavs lived). Today, this is seen as wrong. There was no evidence that Slavs were, as individuals, any better or worse than Germans.
Although Darwin's idea was revered in most of the western societies, some Russian intellectuals did not accept his ideas. They feared that accepting Darwin's ideas would cause harm. One of Darwin's biggest critic was Leo Tolstoy, who felt strongly against what he thought was Darwin's idea. In a letter from his death bed, he warned his children not to take Darwin's struggle for existence as a moral guide.[1] Darwin never suggested his ideas were a basis for human life, just a description of what had happened in evolution.
Social darwinism takes the ideas from Darwin’s theory of evolution and uses it on society. Darwin believed that people who were more able to survive were able to have kids with similar abilities. Social Darwinism says that people who have more skills will become more successful. These people can spread their influence and change the politics and society around them to make it better for themselves.