The Impact Of Thought Of Herbert Spencer On American Society During The Gilded Age

Social Darwinism was a kind of thought which was in support ofthe laissez-faire and social inequality for the capitalist political and economic system.In the 1850s and 1860s,Hebert Spencer brought up the ideas on the basis of Darwin's concept of biology,the liberal theory of political economy and utilitarianism.Social Darwinism also was a kind of ideology that support to the free competition of capitalist system,which was the product of the combination of Darwinism and middle class values.In the Gilded Age,Spencer's social Darwinism was so prevalent that it penetrated into every aspect of socio-economic life and had a profound impact on American society.This paper willbe divided into five chapters which will discuss How the social Darwinism Spring up,why it is prevalent in the United States and that the impact on American society.Darwin's theory of evolution lead to a changeof worldview which have a profound effect on ideology and social culture.The first chapter will discuss the influence of Darwin's scientific revolution and How Spencer Combined the evolution theory of Darwinian with the free competition and laissez-faire ideology to explain the social Darwinism.Spencer's social Darwinism which was introduced to the United States after the war was received by the American people and became the most popular thought in American society.The second chapter will discuss How American intellectuals diffuse Spencer's social Darwinism and why social Darwinism was prevalent in American society after Civil War.Laissez-faire has always been popular to the American publicSince colonial times.After the civil war,this idea was Combined with the social Darwinism and was regard as the scientific theory because of the social Darwinism.However,connotation of Laissez-faire was changed,it is no longer a simple business theory of classical economics,it is a mix of biology,sociology and economics.This transformation reflected the reshaping of traditional values of American agricultural society by the industrialization and scientific concepts in the gilded age.The third chapter will discuss why social Darwinism can be combined with laissez-faire.Laissez-faire was the mainstream of American social thought in Gilded age.Industrial capitalists and middle-class intellectuals have provided the theoretical basis for the legitimacy of this policy by borrowing the social Darwinism,which brought about prevailing of social Darwinismand laissez-faire.Howeverwith the intensification of social crisis which brought by labor problem,middle-class and working-class adamantly opposed to this conservative ideology and advocated government intervention to economy order.Chapter four will discuss How social Darwinism has impacted on industrial capitalists,Middle class and working class.The Supreme Court of the United States protected the strong and suppressed the weak in the trials of some economic cases in the Gilded Age,which caused the flooding of“Judicial Darwinism".Chapter five will discuss what was the”judicial Darwinism "and why it has prevailed in the United States.In the conclusion,the paper will explain how scientific and traditional American liberalism provide favorable environmentfor the spreading of social Darwinism from the Perspective of the concept of progress.