According to William Graham Sumner, who helped popularize Social Darwinism in the late-19th century U.S., “A drunkard in the gutter is just where he ought to be, according to the fitness and tendency of things. Nature has set upon him the process of decline and dissolution by which she removes things which have survived their usefulness.” Explore the historical context in which Social Darwinism and the notion of “survival of the fittest” came to influence jurisprudence and economic thinking, its relationship to ideas about capitalism and its ongoing relevance in American history and politics.
Course Code
508851