How Herbert Spencer Helped Liberate Japan, Egypt, and India

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"Today, Herbert Spencer should be known as one of the great classical liberal anti-imperialists. Unfortunately, any mention of his name is typically accompanied by the phrase, “Social Darwinism,” a theory that individuals are subject to the same Darwinian laws of natural selection governing the evolution of plants and animals. Social Darwinism, at times, was used by early twentieth-century intellectuals to justify imperialist, eugenicist, and white supremacist policies under the principle of survival of the fittest. This intellectual caricature of Spencer as a eugenicist and white supremacist has greatly maimed his legacy.

This reputation damage is in part due to the work of the historian Richard Hoftstader, who, forty years after Spencer’s death, published Social Darwinism in American Thought, 1860–1915. Hoftstader condemned free marketeers like Spencer who applied principles of biology to social science. He argued for technocratic economic reform over markets, viewing Herbert Spencer’s doctrines as the source of Social Darwinism’s appeal to American intellectuals. ...

Scholars have since identified Hofstadter’s fundamental error: Herbert Spencer was not a Darwinist but a Lamarckian. Spencer’s Lamarckian account of evolution held that by improving their skills and knowledge to adapt to their environment, humans passed on good practices to their progeny. Darwinian evolution is explained by chance variation and natural selection of inherited traits, while Spencer’s Lamarckian evolution is a result of conscious exertion and self-improvement, characteristic of Spencer’s liberal belief in the freedom of the individual to choose. ...

Despite his quiet life defined by routine and consistency, Spencer was an intellectual rockstar. He is one of the few philosophers who sold a million copies of their work while alive. For decades, Spencer’s ideas inspired millions across the globe in an era before rapid communication. ...

Japan was an isolated archipelago until the latter half of the 19th ​century. In 1853, Commodore Matthew Perry and his gunboat diplomacy forcibly opened Japan’s borders. The reigning Tokugawa fell apart and was quickly replaced by Emperor Meiji, ushering in a period of unparalleled modernization in Japan. During this period, thirty translations of Spencer’s work into Japanese were made. His philosophy was appropriated by the Freedom and Popular Rights movement led by the founder of Japan’s Liberal Party, Itagaki Taisuke, a samurai turned liberal statesman. ...

British occupation spread Spencer’s ideas abroad, paradoxically giving their subjects the intellectual tools to attack imperialism. Under British occupation until 1922, Egypt was also receptive to Spencer. Publications like the popular monthly science magazine Al-Muqtataf promulgated Spencer’s philosophy and helped it spread, which, for many Arabic readers, was an invaluable sociological source on good government.

Muhammad Abduh, the Grand Mufti of Egypt (one of the highest positions of Islamic jurisprudence), visited Herbert Spencer shortly before Spencer’s death. It was a dream come true for the Mufti, who described Spencer as “the greatest living philosopher.” When Spencer died, the editors of Al-Muqtataf wrote how they “mourned his death like that of the greatest Egyptian.” ...

From 1858 to 1947, India was under direct rule by the British government. Shyamaij Krishnavarma was a lawyer, journalist, and early advocate of Indian Independence. He founded the Indian Home Rule Society for the cause of self-rule in India and India House, an organization promoting Indian nationalism. Both organizations became a hub of revolutionary activity.  He was also an avid follower of Herbert Spencer. On the first anniversary of Spencer’s death, he donated £1000 to the University of Oxford to found a Herbert Spencer lectureship. A year later, Krishnavarma also founded fellowships named after Spencer, which enabled Indian graduates to study in England. 

Krishnavarma started a publication called The Indian Sociologist. Every issue had two quotes from Herbert Spencer on the title page:
“Every man is free to do that which he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man” and 
“Resistance to aggression is not simply justifiable but imperative. Non-resistance hurts both altruism and egoism.” ..."

How Herbert Spencer Helped Liberate Japan, Egypt, and India | The Daily Economy