AP European History

## Learning Outcomes

- Distinguish clearly between **Darwinism** and **Social Darwinism**
- Explain how Darwin’s biological ideas were misapplied to human society
- Identify major figures linked to racialized social theory, including **Herbert Spencer** and **Francis Galton**
- Understand how **scientific racism** and **eugenics** developed in the late 19th century
- Analyse how these ideas helped justify **New Imperialism** after **1870**
- Use specific evidence such as the **Berlin Conference (1884–1885)**, the **Scramble for Africa**, and the **White Man’s Burden**
- Build AP exam arguments using causation, continuity and change, and comparison

## AP European History Syllabus

For the AP European History, you are expected to understand how Darwinian language was misused in the late 19th century, with a focus on the following syllabus points:

- Know that **Darwinism** originally referred to biological evolution by **natural selection**, not a political program
- Identify **Herbert Spencer** as the thinker most associated with the phrase **“survival of the fittest”**
- Explain how **Social Darwinism** applied competition and “fitness” to classes, nations, and races
- Understand the meaning of **scientific racism** and how it differed from, but overlapped with, Social Darwinism
- Recognise the role of **Francis Galton** in developing **eugenics**
- Explain how racialized social theories helped justify **New Imperialism** in Africa and Asia after **1870**
- Use specific evidence such as **The Descent of Man (1871)**, the **Berlin Conference (1884–1885)**, and **Rudyard Kipling’s** **“White Man’s Burden” (1899)**
- Understand that imperialism had multiple causes, including economics, nationalism, strategy, religion, and racial ideology

## Test Your Knowledge

_Attempt these questions before reading this article. If you find some difficult or cannot remember the answers, look more closely at that area during your revision._

1. What is the difference between Darwinism and Social Darwinism?
2. Why is it inaccurate to say that Charles Darwin created Social Darwinism?
3. How did scientific racism support European imperialism in the late 19th century?
4. Name two figures linked to racial hierarchy or eugenics.
5. How could Social Darwinist ideas be used to justify both imperialism abroad and prejudice within Europe?

## Introduction

In **Unit 7** of AP European History, this topic sits at the meeting point of science, ideology, nationalism, and imperialism in the period **c. 1815–1914**. Students often know that Darwin changed modern thought, but the more exam-worthy issue is what later writers did with Darwinian language. His scientific work was turned into arguments about class, race, empire, and national struggle.

That matters because AP Euro questions often test **causation** and **distinction**. You need to show not just that racial theories existed, but how late 19th-century Europeans gave older prejudices a new, pseudo-scientific language. That shift helped imperial rule seem “natural,” “modern,” and even “moral” to many Europeans.

> **Key Term: Darwinism**
> Charles Darwin’s biological theory of evolution by natural selection, developed in _On the Origin of Species_ (1859), explaining how species change over time.

### Darwinism as science, not social policy

The first distinction you must make is simple but essential: **Darwinism** was a theory about biology. Darwin argued that within a species, individuals vary. Some inherit traits that make survival and reproduction more likely in a given environment. Over time, those traits become more common. He called this process **natural selection**.

This was a major break from the older belief that species were fixed and separately created. In **1859**, _On the Origin of Species_ explained change in nature without relying on a one-time act of creation. In **1871**, _The Descent of Man_ extended this logic to human origins, arguing that human beings were also part of the evolutionary process.

> **Key Term: natural selection**
> The process by which organisms with advantageous inherited traits are more likely to survive and reproduce, passing those traits on.

Darwin’s theory was powerful because it offered a mechanism for change. It did not say that the rich deserve wealth, that empires should crush weaker peoples, or that some races should rule others. Those later claims were added by other thinkers.

This is where students often lose precision. Darwin described what he believed happened in nature. He did not create a formal political doctrine for human society. On an SAQ or LEQ, that distinction can earn accuracy and complexity points.

> **Test Tip:** If a question mentions Darwin, Spencer, and imperialism together, do not collapse them into one idea. Start by separating **Darwin’s biology** from **later ideological misuse**.

### How Social Darwinism distorted Darwin’s ideas

The best-known figure here is **Herbert Spencer (1820–1903)**. Spencer, not Darwin, is most associated with the phrase **“survival of the fittest.”** He applied competitive language to human society and argued that state help for the poor interfered with the natural struggle for existence. In this reading, success showed superiority and failure showed weakness.

> **Key Term: Social Darwinism**
> A social and political misuse of evolutionary language that applied ideas of struggle and fitness to human classes, races, and nations.

This was not a careful extension of biology. It was an ideological move. Spencer and others took language from nature and used it to justify human inequality. If competition in nature produced stronger organisms, they argued, competition in society produced stronger people, classes, or nations. Therefore, helping the poor, restraining ruthless competition, or protecting colonized peoples could be portrayed as going against nature.

That logic appealed to many late 19th-century Europeans for several reasons.

First, it fit the age’s respect for science. The century saw rapid growth in medicine, industry, statistics, and the social sciences. Claims sounded more convincing when they wore the language of science.

Second, it suited middle-class and elite interests. Industrial society produced huge inequality. Social Darwinism made inequality seem inevitable rather than political.

Third, it matched the era’s nationalism. If nations were in constant struggle, then war, rivalry, and empire could be explained as part of a natural competition among peoples.

The textbook material also points to another use: anti-Semitism. Some late 19th-century writers argued that Jews were a separate and inferior race who could never truly belong. Here, older religious prejudice became racialized. Instead of saying Jews followed the wrong religion, critics increasingly claimed Jews were biologically different.

This is a major continuity-and-change point. Prejudice against Jews, Africans, and Asians was not new. What changed was the language used to defend it. Older hatred now claimed scientific authority.

> **Key Term: scientific racism**
> The pseudo-scientific belief that human groups can be divided into biologically distinct races arranged in a hierarchy of superior and inferior peoples.

Social Darwinism and scientific racism overlapped, but they were not identical. Social Darwinism stressed struggle, competition, and “fitness.” Scientific racism stressed fixed racial ranking. Together, they formed a potent ideological mix: some peoples were allegedly better by nature, and struggle supposedly proved it.

A related figure was **Francis Galton**, Darwin’s cousin. Galton argued that inherited human traits could be directed to improve populations.

> **Key Term: eugenics**
> The theory that human populations could be “improved” by controlling reproduction in order to encourage some inherited traits and discourage others.

Eugenics pushed the argument one step further. If heredity explained human ability, then society could supposedly manage breeding to improve the nation. That claim would have grim consequences in the 20th century, but its roots lie in this late 19th-century faith that social problems could be solved through biological thinking.

You may also mention **Arthur de Gobineau**, whose _Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races_ (**1853–1855**) argued that history was shaped by racial difference and hierarchy. Even if not every textbook centres him as much as Spencer, he is strong supporting evidence for AP essays on racial theory.

### Why racialized social theories mattered for imperialism

The most important AP move is to connect ideology to imperialism without making ideology the only cause. After **1870**, European states rapidly expanded into Africa and Asia in what historians call **New Imperialism**. Technology mattered: steamships, telegraphs, quinine, and rapid-fire weapons made conquest easier. Economics mattered: states wanted raw materials, markets, and strategic routes. National prestige mattered too.

But ideology helped justify all this.

> **Key Term: New Imperialism**
> The rapid expansion of European overseas empire after 1870, especially in Africa and Asia.

If Europeans believed they were more “advanced” or more “fit,” conquest could be presented as natural. If they believed Africans and Asians were childlike or inferior, imperial domination could be reframed as guidance rather than exploitation.

The textbook gives a clear example: paintings often showed colonists with local children, sending the message that Africans were like dependants who needed European direction. This was paternalism backed by racial hierarchy.

Rudyard Kipling’s **“White Man’s Burden” (1899)** is especially useful evidence because it shows how empire was moralized. The poem framed imperial rule as a duty to serve and civilize supposedly backward peoples. On the surface, that sounds benevolent. In practice, it assumed inequality. Europeans cast themselves as guardians and others as incapable of self-rule.

> **Key Term: civilizing mission**
> The claim that European imperial powers had a duty to rule and “improve” colonized peoples by spreading European culture, religion, and institutions.

The **Berlin Conference (1884–1885)** also reveals this mindset. European leaders met to establish rules for claims in Africa. Official language included improving Africans’ moral and material well-being and suppressing slavery. Yet the conference also formalized the partition of African territory by outside powers with almost no regard for African political or cultural boundaries.

That is a classic AP causation point: humanitarian language could exist alongside raw power politics. States did not divide Africa mainly because of concern for Africans. They did so because they were rivals competing for influence, resources, and prestige. Social Darwinist and racist ideas helped them present that seizure as legitimate.

> **Test Tip:** In essays, avoid saying imperialism happened “because of Social Darwinism” alone. A stronger claim is that Social Darwinism **justified and intensified** imperialism alongside economic, strategic, nationalist, and missionary motives.

A strong example is the **Congo Free State** under **King Leopold II**. Europeans often claimed empire would bring order and progress, yet in the Congo forced labour, mutilation, and mass death exposed the brutality behind that rhetoric. This helps you evaluate imperial ideology critically: talk of uplift often masked extraction and violence.

India offers another useful case. British rule there was justified partly through claims of administrative superiority and civilization. After the **Sepoy Rebellion of 1857**, the British tightened control and increasingly framed direct rule as necessary. Yet the same empire that built railways and administrative systems also insisted that British authority was more fit to govern than Indians themselves.

China shows a different model: **informal empire**. Britain and other powers gained trade privileges and treaty ports without fully colonizing the country. Even here, assumptions of superiority were central. Western powers treated China as weak, backward, and open to coercion.

### Wider effects inside Europe and how to write about them

Racialized social theories did not only shape colonies. They fed politics within Europe itself. The textbook links Social Darwinism to heightened anti-Semitism in the late 19th century. This is important because AP Euro often asks you to connect imperial ideas abroad with exclusion at home.

Jews increasingly faced claims that they were not simply a religious minority but a biologically separate race. This thinking later appeared in events such as the **Dreyfus Affair** in France, where anti-Semitic assumptions made many willing to believe a Jewish officer guilty despite weak evidence. Even when a prompt is not directly about Social Darwinism, you can use this as outside evidence to show how racial theory entered modern politics.

These ideas also linked to nationalism. If nations were seen as locked in a struggle for survival, then international rivalry became not just normal but desirable. Strong states deserved to expand; weak ones would decline. That logic fed the aggressive mood of the late 19th century.

For AP historical reasoning, this topic works especially well through **continuity and change**:

- **Continuity:** Europeans had long held prejudices about non-Europeans and religious minorities.
- **Change:** In the late 19th century, those prejudices increasingly took a scientific or pseudo-scientific form, giving them new authority.

It also works through **causation**:

- Darwin’s theory of natural selection changed intellectual life.
- Later thinkers distorted that theory into Social Darwinism.
- Social Darwinism combined with scientific racism and eugenics.
- These ideas helped defend imperialism, exclusion, and racial hierarchy.

And it works through **comparison**:

- Darwinism explains biological change.
- Social Darwinism explains social inequality through a false analogy.
- Scientific racism ranks races.
- Eugenics proposes managing heredity.

If you can distinguish those four ideas while linking them, you are writing at a high level.

A useful thesis model for a long essay would be: Darwin’s theory of natural selection did not itself create a political doctrine, but later thinkers such as Herbert Spencer and Francis Galton misused evolutionary language to defend social inequality, racial hierarchy, and imperial domination, especially during the era of New Imperialism after 1870.

That kind of thesis shows distinction, causation, and specific evidence.

## Key Point Checklist

_This article has covered the following key knowledge points:_

- **Darwinism** referred to biological evolution by **natural selection**, not a social program
- **On the Origin of Species** was published in **1859**
- **The Descent of Man** was published in **1871** and extended Darwin’s argument to human origins
- **Herbert Spencer** is associated with **“survival of the fittest”** and **Social Darwinism**
- Social Darwinism misapplied biological ideas to classes, races, and nations
- **Scientific racism** claimed that human races could be ranked in a hierarchy
- **Francis Galton** developed the idea of **eugenics**
- These theories gave older prejudice a new pseudo-scientific language
- Social Darwinist and racist ideas helped justify **New Imperialism** after **1870**
- The **Berlin Conference (1884–1885)** showed European assumptions of authority over Africa
- **“White Man’s Burden” (1899)** presented imperial rule as a moral duty
- Imperialism was driven by multiple causes, including economics, nationalism, strategy, religion, and racial ideology

## Key Terms and Concepts

- Darwinism
- natural selection
- Social Darwinism
- scientific racism
- eugenics
- New Imperialism
- civilizing mission


Darwinism, Social Darwinism - Darwinism informed racialized social theories