Research On The British Eugenics Movement,1904-1939

Since the late 19th century,some deep changes have appeared in all social fields in Britain:the birth rate has been declining,the birth rate of the lower class has maintained a strong growth,the problem of urban poverty has intensified and the infant mortality rate has remained high for a long time.At the beginning of the 20th century,some of the British people of insights leveraged the flag of eugenics,emphasizing the decisive role of genetics in the development of human society,and requiring improvement of national quality and efficiency by means of social intervention and through eugenics,and thus promoting the gradual rise of eugenics movement in early 20th century Britain.The development of eugenics movement in Britain basically has two kinds of forms:theory and practice,and carried out by means of two important organizations.In the theoretical level,Karl Pearson and a handful of eugenics scholars carried on theory work based on Galton Laboratory for National Eugenics,committed themselves to using statistical methods to construct the scientificity of eugenics;In the practical level,Leonard Darwin and most eugenics scholars organized practice activities in the help of Eugenics Education Society,under two basic principles carrying out various forms of activities:one is to increase social superior quality as well as decrease inferior quality,namely "race building";The other is restrain the number of social "sick" namely "race cleansing".This two principles cooperated with each other and finally promote the eugenics movement forward.After decades of vigorous development,eugenics movement has been abrupt depressed since the start of the second world war.Eugenics movement,although failed in Britain,has had a significant impact on the spread of eugenics,the formulation of social policies,and the construction of welfare countries.This paper is divided into three chapters with the main contents as follows:The first chapter mainly introduces the background and motivation of the rise of the British eugenics movement.First of all,it introduces the theoretical basis for the rise of eugenic movement--the birth of eugenics.In 1883,Galton founded eugenics.He believed that genetics decides the individual’s intelligence and talents.To improve the quality of race,the inferior quality must be minimized at the same time of vigorously increasing the good quality,and this goal is possible to be achieved only by virtue of eugenics.Secondly,it analyzes the realistic motive for the development of eugenics.From the late 19th century,the British population birth rate began to change significantly,the total population birth rate and the population birth rate of middle and upper class continued to decline in Britain,and at the same time the population birth rate of lower class still maintained a strong growth.The British believed that the continuous development of this situation would be harmful to the future development of the British people.This trend can be reserved only through restraining the fertility rate of the people at lower class and improving the fertility rate of the upper-middle class.Finally,the increasingly grave poverty problem,the high infant mortality rate and the hard win of the Boer War caused the British to be seriously concerned about the national physical decline.The combination of various factors finally promoted the rise of eugenics movement in Britain gradually.The second chapter elaborates the specific contents and forms of implementation of eugenics movement in Britain.First of all,the paper analyzes the contents of eugenics movement at theoretical level.Eugenics scholars in minority carried out theoretical work relying on the Galton national eugenics laboratory,was committed to building scientificity of eugenics through applying statistical methods and promoting eugenics to be accepted by more people in scientific community,which laid the foundation of eugenics as an independent discipline.Secondly,it analyzes the form of eugenics movement at practical level.The majority of eugenics scholars organized eugenics education association,and carried out various forms of movements under the standard of the two basic principles:the first is to increase the social high-quality characteristics,promote eugenics,and enhance public awareness of eugenics through lectures,propaganda,training and all kinds of other social services.The second is to suppress the quantity of "the unfit" in society,promote parliamentary legislation on implementing legalization of permanent isolation of the mentally deficient and voluntary sterilization among the mass at the bottom of the society.In the meantime participate in the birth control movement,and provide the working class with contraceptive knowledge and measures to control their birth rate.The third chapter is the analysis on the influence and evaluation of the British eugenics movement.In terms of influence,the first is promotion of the spread of eugenics Britain,prompting eugenics to be sought after by the upper class and widely spread in the female group,winning favor from many feminists.Secondly,the theories on intelligence and genetics involved in eugenics movements also had a negative impact on the development of British education policies.In addition,as an important part of the national efficiency ideological trend at the beginning of the 20th century,the eugenics movement also had a positive effect on the construction of the welfare country of Britain.At last,an overall evaluation of eugenics is made in this paper.It is pointed out that the British eugenics movement is an attempt to solve the population,economic and social problems in the name of eugenics by the middle and upper classes,and it is a solution form of their interest demands.However,the genetic pre-determinism and other theories contained in eugenics lack the scientific theoretical basis.The various propositions and behaviors in the movement are accompanied by strong class prejudice and class discrimination,which leads to the loss of support from the public and finally leads to failure.Eugenics movement annotated vividly the British intense class struggle behind political process in 20th century,becoming one of important footnote in the key stage of social progress.