Exercises on Social Darwinism

(UNESP) At the end of the last century, domination and dispossession took on new characteristics in shared and neo-colonized areas. Belief in progress, social Darwinism and the alleged superiority of the white man marked the height of European hegemony. Mark the alternative that contains, on the ideological level, a certain effort to justify imperialist interests.

a) The humiliation suffered by China for a century and a half is unimaginable to Westerners.

b) Civilization must be imposed on countries and races where it cannot arise spontaneously.

c) The Lancashire cotton fabric invasion dealt a serious blow to Indian craftsmanship.

d) The diplomacy of the cannon and the rifle, the action of missionaries and naturalist travelers contributed to breaking the cultural resistance of the African, Asian and Latin American populations.

e) The communications map teaches us:the railways put the ports of the colonized areas in contact with the outside world.

Social Darwinism can be correctly defined as:

a) the study of biological life in society, such as bee and ant societies, etc.

b) the attempt to equalize, in terms of social organization, the higher animals, such as mammals, and the society of men.

c) the period of Charles Darwin's intellectual activity in which the English naturalist dedicated himself to the creation of Sociology, alongside names such as August Comte.

d) the transposition of the theory of evolution of species and of natural selection from the terrain of natural science to sociocultural reality.

e) the attempt to establish a relationship between animal behavior and human behavior through psychological experiments.

(FGV) Carefully read the text below and then mark the correct alternative:

"The bases of inspiration of these new elites were the scientificist currents, the social Darwinism of the English Spencer, the German monism and the French positivism of Auguste Comte. Their main base of economic and political support came from the recent wealth generated by the expansion of the coffee culture in the Southeast of the country, as a result of the growing demand for stimulant substances by societies that were experiencing the intensification of the pace of life and the cadence of work" (SEVCENKO, N. “Introdução”. In:História of private life in Brazil. São Paulo:Cia das Letra, 1998, p. 14).

a) The diffusion of scientific and evolutionary theories throughout the 19th century provided arguments for the critique of neocolonialist practices, favoring the decolonization process. b) The influence of scientific theories in Brazil is mainly exemplified by the formation of an elite that established a platform of modernization that was based on the commercial and agricultural development of the country.

c) Despite the fact that coffee consumption was adequate to the acceleration of the social rhythm in the 19th century, Brazilian industrialization took place independently of the coffee complex.

d) The incorporation of positivism by the Brazilian military was prevented by Comte's definitions of the military type as characteristic of the theological regime, marked by the dominance of force, war and irrational command, as opposed to the industrial movement that manifested itself in cooperation, free production and rational acceptance.

e) The adoption of scientistic ideas favored the separation of Church and State, as well as had repercussions on the conservative modernization project of Brazilian elites in the republican period.

We can say that one of the consequences of the doctrine of Social Darwinism, elaborated in the 19th century, was:

a) the improvement of democratic societies and western technological evolution.

b) struggles for civil rights and “racial equality”.

c) 20th century racial segregation policies.

d) the racial segregation laws implemented in Brazil during the republican period.

e) racial desegregation in the United States in the first half of the 20th century.

Letter B

The doctrine of Social Darwinism, which considered some “races” inferior and less sophisticated than others, served as the basis for the European imperialist ideology of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The European powers set out to colonize the African and Asian continents using the argument that they would bring “civilization” and “progress”, especially technological, to these continents.

Letter D

Social Darwinism was elaborated by intellectuals such as the sociologist Herbert Spencer. Spencer sought to adapt the theses of the English naturalist Charles Darwin on the evolution of species and natural selection (in which, throughout natural history, the one that adapts best survives) to the structure of social and cultural reality. Spencer imagined that European civilization was superior to the others because it had achieved a better ability to master natural resources (through industry), better philosophical and scientific understanding, better artistic development, etc.

Letter E

Alongside positivism, social Darwinism came to be received in Brazil at the turn of the 19th to the 20th century and can be seen in the way some intellectuals belonging to the elites of that period saw the problem of miscegenation in Brazil – as is the case of Sylvio Romero. Ultimately, however, social Darwinism did not produce racial segregation among us. However, the alliance of social Darwinism with positivism provided the basis for republican secularism, which separated the Church from the State in 1889.

Letter C

Social Darwinism gave theoretical support to the racial segregation policies of the 20th century precisely because it made us believe that there are inferior “races” and superior “races”. This is what happened in Nazi Germany with regard to the Jews; and in the United States and South Africa, with respect to blacks.