Benjamin Kidd
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Benjamin Kidd (1858- 1916) was a British sociologist. He entered the British civil service and did not become generally known until the publication of a brilliant essay, Social Evolution, in 1894. This work passed through several editions and was translated into German (1895), Swedish (1895), French (1896), Russian (1897), Italian (1898), Chinese (1899), Czech (1900), Danish (1900), and Arabic (1913). The main theme of Social Evolution is the conflict between private interest and social welfare, the struggle which eliminates the unfit being the condition of progress. Kidd held that society should be interpreted in terms of biology.[1]
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[edit] Biography
Benjamin Kidd was born in County Clare, Ireland on September 9th 1858. His father, also Benjamin, was a constable with the Royal Irish Constabulary. Following a poor education, Benjamin Junior entered the Inland Revenue Department of the Civil Service in a minor capacity in 1877. He worked in obscurity there for seventeen years. However, his spare time was devoted to study and in 1894 his first work was published. It was entitled “Social Evolution” and it brought him financial success and international fame. The success of his work allowed Benjamin to retire from the Civil Service and in 1898 he travelled extensively throughout America and Canada and in 1902 he visited South Africa. These travels resulted in a series of articles commissioned by The Times and later published under the title “The Control of the Tropics”.
He married Emma Isabel Perry, of Weston-Super-Mare in 1887. They had three sons. He died of heart disease, at Croydon, England on October 2nd, 1916.
[edit] Influences
Benjamin Kidd was inspired by both Karl Marx and Herbert Spencer (mostly Spencer) but criticized both. He granted to the marxists that the members of the ruling class were not superior. He believed that the ruling families were degenerating so that new rulers had to be recruited from below. He was therefore against privileges. He denied the innate intellectual superiority of the white race, which he ascribed to social heritage, by which he meant accumulated knowledge. On the other hand he agreed with the racists that the English race was superior when it came to "social efficiency", by which he meant the ability to organize and to suppress egoistic instincts to the benefit of the community and the future. Kidd attributed this altruism to the religious instinct.
[edit] Works
- Social Evolution (1894)
- Control of the Tropics (1898)
- Principles of Western Civilization (1902; Spanish translation, 1903)
- Herbert Spencer and After (1908)
- Two Principal Laws of Sociology (1909)
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
This article incorporates text from an edition of the New International Encyclopedia that is in the public domain.
