Question

How Social Darwinism play a role in the debate over the annexation of the Philippines?

Answer 1

• The U.S. annexation of the Philippines was the part of a large colonizing project, which the historian E.J. Hobsbawm has termed as, “the age of empire”, between 1876 and 1915.
• Many sociologists and political theorists turned to Social Darwinism to argue against government programs to aid the poor, as they believed that poverty was the result of natural inferiority, which should be bred out of the human population.
• Imperialism that was backed up by Social Darwinism provides a scientific justification for the annexation of the Philippines. In 1898, United States began its military involvement in the Philippines to help fight the freedom of Philippines from the Spanish colonial rule.
• After, Spanish were defeated, President McKinley’s argument to retain control over the Philippines is justifiable by the scientifically proven theory of Darwinism, that, they are non-white people, and they are unfit for the Government until they are educated and civilized.
• Rudyard Kipling of Britain also used the Social Darwinism theory to make a statement that it is a white man’s burden to civilize non-European peoples who are far-off lands.
• Social Darwinism was used as a justification for American imperialism in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines following the Spanish-American War, as many adherents of imperialism argued that it was the duty of white Americans to bring civilization to "backwards" peoples.