Classical Social Evolutionism Versus Neo-Evolutionism

Introduction

The second half of the nineteenth century marked the dawn of evolutionary thought beyond human biology into human society and culture. This paradigm grew rapidly over the next century as well, with understanding of human society and culture becoming more complex and detailed with every new theorist. The onset of social evolution was considered to be analogous with biological evolution, however it’s main pitfall laid in the fact that it didn’t consider a historical account for it. Theorists such as Linneaus, Buffon, Lamarck, all dealt with evolutionary questions to discern ideas of individual differences, whether it be in relation to adaptation to an environment or even potential driving changes in organisms; evolution had been up for deliberation, although it’s scope was limited to biology. The ‘Age of Enlightenment’ came forward only with Charles Darwin, who declared that only the individuals that survive to reproduce will pass on their genes, and only mutations that enable this survival will be favoured. This suggested adaptations only favour those who have the ability to survive in a competitive environment, and therefore the famous “survival of the fittest” sprouted out of Darwin’s thought.

When it comes to Anthropology however, while Darwin received considerable credit for his theory’s biological implications, social and cultural connotations were also beginning to attach themselves to it. The forefathers of Evolutionary Thought in Anthropology however, dated themselves before Darwin, since Tylor and Morgan were also actively interacting with the same ideas of evolution in human society in the same year – 1871 (Barnard, 2000). Evolution here onwards was then categorised as unilinear, universal, multilineal and more recently, Neo-Darwinism. These definite categories of evolution and anthropology therefore gave it an edge over the biological or archaeological theories since those were mainly based on conjecture without necessary and enough scientific evidence.

Social Evolutionism

Morgan and Tylor on the other hand, build upon similar ideas, advancing this argument as evolution comprising phasic stages of cultural development, wherein societies move from simple to complex. While both the theorists are categorised as unilineal evolutionists and shared similar theoretical foundations, they differed in terms of culture, particularly in terms of the aspect of culture they studied. Morgan’s research primarily focused on family and subsistence patterns of Native Americans in particular, and in Ancient Society (1977), he set forth his theory of “ethnical periods’ ‘ of human cultural development. He assorts societies into a sequential manner by judging their level of technological development, whether it be in terms of subsistence patterns (savagery, barbarism, civilization) or family-kinship (consanguine, punaluan, syndyasmian, patriarchal, monogamian). His theory differs from Spencer’s when it comes to the aspect of competition, since Morgan proposed technological advancement or “germs of thought” that sparked the transition from one stage to another (McGee and Warms, 2004).

In comparison, Tylor branched his study out towards “survivals” or cultural remnants that signified cultural development, and argued this by stating that earlier stages of development could be studied through reconstruction (McGee and Warms, 2004). Tylor’s approach was therefore, more diachronic by using myths, religion, and language to reconstruct the past histories. His primary research on religion, where he focuses on the evolution of enlightened monotheism arising from polytheism and animism. However, a common ground between Morgan and Tylor lies in their belief in the “psychic unity of mankind”, which implies that while cultural development took place parallely however at independent stages for different societies. Spencer, Morgan and Tylor therefore, laid down the foundations of social evolutionism or unilineal evolutionism. The century after saw Marx and Engels as two more proponents of social evolutionism with their extensive study on the historical development of capitalism. Both these theorists validated their theories through Morgan’s emphasis on material achievements and technology, since Marx as well as Engels believed conflict to be the driver of social change.

Neo-Evolutionism

Neo-evolutionism thus moved beyond the sequential stages of development and broadened its expanse to factoring in other variables that could impede these stages progression. It’s adoption of historical development to explain change, while taking into account the cultural ecology of the society and thereby attribute evolution to beyond one specific factor. While acknowledging these merits, another point to attend to is that cultural relativism is another perspective it employs. Unlike previous evolutionary theories, neo-evolutionism looks at cultures from the standard of their own, rather than comparing them to another standard. Taking into account the criticism of neo-evolutionism, the role of social institutions and unforeseen social change is lost, in the sense that these factors are not considered to impact cultural development. Secondly, their emphasis on the causation of techno-environmental causation somewhere loses the essence of evolutionary thought in the first place.

Comparing Social Evolutionism and Neo-evolutionism

The paradigms that both social evolutionism and neo-evolutionism belong to are although resting on the same foundation, they present two very stark differences in their theoretical approach. While social evolutionism rests it’s belief that societies evolve in levels of complexity, based on economy and subsistence, neo-evolutionism states that societies do not undergo a stage to stage transgression, and rather focuses more on the factors that contribute to development. Therefore, a shift in the paradigm of evolutionary thought is prominent, which indulges itself in an area of speculation rather than proven evidence that says otherwise. Neo-evolutionism was much more widely accepted amongst scholars, as a more tangible school of thought, since it deemed societies at the standard of their own rather than comparing them, while also studying their development patterns through historical development. However, neo-evolutionism failed too, largely because they over-prioritised the factors causing development rather than the development itself. The focus shifted from evolution to what causes evolution and therefore, neo-evolutionism adopted a selectivist view of culture itself.

Conclusion

References

2. Barnard, A. (2000). History and Theory in Anthropology. Cambridge University Press.

3. Brick H. (2012) Neo-Evolutionism Anthropology, the Cold War, and the Beginnings of the World Turn in U.S. Scholarship. In: Solovey M., Cravens H. (eds) Cold War Social Science. Palgrave Macmillan, New York