The idea of social progress in early liberalism: Theory and ideology in Herbert Spencer

Abstract

In Herbert Spencer’s conception of progress is linked to the idea of survival of the fittest and the dialectic of status and contract in the modern age. The notions of status and contract are used systematically in Spencer’s sociology in the form of militarism and industrialism in confrontation of historical systems. Spencer here uses the expressions of Henry Maine, who understood it as a paradigm of social change in the direction of progress. However, this idea of progress was defended by Maine and by Spencer, but the course of time, historical experience, showed how illusory it is to identify evolution and social progress without further ado.