Describe the contributions of Herbert Spencer.

Herbert Spencer is one of pioneers of Sociology and it has been described Herbert Spencer’s Sociology as socially Darwinistic. Herbert Spencer has been called as “Second Father Sociology.”

Being a famous evolutionist, Spencer was very much influenced by Charles Darwin’s book “The origin of the species”. He tried to apply the theory of Biological evolution to Sociology. Spencer used the concept of evolution of animals to explain the evolution of society and he compares the society to human organisms. His theory of organic analogy was very much popular earlier even though it has been rejected now. Spencer claimed that man’s mind has evolved in the same way from the simple automatic responses of lower animals to the process of reasoning in the thinking of man. 

Spencer believed in two kinds of knowledge: knowledge gained by the individual and knowledge gained by the race. He also developed a theory of two types of society. 

They are 

(1) militant society 

(2) Industrial society. 

These correspond to the evolutionary progression. Thus according to him, society is changing from simple form to complex form. Spencer stressed that the whole society should be considered as a unit of society.

According to him the different parts of society are interrelated and interdependent, not only the parts influence the whole system, but also, the whole system influences the parts. While explaining the stages of the development of society his attitude of comparison draws a special attention. Major works of Herbert Spencer are “Social Statics”, “First Principles”, “Principles of ‘ Ethics”, “The Man Versus State”, “The study of sociology”, Principles of sociology”.