The Man versus the State

“Survival of the fittest” is a phrase often attributed to Darwin or Darwinism, but it was actually coined by Herbert Spencer (27 April 1820 – 8 December 1903), an English philosopher, biologist, sociologist, and prominent classical liberal political theorist during the Victorian era.

Spencer developed an all-embracing conception of evolution as the progressive development of the physical world, biological organisms, the human mind, and human culture and societies. As a polymath, he contributed to a wide range of subjects, including ethics, religion, anthropology, economics, political theory, philosophy, biology, sociology, and psychology. During his lifetime he achieved tremendous authority, mainly in English-speaking academia and became possibly the most renowned intellectual in Europe during the final decades of the 19th century. 

One of Spencer’s best works was The Man versus The State, which makes a passionate defense of liberalism in England. Spencer argues for the law of equal freedom, stating in the book, “Every man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man." The Man versus The State argues that liberalism, which had over time liberated the world from slavery and feudalism, was undergoing what Spencer considered a disturbing transformation. That transformation was the state encroaching on individual freedoms by taking on more and more tasks and obligations itself. Spencer feared this would create a new despotism that would be worse than the old, labeling it the Coming Slavery. In an age where advanced Western nations are facing massive debts incurred by creating expensive social safety nets and social programs, Spencer’s warnings are just as relevant today.


This edition of The Man versus The State is specially formatted with a Table of Contents.