The London School of Economics (LSE) has engaged with its complex legacy concerning eugenics and its relationship to the development of the welfare state in Britain. This engagement is particularly significant because LSE was founded with a mission of "social betterment" through empirical investigation, and many of its early influential figures were intertwined with eugenic thought.

Here's a breakdown of how LSE is associated with these legacies:

1. Founding Figures and Eugenics:

Sidney and Beatrice Webb: The founders of the LSE were prominent members of the Fabian Society, a socialist intellectual movement. While often seen as progressive reformers advocating for a more equitable society, they also held eugenic views. They believed that an "efficient" welfare society depended on addressing what they saw as the "unfit" elements of the population, often referring to the "feeble-minded" and those on the social margins ("the residuum").They advocated for state intervention in reproduction and were interested in how environment and inheritance combined to affect population development.

Sidney Webb, for instance, gave a talk at the Eugenics Education Society (later the Eugenics Society) in 1909 titled "Eugenics and the Poor Law," discussing how welfare systems should consider eugenic outcomes, critiquing mixed workhouses for allowing "undesirable" people to mix and reproduce.


William Beveridge: The architect of the seminal 1942 "Beveridge Report" which laid the intellectual framework for the modern British welfare state, was also a eugenicist. In 1943, shortly after his report was released, Beveridge delivered the prestigious Galton Lecture (named after Francis Galton, the founder of eugenics) to the Eugenics Society. In this speech, "Eugenic Aspects of Children's Allowances," he attempted to reassure eugenicists that his proposals for a universal social safety net, including child benefits, would align with eugenic aims.

Beveridge was concerned about the "inverted birth rate" – the idea that wealthier, "more successful" people had fewer children than the poor. He argued that children's allowances could help balance this by enabling poorer families with "good virtues" to provide better opportunities for their children, allowing them to rise in social standing and potentially contribute to the "enrichment of the British race."


Richard Titmuss: A towering figure in mid-20th century British social science and a key shaper of social welfare policy, Titmuss also had personal and intellectual connections with the eugenics movement, particularly in his early career. His interests in inequality and welfare services were shaped by these connections, and he joined the Eugenics Society in 1937.

2. Eugenics in Social Science and Population Research at LSE: The LSE, from its inception, aimed to apply a "scientific" approach to social problems, which often aligned with eugenic thinking. Eugenics was often presented as a "neutral" scientific discipline.

The Population Investigation Committee (PIC), a significant social research group focused on demography, was founded in 1936 by the council of the British Eugenics Society. While it later became an independent organization and was housed at the LSE, its origins were directly linked to eugenics, and it was involved in population studies that had historical ties to eugenic concerns.

Research at LSE, including in areas like quantitative social mobility studies, has been shown to have intellectual and institutional links to the eugenics movement. Key components of British sociology were, in some ways, forged within the context of British eugenics.
3. The Intertwining of Eugenics and the Welfare State: This is a crucial point of LSE's legacy. Unlike some understandings that see eugenics as solely about "negative" measures (preventing "undesirables" from reproducing), the British eugenics movement, particularly its "reform eugenics" strand, also focused on "positive" measures – encouraging reproduction among certain social groups and improving the environment to maximize the "fitness" of the population.

Many social reformers and architects of the welfare state genuinely believed that social policy, including universal benefits, could be used to achieve eugenic aims by improving the conditions of the "fit" working class and preventing "degeneration."

This meant that elements of eugenic thinking, even if not explicitly labelled as such, became "baked into the foundations" of the welfare state. The goal was often to improve the overall "quality" of the nation's population for the benefit of society and the British Empire, rather than solely focusing on individual rights or universal equality as understood today.

4. LSE's Engagement with this Legacy: LSE has started to engage with this problematic history through various initiatives, including research by its academics, archival projects, and public discussions.

For instance, LSE Library's collections contain material related to eugenics, and researchers are exploring how these ideas influenced the work of key LSE figures and the development of social policy.

This engagement is part of a broader movement within academia to decolonise curricula and acknowledge the historical ties of institutions to problematic ideologies like eugenics, scientific racism, and colonialism. The aim is to confront historical amnesia and ensure that the lessons from the past are learned.

In summary, LSE's association with eugenics is not just about individuals holding certain views, but about how these views influenced the foundational ideas and the development of public policy, particularly the welfare state, in Britain.