Social Statics: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

Social Statics, credited to Herbert Spencer, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

LibriVox recording of Social Statics by Herbert Spencer. Read by LibriVox Volunteers Social Statics, or The Conditions essential to Happiness specified, and the First of them Developed is an 1851 book by the British polymath Herbert Spencer. In it, he uses the term "fitness" in applying his ideas of Lamarckian evolution to society, saying for example that "It is clear that any being whose constitution is to be moulded into fitness for new conditions of existence must be placed under those conditions. Or, putting the proposition specifically — it is clear that man can become adapted to the social state, only by being retained in the social state. This granted, it follows that as man has been, and is still, deficient in those feelings which, by dictating just conduct, prevent the perpetual antagonism of individuals and their consequent disunion, some artificial agency is required by which their union may be maintained. Only by the process of adaptation itself can be produced that character which makes social equilibrium spontaneous." Despite its commonly being attributed to this book, it was not until his Principles of Biology of 1864 that Spencer coined the phrase "survival of the fittest", which he would later apply to economics and biology. This was a key tenet of so-called Social Darwinism. Economist Murray Rothbard called Social Statics "the greatest single work of libertarian political philosophy ever written. (Wikipedia)

Recording facts

• Recording title: Social Statics
• Author credits: Herbert Spencer
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 40
• Listed recording duration: 17:53:36

Catalogue topics

• political philosophy
• society
• survival of the fittest
• social equilibrium

Opening tracks: first 24 of 40

1. 00 - Preface and Introduction: The Doctrine of Expediency, The Doctrine of the Moral Sense — 55:21
2. 01 - Introduction: Lemma I — 16:51
3. 02 - Introduction: Lemma II — 33:03
4. 03 - Part 1, Chapter 1, Definition of Morality — 6:46
5. 04 - Part 1, Chapter 2, The Evanescence of Evil — 16:07
6. 05 - Part 1, Chapter 3, The Divine Idea; and the Conditions of its Realization — 15:09
7. 06 - Part 2, Chapter 4, Derivation of a First Principle — 34:38
8. 07 - Part 2, Chapter 5, Secondary Derivation of a First Principle — 21:52
9. 08 - Part 2, Chapter 6, First Principle — 9:53
10. 09 - Part 2, Chapter 7, Application of this First Principle, Chapter 8, The Rights of Life and Personal Liberty — 5:28
11. 10 - Part 2, Chapter 9, The Right to the Use of the Earth — 18:53
12. 11 - Part 2, Chapter 10, The Right of Property — 16:21
13. 12 - Part 2, Chapter 11, The Right of Property in Idea, Chapter 12, The Right of Property in Character — 29:18
14. 13 - Part 2, Chapter 13, The Right of Exchange, Chapter 14, The Right of Free Speech, Chapter 15, Further Rights — 23:04
15. 14 - Part 2, Chapter 16, The Rights of Women, Part 1 — 31:00
16. 15 - Part 2, Chapter 16, The Rights of Women, Part 2 — 24:37
17. 16 - Part 2, Chapter 17, The Rights of Children, Part 1 — 37:03
18. 17 - Part 2, Chapter 17, The Rights of Children, Part 2 — 29:00
19. 18 - Part 3, Chapter 18, Political Rights — 25:04
20. 19 - Part 3, Chapter 19, The Right to Ignore the State — 24:57
21. 20 - Part 3, Chapter 20, The Constitution of the State, Part 1 — 35:30
22. 21 - Part 3, Chapter 20, The Constitution of the State, Part 2 — 45:49
23. 22 - Part 3, Chapter 21, The Duty of the State, Part 1 — 27:04
24. 23 - Part 3, Chapter 21, The Duty of the State, Part 2 — 29:06

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Source and rights

This is a record from LibriVox's official Internet Archive collection, with a public-domain licence recorded in its metadata. LibriVox's policy includes its catalogue summaries as well as its recordings. Its public-domain assessment follows United States law; copyright status can differ elsewhere. The summary and track facts are reproduced and reformatted from that record. Dates attached to the archive upload are not treated as original book publication dates.