Page 60 - The Social Weapon: Darwinism

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1) The state must extend a hand to the down-and-out and
the unemployed, as a requirement of the concept of the “social

state” and take measures to help them.
2) Feelings of cooperation and solidarity, that religious
moral values require, need to pervade society as a whole.
The second requirement is particularly important because
in the end, it tends to define the first. If a society attaches power-
ful importance to religious and moral values, then the liberal
economy that society implements will provide both economic
development and social justice. The rich will use part of their ac-
quired capital to help the poor and establish social programs to
support the weak. (Indeed, this is the economic model revealed
by God in the Qur'an. Private property does exist in Islam, but
its owners are charged to use part of their assets, in the form of
alms, to assist the poor and those in need.)
If a society undergoes moral degeneration, then the liberal
economy turns into “savage capitalism” in which the poor and
down-and-out are oppressed and receive no help at all, in which

there are no social welfare programs, and where social injustice
is regarded not as a problem but as a “natural” state of affairs.
The economic model we shall be criticizing here is not the
liberal economy—the free economic model based on private
property and competition—but savage capitalism.
The source of inspiration behind it, as we shall show in due
course, is Social Darwinism.
Those who first brought Darwinist practices into the busi-
ness world were the Americans known as the “robber barons.”
They believed in Darwinism and thought that its claim regard-
ing “the survival of the fittest” somehow justified their own
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ruthless practices. The result was the start of a ruthless compe-
tition in business, capable of ending even in murder. The robber

barons' sole aim was to make even more money and gain even

The Social Weapon: Darwinism