Content area
Full Text
Abstract: The goal of this review is to introduce the reader to the ideas behind the eugenic movement, its implementation, and its consequences. First, we address the work of prominent 19th century forerunners of eugenics. Second, we discuss the eugenic movement during the first half of the 20th century, and its common and differential characteristics in countries where its expression was more marked, including the US and Nazi Germany. We also discuss the eugenic movement in Sweden, whose history has remained unknown until recently. We analyze the reasoning behind forced sterilization and involuntary euthanasia. Finally, we consider the impact that past eugenics has had on the profession of psychiatry and psychiatric research, particularly genetics. We argue that the history of the 20th century eugenics movement and its leaders still require attention.
Introduction
The goal of this review is to introduce the reader to the ideas behind the eugenic movements, the consequences of their implementation, and to the influence they had on the profession of psychiatry. According to a contemporary definition, eugenics (from Greek, eu, good and gen, produce) is "the study of methods of improving the quality of human populations by the application of genetic principles" (1). From the late 19th century to before World War II, eugenics was popular in Europe and the US, and it became an indissoluble component of the official policy of Nazi Germany. Eugenics was taught at the leading universities in the West, and the subject was treated in standard texts of human heredity. In Nazi Germany, eugenics was associated with mass forced sterilization, with the killing of the mentally ill and of others deemed unworthy of life, and with unscrupulous experimentation. Furthermore, the Holocaust was seen by its perpetrators as an exercise in eugenics. In other European countries and in the US, forced sterilization, stigmatization, institutional segregation, limits on immigration (and expulsion), laws against miscegenation (from Latin miscre, to mix and genus, race), and limitations on marriage ensued from the eugenic policies.
The quality of the science done by eugenicists was very variable. While some eugenicists, such as Francis Galton (1822-- 1911), were talented scientists, many of the leaders of the eugenic movement were mediocre, and others, such as Henry Goddard in the US, performed research of...