The Shortest History of Eugenics

This is such a triggering and sensitive topic that many may shy away from seeking information about it. The “shortest history” approach is an ideal way to engage and inform people about a topic which remains hugely controversial and relevant. The author has distilled useful information from a range of credible sources to offer something of a condensed account of the topic and has done so very well indeed.

This was a great guided history of eugenics, covering a broad range of dates. The information was presented well and clearly, overall a great read.

The shortest review of The Shortest History of Eugenics is: exactly what it says on the tin.

The book is a history of eugenics, starting with references from ancient history and ending…well, it does not end. The book makes it a point to detail the ways in which eugenics or eugenics-inspired theories exist in contemporary political and social discussion.

It is a brief introduction (I keep wondering if "shortest" is a pun) out of necessity of covering 2,500 years of history. It is also brief because eugenics itself is a protean figure. Think, for instance, if you were writing the history of light. The book could discuss physics, the eye, astronomy, art theory, yet eugenics is still worse for having not only science but pseudoscience.

The author makes a pair of good choices in terms of presenting a satisfying arc. The first is in focusing on biographies of the proponents throughout the years. This helps the reader have something concrete to hold to as the modalities change, and it provides humanization without rationalization.

The second is in stressing the trend of the history from "positive" to "negative." Not in a moral sense - it is all evil - but in a methodological sense of eugenicists trying to breed "the good" shifting to sterilization or genocide of "the bad."

Its brevity is weakness and strength. It is necessarily short to be an overview, but at points that becomes elision, for instance in dealing with genetics pre-re-discovery of Mendel (the subject of a great public science <a href="https://www.constantpodcast.com/episodes/archives/01-2023">series</a>). I am less worried about this in the abstract of the book as foundational education as I am in thinking about where our current supporters of Eugenics or I Can't Believe It's Not Eugenics! supporters would criticize the text on. The same goes for some of the melodrama in the writing. It is justified on the basis of the material (contra the chapter titles, where an editor ought to have stepped in [or if an editor did step in, find a new career]), but I feel that the persuasive value is less than the risk of tone policing.

So, while this should be looked at as more of a springboard to further reading, it does not profess to be anything else, and does that job well. The book is a reminder of how far we have not come, how bad so many otherwise decent people were, and as an adjunct to many other intellectual histories that glues ideas together.

My thanks to the author, Erik Peterson, for writing the book, and to the publisher, The Experiment, for making the ARC available to me.

4.5

This book does exactly what it says: it gives you a good understanding of the way this dangerous movement came to be so powerful and how it's impacted politics and society-wide healthcare while pointing out how much of these ideas still exist today and how some of those truly atrocious acts are still committed (legally!!!) in many countries as I write this review.

The content isn't too dense even though it's part history, part science (pseudoscience for the most part), and this book covers many countries which I found was really interesting as the other book on the topic I've read only included cases and politics in the UK and the US.

Such a relevant read in these times of political... chaos and with the rise of the very controlling and dangerous extreme-right. That said, don't fool yourself into thinking only Trump supporters support eugenics.



I wish the very last part included a bit more of a look at how eugenics are a part of the popular culture / how people talk about eugenic ideas so casually without fully recognizing it's eugenics. I think it would have been a perfect opportunity to get the reader to question their own feelings and beliefs by stating more common ideas that float around society, but that's just personal preference. This book was good regardless of this little thing.

Thank you NetGalley and The Experiment for the opportunity to read this ARC.


P.S. Note to other reviewers (I am only adding this on NetGalley) : The Experiment does watermarks in the middle of every page which made reading a bit difficult for me as the contrast of the black letters on the white background wasn't very different from the grey watermark, this is just a thing to consider if you request one of their ARCs.