Social Darwinism is the theory that individuals, groups, and people sare subject to the same Darwinian laws of natural selection as plants and animals. Now largely discredited, Social Darwinism was advocated by Herbert Spencer and others in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and was used to justify political conservatism, imperialism, and racism and to discourage intervention and reform. In an era of rampant racism and economic disparity, the wealthy believed that they had the natural right to have a higher position, more wealth, and more power than the rest of humanity due to their belief in Social Darwinism.