Benjamin Kidd

Benjamin Kidd (1858-1916) was a British sociologist born in County Clare, Ireland, who worked as a civil service clerk for 17 years before achieving worldwide fame with his 1894 book *Social Evolution*, which argued that group coercion drives social progress over individual freedom.[1][2][4] Lacking formal university education, he self-taught extensively, resigned his post after the book's success, traveled widely, and authored works defending imperialism and exploring power dynamics, such as *The Science of Power* published posthumously in 1918.[1][3][4]