Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 10.djvu/619

 EVOLUTION OF SOCIAL STRUCTURES 603

and subjugation of one race or nation by another, and a long series of social assimilations, all similar to those described. That these countries have not attained the same stage of culture as have those of Europe is due to causes too subtle and obscure to be discussed here, even if I were competent to discuss them ; but one truth seems to be growing more and more clear, viz., that the difference is due much less to the native abilities of these peoples than to the external conditions to which they have been subjected. Fifty years ago Japan and China were habitually classed together, and they were regarded as inferior races incapable of any such civilization as that of the western world. No one so classes them now, and it is all because Japan has resolutely set about adopting western methods. Should China ever do so, the result would be the same, and it is impossible to calculate what this might be.

But it is not necessary that the two races brought into conflict be of the same degree or order of assimilation. It is equally possible that they be of very different degrees in this respect. Of course, in such cases it is easy to see which will be the conquering race. The race having the greatest social efficiency will easily subdue the other, and the process of assimilation will be somewhat different. The new racial product will differ much less from the conquering race. That race will be prepotent and will virtually absorb the inferior race. If the difference is very great, as where a highly civilized race invades the territory occupied by a race of savages, the latter seems soon to disappear almost altogether, like the North American Indians, and to exert scarcely any influence upon the superior race. It is so in Australasia and in South Africa. But where there remains a great numerical disproportion of the native race, this latter being somewhat advanced in civilization, as in British India, other complications arise and new problems confront the student. In Mexico, and to a greater or less extent throughout Central and South America, there has been extensive blending of conquering and conquered racers, giving rise to still other conditions, and correspondingly varying the character of the resultant social structures.

This is not the place to dilate upon the remote effects of this