This outstanding history examines the eugenics movement from its origin to its heyday as the source of a science of human genetics. Eugenics, Human Genetics and Human Failings makes a major contribution to the study of the British eugenics movement and its applications to current scientific work.

Previous treatments have been flawed in not viewing eugenics as a science whose methods required serious consideration. By avoiding this narrow approach, Pauline Mazumdar provides a scholarly and provocative analysis, utilizing important archival material newly available to researchers. The conclusions she draws from this material give the reader important insight into the inner workings of the British eugenics that published sources alone could not provide. The study also provides a historical introduction to the current problems connected with the huge international projects for the mapping of the human genome.