Adams, Brooks (1848-1927), was an American historian and a critic of capitalism. He believed that commercial civilizations rise and fall in predictable cycles. First, masses of people draw together in large population centers and engage in commercial activities. Then, as their desire for wealth grows, greed replaces spiritual and creative values. Finally, the society crumbles. In The Law of Civilization and Decay (1895), Adams noted that as new population centers emerged in the West, centers of world trade shifted. They moved from Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey) to Venice, Italy, and eventually to London. Adams predicted in America’s Economic Supremacy (1900) that Russia and the United States would become the leading world powers by 1950.
Adams was born on June 24, 1848, in Quincy, Massachusetts. He was the son of U.S. diplomat Charles Francis Adams, brother of historian Henry Brooks Adams, and a grandson of President John Quincy Adams. Brooks Adams died on Feb. 13, 1927.
