"There can be no doubt that the modem environment is changing faster than any environment ever previously changed; therefore, the social center of gravity constantly tends to shift more rapidly; and therefore modem civilization has unprecedented need of the administrative or generalizing mind. I take it to be an axiom, that perfection in administration must be commensurate to the bulk and momentum of the mass to be administered, otherwise the centrifugal will overcome the centripetal force, and the mass will disintegrate. In other words, civilization will dissolve. A moment arrives when the minds of any given dominant type fail to meet the demands made upon them, and are superseded by a younger type, which in tum is set aside by another still younger, until the limit of the administrative genius of that particular race has been reached. Then disintegration sets in, the social momentum is gradually relaxed, and society sinks back to a level at which it can cohere."
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Lawyers from the United StatesEducators from the United StatesHarvard University alumniHistorians from Boston
Original Language: English
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p. 204-5, as cited in: Albert Lepawsky (1949), Administration, p. 9-10
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Brooks_Adams
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Brooks Adams
Peter Chardon Brooks Adams (June 24, 1848 – February 13, 1927) was an American historian and a critic of capitalism. He graduated from Harvard University in 1870 and studied at Harvard Law School in 1870 and 1871.
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