Werner Sombart

Werner Sombart (1863 to 1941) was a German economist, historian and sociologist who headed the Youngest Historical School and was one of the leading Continental European social scientists of the first quarter of the twentieth century. The term late capitalism is credited to him, as is the concept of creative destruction associated with capitalism. His major work was Der moderne Kapitalismus, published in three volumes from 1902 through 1927. In it he described four stages in the development of capitalism, from proto-capitalism as it evolved out of feudalism, through early and high capitalism, to late capitalism, or Spaetkapitalismus, in the period after the First World War.