Arthur C. Brooks: life, ideas, books and debates

आर्थर सी. ब्रुक्स Arthur C. Brooks

Arthur C. Brooks was born in Spokane in 1964. He left music college to play the French horn for a living. He went back to study in his late twenties and took a doctorate at RAND in 1998. He led the American Enterprise Institute from 2009 to 2019. He then taught at Harvard and wrote The Atlantic’s column How to Build a Life. In July 2026 he moved to Vanderbilt University.

Curated by Nikhil Sharma: a professional French horn player who became a social scientist. He ran a Washington think tank for ten years and then taught happiness at Harvard. He met a teacher in Palakkad and took the Hindu idea of vanaprastha into his advice on ageing. He has visited the Dalai Lama eleven times.

Arthur C. Brooks in 2017. Photograph: Gage Skidmore, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0.

3 No. 1 bestsellers: From Strength to Strength, Build the Life You Want and The Meaning of Your Life
10 Years leading AEI: President of the American Enterprise Institute from 2009 to 2019
11 Visits to the Dalai Lama: His count by April 2024
9 Age he took up the horn: He played professionally into his late twenties

The facts

Born: 21 May 1964 in Spokane, Washington. His father taught mathematics and his mother was an artist (Wikipedia: Arthur C. Brooks)
Education: BA in economics from Thomas Edison State (1994) by distance learning. MA in economics from Florida Atlantic University (1994). MPhil and PhD in public policy analysis from the RAND Graduate School (1997 and 1998) (Vanderbilt University: Arthur Brooks, Medicine, Health, and Society)
Now: Professor of the Practice of Medicine, Health, and Society at Vanderbilt University from 1 July 2026. Senior fellow at Harvard Business School (Vanderbilt University: Arthur C. Brooks to join faculty at Vanderbilt (23 April 2026))
Earlier posts: Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor at Harvard Kennedy School and professor of management practice at Harvard Business School from 2019. President of AEI from 2009 to 2019 (Harvard Kennedy School: Arthur C. Brooks curriculum vitae)
Music: Annapolis Brass Quintet (1983–1989). Associate principal horn of the City Orchestra of Barcelona (1989–1992) (Harvard Kennedy School: Arthur C. Brooks curriculum vitae)
Writing: The Atlantic column How to Build a Life from April 2020. A weekly Free Press column The Pursuit of Happiness from January 2026. CBS News contributor (Lafayette College: Arthur C. Brooks to deliver keynote at 191st Commencement (27 February 2026))
Teaching online: The Art and Science of Happiness, a ten-video series sold on his website. Podcast Office Hours with Arthur Brooks (Arthur C. Brooks: The Art and Science of Happiness video series)
Faith: Raised evangelical. He became a Catholic after an experience at the shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico (Harvard Magazine: The Happiness Revolutionary (6 December 2022))
Family: Married to Ester Munt-Brooks of Barcelona. They have three children (Wikipedia: Arthur C. Brooks)

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