Abstract
This chapter discusses the popular idea according to which Smith is the father of economic liberalism. First, this chapter explores the ambiguities of Laissez-faire. Its first occurrence affirms the idea that exporters must act freely to import precious metals, the only strategic commodities lacking in the country. Secondly, it retraces succinctly the history of the word Liberal and of the expression Economic Liberalism. The word liberal refers to the adversaries of the French Restauration (1815–1830) and the Economic Liberalism is a word used by the opponents to the first socialists, after the 1848 Revolution.
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Notes
- 1.
The proceedings of this conference were published by Hiroshi Mizuta and Chuhei Sugiyama (1993).
- 2.
- 3.
See: J. M. Keynes (1926).
- 4.
My translation. “C’est ici que Quesnay s’est rencontré avec le sage M. de Gournay, Intendant du Commerce, son Contemporain, qu’il estima, qu’il aima & sur la personne & sur les disciples duquel il se plaisoit à fonder une partie de l’espoir de sa patrie. M. de Gournay étoit arrivé à ce résultat pratique, par une route différente: personne, disoit-il, ne fait si bien ce qui est utile au commerce que ceux qui le font; il ne faut donc point leur imposer des règlements. Personne n’est si intéressé à savoir si une entreprise de commerce, si un établissement de fabrique, si l’exercice d'une profession lui sera profitable ou non, que celui qui veut le tenter; il ne faut donc ni corporations, ni jurandes, ni privilèges exclusifs”. … “il faut donc affranchir leurs travaux de ces impôts qui en interceptent le succès… Laissez les faire & laissez-les passer”.
- 5.
My translation: “Il faut dire encore que ce prétendu système de M. de Gournay a cela de particulier, que les principes généraux en sont à peu près adoptés par tout le monde; que, de tout temps, le vœu du commerce chez toutes les nations a été renfermé dans ces deux mots: liberté et protection, et surtout liberté. On sait le mot de M. Le Gendre à M. Colbert: “laissez-nous faire””.
- 6.
Mun was a director of the East India Compay (EIC), from 1615 until his death. In the 1620s, the pound sterling was attacked by the foreign-exchange markets, and the price of sterling silver rose. There was debate over why this happened. The newly created EIC, whose trade with India was in deficit as indeed had always been the case of trade between Europe and the Orient, was attacked. Mun defended the Company by demonstrating that the re-export of Asian products to the rest of Europe more than compensated for these deficits. See Lars Magnusson (1994).
- 7.
See F. Hayek (1946).
- 8.
- 9.
Gide and Rist (1944) suggested that there was during the July Monarchy “…a conjunction of political and economic liberty, and these were melded into the same sect and bore the same name—liberalism. Economic liberty, that of work and transactions, was elevated to the same status as the freedom of conscience or the freedom of the press” (p. 382).
- 10.
Skeat, Etymological Dictionary 1879, 1882; Barnhardt, Dictionary of Etymology 1988.
- 11.
“That system which represents the produce of land as the sole source of the revenue and wealth of every country has, so far as I know, never been adopted by any nation, and it at present exists only in the speculations of a few men of great learning and ingenuity in France. It would not, surely, be worth while to examine at great length the errors of a system which never has done, and probably never will do any harm in any part of the world” (WON, 663).
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Diatkine, D. (2021). Smith and Economic Liberalism. In: Adam Smith and the Wealth of Nations. Palgrave Studies in the History of Economic Thought. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-81600-1_1
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