Account of the
dinner-debate held on
Monsieur Paul Dejean is a
historian. He claimed he
was not qualified to speak to us about the philosophical and economic legacy of
Bastiat – in fact he is – and so he chose to speak about his
subject from the historical perspective. It is clear that as a result of his
research he has developed an affection for the personality of Bastiat but this
has not affected his objectivity as a historian. Proof of this is that when the
meeting broke up, at about midnight, no
one could tell whether or not Jean-Claude Paul-Dejean was himself a liberal or
not.
As everyone knows, his hero
was a liberal through and through, i.e. he was committed to the freedom of the
individual in all areas. His passion for freedom governed his whole life.
Unfortunately it was also partly responsible for shortening that life since, despite
feeling the early effects of his tuberculosis and instead of taking the rest
that might have saved him, he worked himself to the point of exhaustion, for
fear of being unable to complete the tasks he had set himself.
Bastiat’s passion for
freedom was at one and the same time the result of an intellectual heritage, of
a system of ideas and of political and moral practice. It was deeply embedded
in the reality of his time and his surroundings.
Bastiat was born in
The year of Bastiat’s
birth saw the publication of Adam Smith’s seminal work on the wealth of
nations. Four years earlier Malthus’ work on population had appeared. Two
years later Jean-Baptiste Say published his monumental treatise on political
economy. In 1817 it was the turn of Ricardo to publish his Principles of Political
Economy. By the time Bastiat reached manhood, political economy was already
well established with a large corpus of theoretical works with liberal
leanings, which Bastiat read, assimilated and even criticized.
Another expression of
liberalism, political liberalism, established its reputation in 1817 when
Benjamin Constant republished two texts dating from 1814 and 1815 in the form
of a book entitled On the Liberty of the
Ancients Compared with that of the Moderns. It would become an instant
classic.
This generation would
therefore have at its disposal first-rate theoretical analyses both in the
field of politics and economics and all these analyses agreed on the notion of
freedom.
Freedom is not genetically
pre-programmed. It is not a notion that suddenly appears out of thin air. It is
the product of experience, education and reflection.
Frédéric
spent his youth during the Empire. What was his attitude towards it? For him
the Empire meant neither military adventures, nor victories nor parades. For
the inhabitants of Bayonne the Empire meant first and foremost the continental
blockade, which dealt a fatal blow to the town’s trade. The port of
Bayonne had benefited from its ‘freedom’. In 1787 it had become a
free port. It could trade freely, especially with the new United States of
America. With the continental blockade all trade came to a halt and the port of
Bayonne fell into decline. The trade in wine from the Chalosse for sale abroad
would be affected. Bastiat could not have failed to make a causal connection
between the protectionism imposed by the continental blockade and the economic
doldrums affecting the
On the other hand Bayonne
was a garrison town from which soldiers set off for the Peninsular War. Bayonne
did not see Iena or Austerlitz but instead the most painful of all the wars
Napoleon waged. Those soldiers who did return had been defeated by a whole
people. In 1813 the South-West was the first region of France to be invaded by
foreign troops. Bastiat’s family, who traded with
On the
death of his parents Frederic went to live with the family of his grandparents
in Mugron. Brought up by his aunt, he would attend first the secondary school
in Saint-Sever. The teaching there was fairly ordinary. Therefore in 1814 the
family would send Frederic to one of the most famous schools in France, the
school at Sorèze, in the Tarn department. It had been run by priests who were
very broad-minded but they had been driven out by the Revolution. However, it
was taken over by two brothers, the Ferlus brothers, who retained its
open-mindedness and respect for others. The school survived until recently but
it is now closed.
The school catered for both
Catholics and Protestants. Unusually for the time the school had a Catholic and
a Protestant chaplain. The medium for teaching was no longer Latin but French.
Modern languages were more important than the classical languages, and the
pupils had to learn English, German, Italian and Spanish. The sciences
dominated the curriculum: after four years of mathematics the pupils tackled
integral calculus. But they also did accountancy, a practical way of
approaching economic ideas. In philosophy the pupils were introduced to
intellectual debate, thereby fostering in them both respect for the opinions of
others and mental agility. Sport also played a major role. Riding and swimming
were part of the curriculum.
It is striking that once
they had gone out into the world the pupils of Sorrèze, though they may have
had opposing political views still showed a mutual respect for one another at
old boy reunions.
Bastiat would be an
outstanding pupil in Sorèze but he would be called away to help his uncle in
his business in
During the several years he
would spend in
In Bayonne,
Frédéric led a relatively
austere life for a boy of his age. He read extensively. On returning to the
Landes he would read even more. He read works of economy and political
philosophy. Three now forgotten authors particularly influenced him: the philosopher
Pierre Larromiguière, the economist Charles Dunoyer and the jurist Charles
Comte. All three preached individual freedom and responsibility Frédéric led a
relatively austere life for a boy of his age. He read extensively. On returning
to the Landes he would read even more. He read works of economy and political
philosophy. Three now forgotten authors particularly influenced him: the
philosopher Pierre Larromiguière, the economist Charles Dunoyer and the jurist
Charles Comte. All three preached individual freedom and responsibility: man
is free to choose and must accept responsibility for his choices.
But Bastiat was not content
simply to read. He meditated and engaged in unending debates with his friend
Felix Coudroy, a jurist and lawyer, as they walked around the countryside of
the Chalosse. Coudroy was not a liberal and these exchanges would enable
Bastiat to hone his arguments, with the result that Coudroy eventually came
around to Bastiat’s ideas.
Towards the age of 28 the precocious
young Frederic Bastiat began to develop his theory of freedom, which was for
him nothing other than the theory of the relations between man and society. He
was already aware of the continuity existing between economic liberalism and
political liberalism.
Any theory of the relations
between man and society posits the existence of a social pact. The problem with
the social pact is to find the right balance between the individual and
society. Most writers tip the scales in favour either of the individual or of
society and become caught up in contradictions. Bastiat sought to overcome
these contradictions and the following idea enabled him to do so: man sums up
in himself the whole of society. He is both producer and consumer. He can be a
businessman and a scholar. He can be capitalist and a wage-earner. Therefore
what is good for the individual is good for society. Any epistemological break
between the individual and society can only result in
Man has needs and
capacities and he will use these capacities to meet his needs He is free to
choose but he is perfectible. He can compare, judge, decide and then analyse
the consequences of his actions. He can only improve himself if he is forced
to accept the consequences of his actions. This is responsibility, which is
indissociable from freedom.
Property is consubstantial
with freedom. It is the appropriation of the fruits of one’s labour. To
deprive someone of the fruits of his labour is tantamount to depriving him of
his capabilities, and therefore to preventing from satisfying his needs by the
use of his capabilities. Agreeing with Locke, Bastiat showed that there can be
no freedom without property and vice versa
Lastly, freedom implies equality
of rights. This also is a question of epistemology, of the internal logic of
ways of thinking about society. It is a direct application of the principle of
non-contradiction: freedom of the individual is only meaningful to the extent
that it does not limit the freedom of others by despoiling them either directly
or indirectly (i.e. by the workings of the law). A splendid illustration of
this concept is to found in what was to be the last – and perhaps the
finest – of the speeches Bastiat made in the Chamber of Deputies, in 1849
on worker associations.
But does not freedom lead
to material inequality? This was indeed the prevailing view, even among
liberals. For the latter a free society did not abolish material inequalities
but compared to a centrally planned economy it improves the lot of everyone,
including the poor. Bastiat went further. He showed that freedom would enable
the accumulation of capital. It would enable this capital to be directed
towards investments that were the most profitable and therefore the most
useful. Thus the availability of capital would increase and interest rates
fall. But increased activity would create an increasing demand for labour and
thereby an increase in wage. The result would therefore be a general rise in
the standard of living and if not absolute social equality at least a general
movement up the scale, favouring the creation of an increasing large and
well-off middle class. It has to be admitted that this is in fact what has
happened everywhere that economic freedom has indeed prevailed.
Bastiat did not limit his
concern for freedom just to France. He was strongly opposed to war and took a
courageous stand against colonial adventures, especially the conquest of
Algeria. Although a great Anglophile with many friends in England, he argued
that the English would be better off freeing their colonies. An opponent of
slavery, he predicted that the latter would in the end bring about a civil war
in
On these issues Bastiat was
not content merely to theorise. He fought with all energy at grass roots level,
until he was utterly exhausted. He founded then ran the French Association for
Free Trade. He saw in free trade the way of lowering prices and therefore of
improving the standard of living of the poorest classes and strengthening the
bonds between nations. But he obviously came up against powerful vested
interests.
A thoughtful Catholic, he
was an advocate of religious freedom and argued that the state should not
interfere in matters of religion, another idea in advance of his time. We
should not forget that the system in place was the Concordat.
In politics he saw
democracy as "progress through freedom". At the time some spoke of
"progress through association", to which Bastiat replied "yes,
providing that association is freely consented to". Faithful to the
liberal current of thought that had conceived the Declaration of the Rights of
Man in 1789, Bastiat considered that political freedom meant limiting the
powers of the state. He was a forerunner of today’s liberal school, for
whom the good state is the one that limits its role to the so-called regalian
powers, i.e. justice, the police and defence. However, he was not against the
idea of the state being involved in infrastructure works of general benefit.
On the other hand he was
against the intervention of the state in education. It must be remembered that
in the time of Napoleon the university was a body controlled entirely by the
state. Bastiat criticised state education for singing the praises of political
systems, those of
Naturally he was in favour
of greater devolution of the powers of central administration – in
a word decentralisation.
Thus for Bastiat freedom
was the very essence of man. Unlike most philosophers who in the end become
entangled in contradictions, his method was completely self-consistent and
still has not been faulted. It was a method encompassing economics, politics,
ethics, sociology, religion and education. "I have only had one
passion", he said one day, "that of freedom".
(Translated by Michael
Glencross)
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