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Claude-Frédéric Bastiat (; ; 30 June 1801 – 24 December 1850) was a French economist, writer and a prominent member of the French liberal school. A member of the
French National Assembly The National Assembly (, ) is the lower house of the Bicameralism, bicameral French Parliament under the French Fifth Republic, Fifth Republic, the upper house being the Senate (France), Senate (). The National Assembly's legislators are known ...
, Bastiat developed the economic concept of
opportunity cost In microeconomic theory, the opportunity cost of a choice is the value of the best alternative forgone where, given limited resources, a choice needs to be made between several mutually exclusive alternatives. Assuming the best choice is made, ...
and introduced the parable of the broken window. He was described as "the most brilliant economic journalist who ever lived" by economic theorist
Joseph Schumpeter Joseph Alois Schumpeter (; February 8, 1883 – January 8, 1950) was an Austrian political economist. He served briefly as Finance Minister of Austria in 1919. In 1932, he emigrated to the United States to become a professor at Harvard Unive ...
. As an advocate of
classical economics Classical economics, also known as the classical school of economics, or classical political economy, is a school of thought in political economy that flourished, primarily in Britain, in the late 18th and early-to-mid 19th century. It includ ...
and the economics of
Adam Smith Adam Smith (baptised 1723 – 17 July 1790) was a Scottish economist and philosopher who was a pioneer in the field of political economy and key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment. Seen by some as the "father of economics"——— or ...
, his views favored a
free market In economics, a free market is an economic market (economics), system in which the prices of goods and services are determined by supply and demand expressed by sellers and buyers. Such markets, as modeled, operate without the intervention of ...
and influenced the
Austrian School The Austrian school is a Heterodox economics, heterodox Schools of economic thought, school of economic thought that advocates strict adherence to methodological individualism, the concept that social phenomena result primarily from the motivat ...
. Thornton, Mark (11 April 2011
"Why Bastiat Is Still Great"
Mises Institute The Ludwig von Mises Institute for Austrian Economics, or Mises Institute, is a nonprofit think tank headquartered in Auburn, Alabama, that is a center for Austrian economics, right-wing libertarian thought and the paleolibertarian and ana ...
. Retrieved 1 August 2019.
He is best known for his book '' The Law'', where he argued that law must protect rights such as private property, not "plunder" others' property.


Biography

Bastiat was born on 29 June 1801 in
Bayonne Bayonne () is a city in southwestern France near the France–Spain border, Spanish border. It is a communes of France, commune and one of two subprefectures in France, subprefectures in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques departments of France, departm ...
,
Aquitaine Aquitaine (, ; ; ; ; Poitevin-Saintongeais: ''Aguiéne''), archaic Guyenne or Guienne (), is a historical region of southwestern France and a former Regions of France, administrative region. Since 1 January 2016 it has been part of the administ ...
, a port town in the south of France on the
Bay of Biscay The Bay of Biscay ( ) is a gulf of the northeast Atlantic Ocean located south of the Celtic Sea. It lies along the western coast of France from Point Penmarc'h to the Spanish border, and along the northern coast of Spain, extending westward ...
. His father, Pierre Bastiat, was a prominent businessman in the town. His mother died in 1808 when Frédéric was seven years old. His father moved inland to the town of Mugron, with Frédéric following soon afterward. The Bastiat estate in Mugron had been acquired during the French Revolution and had previously belonged to the Marquis of Poyanne. Pierre Bastiat died in 1810, leaving Frédéric an orphan. He was fostered by his paternal grandfather and his unmarried aunt Justine Bastiat. He attended a school in Bayonne, but his aunt thought poorly of it and so enrolled him in the school Saint-Sever. At age 17, he left school at Sorèze to work for his uncle in his family's export business. It was the same firm where his father had been a partner. Bastiat began to develop an intellectual interest as he no longer wished to work with his uncle and desired to go to Paris for formal studies. This hope was not realized as his grandfather was in poor health and wished to go to the Mugron estate. Bastiat accompanied him and cared for him. The next year when Bastiat was 24, his grandfather died, leaving him the family estate, thereby providing him with the means to further his theoretical inquiries. Bastiat developed intellectual interests in several areas including philosophy, history, politics, religion, travel, poetry,
political economy Political or comparative economy is a branch of political science and economics studying economic systems (e.g. Marketplace, markets and national economies) and their governance by political systems (e.g. law, institutions, and government). Wi ...
and biography. After the middle-class Revolution of 1830, Bastiat became politically active and was elected justice of the peace of Mugron in 1831 and to the Council General (county-level assembly) of Landes in 1832. Bastiat was elected to the national legislative assembly after the
French Revolution of 1848 The French Revolution of 1848 (), also known as the February Revolution (), was a period of civil unrest in France, in February 1848, that led to the collapse of the July Monarchy and the foundation of the French Second Republic. It sparked t ...
. His public career as an economist began only in 1844, when his first article was published in the '' Journal des économistes'' during October of that year and it was ended by his untimely death in 1850. Bastiat contracted
tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...
, probably during his tours throughout France to promote his ideas and that illness eventually prevented him from making further speeches (particularly at the legislative assembly to which he was elected in 1848 and 1849) and ended his life. In '' The Law'', he wrote: "Until the day of my death, I shall proclaim this principle with all the force of my lungs (which alas! is all too inadequate)". This last line is understood by translators to be a reference to the effects of his tuberculosis. During the autumn of 1850, he was sent to Italy by his doctors, and he first traveled to Pisa, then to Rome. On 24 December 1850, Bastiat called those with him to approach his bed and murmured twice the words "the truth" before he died at the age of 49.


Works

Bastiat was the author of many works on economics and political economy, generally characterized by their clear organization, forceful argumentation and acerbic wit. Economist
Murray Rothbard Murray Newton Rothbard (; March 2, 1926 – January 7, 1995) was an American economist of the Austrian School,Ronald Hamowy, ed., 2008, The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism', Cato Institute, Sage, , p. 62: "a leading economist of the Austri ...
wrote that "Bastiat was indeed a lucid and superb writer, whose brilliant and witty essays and fables to this day are remarkable and devastating demolitions of
protectionism Protectionism, sometimes referred to as trade protectionism, is the economic policy of restricting imports from other countries through methods such as tariffs on imported goods, import quotas, and a variety of other government regulations ...
and of all forms of government
subsidy A subsidy, subvention or government incentive is a type of government expenditure for individuals and households, as well as businesses with the aim of stabilizing the economy. It ensures that individuals and households are viable by having acc ...
and control. He was a truly scintillating advocate of an unrestricted
free market In economics, a free market is an economic market (economics), system in which the prices of goods and services are determined by supply and demand expressed by sellers and buyers. Such markets, as modeled, operate without the intervention of ...
". However, Bastiat himself declared that subsidy should be available, albeit limited under extraordinary circumstances, saying the following:
"Under extraordinary circumstances, for urgent cases, the State should set aside some resources to assist certain unfortunate people, to help them adjust to changing conditions".
Among his better-known works is ''Economic Sophisms'', a series of essays (originally published in the ''Journal des économistes'') which contain a defence of
free trade Free trade is a trade policy that does not restrict imports or exports. In government, free trade is predominantly advocated by political parties that hold Economic liberalism, economically liberal positions, while economic nationalist politica ...
. Bastiat wrote the work while living in England to advise the shapers of the French Republic on perils to avoid. ''Economic Sophisms'' was translated and adapted for an American readership in 1867 by the economist and historian of money
Alexander del Mar Alexander del Mar (aka Alexander Del Mar and Alexander Delmar; August 9, 1836 – July 1, 1926) was an American political economist, historian, numismatist A numismatist is a specialist, researcher, and/or well-informed collector of numismat ...
, writing under the pseudonym Emile Walter.


''Economic Sophisms'' and the candlemakers' petition

Contained within ''Economic Sophisms'' is the
satirical Satire is a genre of the visual arts, visual, literature, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently Nonfiction, non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ...
parable known as the candlemakers' petition in which candlemakers and tallow producers lobby the
Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourb ...
of the French
July Monarchy The July Monarchy (), officially the ''Kingdom of France'' (), was a liberalism, liberal constitutional monarchy in France under , starting on 9 August 1830, after the revolutionary victory of the July Revolution of 1830, and ending 26 Februar ...
(1830–1848) to block out the Sun to prevent its unfair competition with their products. Also included in the ''Sophisms'' is a facetious petition to the king asking for a law forbidding the usage of everyone's right hand, based on a presumption by some of his contemporaries that more difficulty means more work and more work means more wealth.


''The Law'' (1850)

Bastiat's most famous work is '' The Law'', originally published as a pamphlet in 1850. It defines a just system of laws and then demonstrates how such law facilitates a free society. In ''The Law'', Bastiat wrote that everyone has a right to protect "his person, his liberty, and his property". The state should be only a "substitution of a common force for individual forces" to defend this right. According to Bastiat, justice (meaning defense of one's life, liberty and property) has precise limits, but if government power extends further into philanthropic endeavors, then government becomes so limitless that it can grow endlessly. The resulting statism is "based on this triple hypothesis: the total inertness of mankind, the omnipotence of the law, and the infallibility of the legislator". The public then becomes socially engineered by the legislator and must bend to the legislators' will "like the clay to the potter", saying:
Socialism, like the ancient ideas from which it springs, confuses the distinction between government and society. As a result of this, every time we object to a thing being done by government, the socialists conclude that we object to its being done at all. We disapprove of state education. Then the socialists say that we are opposed to any education. We object to a state religion. Then the socialists say that we want no religion at all. We object to a state-enforced equality. Then they say that we are against equality. And so on, and so on. It is as if the socialists were to accuse us of not wanting persons to eat because we do not want the state to raise grain. I do not dispute their right to invent social combinations, to advertise them, to advocate them, and to try them upon themselves, at their own expense and risk. But I do dispute their right to impose these plans upon us by law – by force – and to compel us to pay for them with our taxes.
Bastiat posits that the law becomes perverted when it punishes one's right to self-defense (of his life, liberty and property) in favor of another's right to legalized plunder which he defines as "if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime" in which he includes the tax support of "protective tariffs, subsidies, guaranteed profits, guaranteed jobs, relief and welfare schemes, public education, progressive taxation, free credit, and public works". According to Bastiat, legal plunder can be committed in "an infinite number of ways. Thus, we have an infinite number of plans for organizing it: tariffs, protection, benefits, subsidies, encouragements, progressive taxation, public schools, guaranteed jobs, guaranteed profits, minimum wages, a right to relief, a right to the tools of labor, free credit, and so on, and so on. All these plans as a whole — with their common aim of legal plunder — constitute socialism". Bastiat also made the following humorous point: "If the natural tendencies of mankind are so bad that it is not safe to permit people to be free, how is it that the tendencies of these organizers are always good? Do not the legislators and their appointed agents also belong to the human race? Or do they believe that they themselves are made of a finer clay than the rest of mankind?""The Law"
''Bastiat.org''.


"What is Seen and What is Not Seen"

In his 1850 essay "Ce qu'on voit et ce qu'on ne voit pas" (" What is seen and what is not seen"), Bastiat introduced through the parable of the broken window the concept of
opportunity cost In microeconomic theory, the opportunity cost of a choice is the value of the best alternative forgone where, given limited resources, a choice needs to be made between several mutually exclusive alternatives. Assuming the best choice is made, ...
in all but name. This term was not coined until over sixty years after his death by
Friedrich von Wieser Friedrich von Wieser (; 10 July 1851 – 22 July 1926) was an early (so-called "first generation") economist of the Austrian School of economics. Born in Vienna, the son of Privy Councillor Leopold von Wieser, a high official in the war ministry, ...
in 1914.


Debate with Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

Bastiat also famously engaged in a debate between 1849 and 1850 with
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (, ; ; 1809 – 19 January 1865) was a French anarchist, socialist, philosopher, and economist who founded mutualist philosophy and is considered by many to be the "father of anarchism". He was the first person to ca ...
about the legitimacy of interest. As Robert Leroux argued, Bastiat had the conviction that Proudhon's anti-interest doctrine "was the complete antithesis of any serious approach". Proudhon famously lost his temper and resorted to personal attacks: "Your intelligence is asleep, or rather it has never been awake. You are a man for whom logic does not exist. You do not hear anything, you do not understand anything. You are without philosophy, without science, without humanity. Your ability to reason, like your ability to pay attention and make comparisons is zero. Scientifically, Mr. Bastiat, you are a dead man."


Views

Bastiat asserted that the sole purpose of government is to protect the right of an individual to life, liberty and property and that it is dangerous and morally wrong for government to interfere with an individual's other personal matters. From this, Bastiat concluded that the law cannot defend life, liberty and property if it promotes legal or legalized plunder which he defined as using government force and laws to take something from one individual and give it to others (as opposed to a transfer of property via mutually agreed contracts without using fraud or violent threats against the other party, which Bastiat considered a legitimate transfer of property). In ''The Law'', Bastiat explains that if the privileged classes or socialists use the government for legalized plunder, this will encourage the other socioeconomic class to also use legal plunder and that the correct response to the
socialists Socialism is an economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes the economic, political, and socia ...
is to cease all legal plunder. Bastiat also explains why his opinion is that the law cannot defend life, liberty and property if it promotes socialist policies. When used to obtain legalized plunder for any group, he says that the law is perverted against the only things (life, liberty and property) it is supposed to defend.Bastiat, Frédéric. ''The Law''. Ludwig von Mises Institute, 2007. Bastiat was a strong supporter of
free trade Free trade is a trade policy that does not restrict imports or exports. In government, free trade is predominantly advocated by political parties that hold Economic liberalism, economically liberal positions, while economic nationalist politica ...
who was inspired by and routinely corresponded with
Richard Cobden Richard Cobden (3 June 1804 – 2 April 1865) was an English Radicals (UK), Radical and Liberal Party (UK), Liberal politician, manufacturing, manufacturer, and a campaigner for free trade and peace. He was associated with the Anti–Corn Law L ...
and the English Anti-Corn Law League and worked with free-trade associations in France. Because of his emphasis on the mutual gains to be had from free exchange, on subjective value, and on the importance of deductive reasoning (as opposed to mathematical models) in deriving economic conclusions, Bastiat has been described by Mark Thornton, Thomas DiLorenzo and other economists as a forerunner of the
Austrian School The Austrian school is a Heterodox economics, heterodox Schools of economic thought, school of economic thought that advocates strict adherence to methodological individualism, the concept that social phenomena result primarily from the motivat ...
, with Thornton positing that through taking this position on the motivations of human action he demonstrates a pronounced "Austrian flavor."


Bastiat's tomb

Bastiat died in Rome and is buried at
San Luigi dei Francesi The Church of St. Louis of the French (, , ) is a Catholic Church, Catholic church near Piazza Navona in Rome. The church is dedicated to the patron saints of France: Virgin Mary, Dionysius the Areopagite and King Louis IX of France. The churc ...
in the center of that city.


Books

* * * * * * * *


See also

*
Age of Enlightenment The Age of Enlightenment (also the Age of Reason and the Enlightenment) was a Europe, European Intellect, intellectual and Philosophy, philosophical movement active from the late 17th to early 19th century. Chiefly valuing knowledge gained th ...
*
Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, Baron de Laune Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, Baron de l'Aulne ( ; ; 10 May 172718 March 1781), commonly known as Turgot, was a French economist and statesman. Sometimes considered a physiocrat, he is today best remembered as an early advocate for economic liber ...
* Bastiat Prize * '' Harmonies of Political Economy'' * Hippolyte Castille *
List of liberal theorists Individual contributors to classical liberalism and political liberalism are associated with philosophers of the Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment. Liberalism as a specifically named ideology begins in the late 18th century as a movement toward ...
* Physiocrats


References


Further reading


Bastiat's Legacy in Economics
by Jorg Guido Hulsmann
Frédéric Bastiat's Views on the Nature of Money
by Mark Thornton
Frédéric Bastiat: Two Hundred Years On
by Joseph R. Stromberg * Foville, A. de. "Bastiat" (1900). I
''Nouveau dictionnaire de l’économie politique''
Deuxième édition. Tome premier. ''A–H''. Publié sous la direction de M. Léon Say et de M. Joseph Chailley, 170–172. Paris: Guillaumin et Cie . * * * * * *


External links

* * *
Bastiat.org
publishes and indexes information about Bastiat
Cercle Frédéric Bastiat
publishes and indexes information about Bastiat
The Bastiat Society

"Frédéric Bastiat: Libertarian Challenger or Political Bargainer?"
article by economist Brian Baugus on the development of Bastiat's thinking *
The Bastiat Collection Volume 1
',
The Bastiat Collection Volume 2
' – A collection of Bastiat works published by the
Ludwig von Mises Institute The Ludwig von Mises Institute for Austrian Economics, or Mises Institute, is a nonprofit think tank headquartered in Auburn, Alabama, that is a center for Austrian economics, right-wing libertarian thought and the paleolibertarian and anarcho ...

Audio version of Russell's translation of ''The Law''

''The Law'' – Frederic Bastiat (PDF English)
*

in its entirety (free PDF download) {{DEFAULTSORT:Bastiat, Frederic 1801 births 1850 deaths 19th-century deaths from tuberculosis 19th-century French economists 19th-century French male writers Classical economists Critics of socialism French classical liberal economists French Liberal School French political writers French Roman Catholics Tuberculosis deaths in Italy Members of the 1848 Constituent Assembly Members of the National Legislative Assembly of the French Second Republic Moderate Republicans (France) People from Bayonne Politicians from Nouvelle-Aquitaine French male non-fiction writers Infectious disease deaths in Lazio Natural law ethicists