Laissez-faire doctrine originated with popularizers, not the classical economists

Evidence

Rougier began to put forward a more explicit agenda in his article “Retour au libéralisme” in the Revue de Paris at the beginning of 1938 and a book, Les mystiques économiques, that followed months later. These two texts lament the apparent devolution of po liti cal debate to a choice between fascism and communism, both of which he perceived to renounce the advantages of a liberal system: namely, the division of labor, the circulation of capital, the cosmopolitanism of culture, the dignity of the individual conceived as an end, the security provided by a stable judicial system, the free choice of consumers, and the freedom of thought. … He shared Lippmann’s belief that new economic solutions would require overcoming a static adoption of laissezfaire, which he labeled “la mystique libérale.” — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion, 177 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Working economists abandoned laissez-faire decades before the public realized it — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion: Reinventing Free…, 12; Interwar liberal revivalists saw laissez-faire itself as a dogmatic mystique — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion: Reinventing Free…, 177; Keynes held laissez-faire a popular distortion absent from Smith, Ricardo, and Malthus — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion: Reinventing Free…, 11

Related

• Interwar liberal revivalists saw laissez-faire itself as a dogmatic mystique (similarity 0.90)
• Working economists abandoned laissez-faire decades before the public realized it (similarity 0.84)
• Keynes held laissez-faire a popular distortion absent from Smith, Ricardo, and Malthus (similarity 0.82)

Broader Connections

• Interwar liberal revivalists saw laissez-faire itself as a dogmatic mystique #corroborates (0.75) — Angus Burgin, The Great Persuasion, 177