The Man and the Statesman. Bastiat Frédéric

its related term industriel. In some respects it is a “false friend,” as one is tempted to translate it as “industry” or “industrious” or “industrial,” but this would be wrong because these terms have the more narrow modern meaning of “heavy industry” or “manufacturing” or “the result of some industrial process.” The meaning in Bastiat’s time was both more general and more specific to a particular social and economic theory current in his day.

      In the eighteenth century industry had the general meaning of “productive” or “the result of hard work,” and this sense continued to be current in the early nineteenth century. Industry also had a specific meaning, which was tied to a social and economic theory developed by Jean-Baptiste Say and his followers Charles Comte and Charles Dunoyer in the 1810s and 1820s, as well as by other theorists such as the historian Augustin Thierry. According to these theorists there were only two means of acquiring wealth: by productive activity and voluntary exchanges in the free market (i.e., industrie—which included agriculture, trade, factory production, and services) or by coercive means (conquest, theft, taxation, subsidies, protection, transfer payments, or slavery). Anybody who acquired wealth through voluntary exchange and productive activities belonged to a class of people collectively called les industrieux, in contrast to those individuals or groups who acquired their wealth by force, coercion, conquest, slavery, or government privileges. The latter group were seen as a ruling class or as “parasites” who lived at the expense of les industrieux.

      Bastiat was very much influenced by the theories of Say, Comte, and Dunoyer and adopted their terminology regarding industry. So to translate industrie in this intellectual context as “production” (or some other modern, neutral term) would be to ignore the resonance the word has with the social and economic theory that was central to Bastiat’s worldview. Hence, at the risk of sounding a bit archaic and pedantic, we have preferred to use industry in order to remain true to Bastiat’s intent.

      When Bastiat uses an English word or phrase, we have mentioned this in a footnote, with one exception: Bastiat frequently writes such terms as “free trade” and “free trader” in English, especially in his correspondence with Richard Cobden, and thus we have not noted these occurrences.

      A final note on terminology: in Bastiat’s time, the word liberal had the same meaning in France and in America. In the United States, however, the meaning of the word has shifted progressively toward the left of the political spectrum. A precise translation of the French word would be either “classical liberal” or “libertarian,” depending on the context, and indeed Bastiat is considered a classical liberal by present-day conservatives and a libertarian by present-day libertarians. To avoid the resulting awkwardness, we have decided by convention to keep the word liberal, with its nineteenth-century meaning, in the translations as well as in the notes and the glossaries.

Note on the Editions of the Œuvres Complètes

      The first edition of the Œuvres complètes appeared in 1854-55, consisting of six volumes.¹ The second edition, which appeared in 1862-64, was an almost identical reprint of the first edition (with only minor typesetting differences) but was notable for the inclusion of a new, seventh volume, which contained additional essays, sketches, and correspondence.² The second edition also contained a preface by Prosper Paillottet and a biographical essay on Bastiat by Roger de Fontenay (“Notice sur la vie et les écrits de Frédéric Bastiat”), both of which were absent in the first edition.

      Another difference between the first and second editions was in the sixth volume, which contained Bastiat’s magnum opus, Economic Harmonies. The first edition of the Œuvres complètes described volume 6 as the “third revised and augmented edition” of Economic Harmonies. This is somewhat confusing but does have some logic to it. The “first” edition of Economic Harmonies appeared in 1850 during the last year of Bastiat’s life but in an incomplete form. The “second” edition appeared in 1851, after his death, edited by La Société des amis de Bastiat (most probably by Prosper Paillottet and Roger de Fontenay) and included the second half of the manuscript, which Bastiat had been working on when he died. Thus the edition that appeared in the first edition of the Œuvres complètes was called the “third” edition on its title page. This practice continued throughout the nineteenth century, with editions of Economic Harmonies staying in print as a separate volume as well as being included as volume 6 in later editions of the Œuvres complètes. By 1870-73, therefore, when the third edition of the Œuvres complètes appeared, the version of Economic Harmonies that appeared in volume 6 was titled the “sixth” edition of the work.

      Other “editions” of the Œuvres complètes include a fourth edition, 1878-79, and a fifth edition, 1881-84. If there was a sixth edition, the date is unknown. A seventh edition appeared in 1893, and a final edition may have appeared in 1907. (For a complete listing of the editions of the Œuvres complètes that were used in making this translation, see the bibliography.)

Acknowledgments

      The Man and the Statesman is the first volume of an English-language edition of the complete works of Frédéric Bastiat. The translation and editorial matter in this book and in the forthcoming volumes are the result of the efforts of a Franco-American team whom I have had the honor to coordinate and whose work I have reviewed at every step.

      Jane Willems and Michel Willems were the initial translators; Jean-Claude Paul-Dejean, a historian of Bastiat, his epoch, and his surroundings, prepared the initial drafts of the notes and glossaries. The notes were adapted and translated by me; my English was reviewed by Diana Dupuy, of English origin, who in 2001 translated “To the Electors of the District of Saint-Sever” for the Foundation for Economic Education to commemorate the two-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Bastiat. Dr. Dennis O’Keeffe, Professor of Social Science at the University of Buckingham and Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs in London, carefully read the translation and made very helpful suggestions at every stage. Dr. David Hart, Director of the Online Library of Liberty Project at Liberty Fund, further reviewed the translations. As an expert in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European economists, he considerably enriched the notes related to the said economists and provided much of the scholarly apparatus. Aurelian Craiutu, Professor of Political Science at Indiana University, Bloomington, reviewed the final translations with Dr. Hart and contributed his considerable knowledge of nineteenth-century French politics to the review of the translation. Last but not least, Dr. Laura Goetz, Senior Editor at Liberty Fund, my constant correspondent on the other side of the Atlantic, organized and coordinated with me the various aspects of the project from its inception through to final manuscript.

      

      This volume has thus all the strength and weaknesses of a voluntary, collaborative effort. We hope Bastiat would approve, especially as no government official was involved at any stage.

      Jacques de Guenin General editor, founder, and presidentof the Cercle Frédéric Bastiat

General Introduction

      As in the title of his last publication, What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen, Bastiat’s life contains both “seen” and “unseen” elements. What was readily “seen” by his contemporaries was the arrival in 1844 of a somewhat rustic inhabitant from the provinces into the circle of the sophisticated and urbane Parisian free-market economists. In just a few short years, before his early death in 1850, Bastiat had made a profound impact on French intellectual and political life as a theoretician, a pamphleteer, a journalist, and a deputy (member of Parliament). What is not so readily apparent, either to his contemporaries or to modern readers, is the history of the man before his sudden arrival in Paris.

      The present volume, most of which has never been translated into English before, attempts to fill that gap in our understanding—from