… is from page 180 of Joel Mokyr’s 1990 book, The Lever of Riches: Technological Creativity and Economic Progress:
It seems that as a general rule, then, the weaker the government, the better it is for innovation. With some notable exceptions, autocratic rulers have tended to be hostile or indifferent to technological change. The instinctive need for stability and the suspicion of nonconformism and shocks usually dominated the possible gains that could be attained from technological progress.
