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… is from page 101 of Pierre Lemieux’s excellent 2018 monograph, What’s Wrong With Protectionism? [2]:
Perhaps, with some optimism, we may hope that, in the future, an understanding of the economics of trade will persuade citizens to demand that their own government recognize their liberty to import. We may also hope that people on the Left or on the Right will realize that the only way to protect oneself against a government one does not like is to reduce government power in general, and that free trade is one important means of reducing government power.
DBx: Yes.
If the goal is increased prosperity and peace, free trade is embraced as an important policy. But if the goal is to exercise power either directly or as a courtier to the powerful, a policy of free trade is rejected. Those who crave power, and those who thrill to its exercise, have no use for a policy that leaves peaceful people be. Minding one’s own business in this way is so bourgeois, so mundane, so-1776ish and 1980s-like, and so unimaginative in its lack of grand plans and social blueprints. For the arrogant and the officious, it’s just no fun!