What we need is to create or restore a secular “religion” or dogma. We need a dogma of laissez-faire. As long as John Maynard Keynes’s argument in “The End of Laissez-Faire” is accepted (that is, we should put away the old classical liberal dogmas and decide each issue on its own merits), the special interests will be there to convince a “pragmatic” public that their policies are the ones that, on the merits, warrant support.

I am not arguing for a non-rebuttable dogma, but a strong presumption. Government officials and politicians should feel a sense of trepidation when they propose schemes for our betterment.

Unfortunately, it is not possible simply to construct such a public attitude. Nevertheless, I think that intellectuals can do their part. We should discard the idea that it is more “scientific” or more “objective” to follow an issue-by-issue approach to politics. We ought to recognize the instability of the “on its own merits” policy regime. We need to focus on general rules that inhibit state action. We need to accept the lessons of constitutional political economy, public choice theory and slippery-slope analysis. We need a secular “religion” of laissez-faire.

# posted by Bob Murphy @ 11:12 PM