Capital and Ideology

by Thomas Piketty

Confidence in the state’s ability to render justice fairly and impartially throughout a vast territory, to guarantee security, collect taxes, and provide police, educational, and medical services more justly and efficiently than the old privileged orders was not something that could be decreed from an academic chair. It had to be demonstrated in practice. At bottom, Montesquieu’s fears of a potentially despotic state (which led to his defense of local seigneurial courts) are not very different from the suspicions of various forms of supranational state power that one sees today. For instance, many defenders of interstate competition ignore the fact that some states establish opaque laws that allow them to function as tax or regulatory havens (of particular benefit to the wealthy), justifying their position by pointing to the risk to individual freedom that would result from overcentralization of information and judicial authority under the aegis of a single state. Such arguments are of course often covertly self-serving (as in Montesquieu’s case). Nevertheless, their (at least partial) plausibility makes them that much more politically effective, and only successful historical experimentation can lead to a radical shift in the political and ideological balance of power with issues of this type.

Comparison between state gaining power in 18th century and an interstate gaining more power now. Confidence in the state’s ability to render justice fairly and impartially throughout a vast territory, to guarantee security, collect taxes, and provide police, educational, and medical services more justly and efficiently than the old privileged orders was not something that could be decreed from an academic chair. It had to be demonstrated in practice. At bottom, Montesquieu’s fears of a potentially despotic state (which led to his defense of local seigneurial courts) are not very different from the suspicions of various forms of supranational state power that one sees today. For instance, many defenders of interstate competition ignore the fact that some states establish opaque laws that allow them to function as tax or regulatory havens (of particular benefit to the wealthy), justifying their position by pointing to the risk to individual freedom that would result from overcentralization of information and judicial authority under the aegis of a single state. Such arguments are of course often covertly self-serving (as in Montesquieu’s case). Nevertheless, their (at least partial) plausibility makes them that much more politically effective, and only successful historical experimentation can lead to a radical shift in the political and ideological balance of power with issues of this type.