The Chinese Philosopher Who Explained Spontaneous Order 2,000 Years Before Adam Smith

Updated on 6/4/2022

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Spontaneous order is one of the most important, often misunderstood, and wrongly dismissed concepts of classical liberalism!

"... his poem "Butterfly Dream" goes like this:

Once upon a time, I dreamt I was a butterfly,

fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes

a butterfly. I was conscious only of my happiness as a

butterfly, unaware that I was myself. Soon I awaked,

and there I was, veritably myself again. Now I don't

know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a

butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man. ...

Zhuangzi was not the founder of the [robust libertarian intellectual tradition in Ancient China], however. The tradition ... started with Lao-Tzu (500 BC), a philosopher credited as the father of Taoism who rejected the alleged authoritarianism of Confucianism in favor of individual rights. ...

Zhuangzi followed in Lao-Tzu’s footsteps, and in his most famous work, The Zhuangzi, he shares what ... are the first historical traces of the idea of spontaneous order.

Chuang-tzu reiterated and embellished Lao-tzu's devotion to laissez faire and opposition to state rule: "There has been such a thing as letting mankind alone; there has never been such a thing as governing mankind [with success]." In fact, the world simply "does not need governing; in fact it should not be governed." Chuang-tzu was also the first to work out the idea of "spontaneous order," developed particularly by Proudhon in the nineteenth and by F. A. Hayek of the Austrian School in the twentieth Century:

A perusing of The Zhuangzi shows that Zhuangzi’s conception of spontaneous order could not be more clear: “Good order results spontaneously when things are let alone."

An entire chapter in Zhuangzi’s book is dedicated to “letting alone.” In the chapter, Zhuangzi writes that the natural conditions of human existence require “not artificial aids.” The philosopher touches on the evils of government, traces the failures of coercion in the province, and describes how action springs from inaction (government inaction).

Many tend to think of concepts such as limited government and spontaneous order as “Western” ideas, but this is hardly the case. ..."

The Chinese Philosopher Who Explained Spontaneous Order 2,000 Years Before Adam Smith - Foundation for Economic Education The Chinese philosopher Zhuang Zhou (aka Zhuangzi) is credited with working out one of the most important economic concepts in the world: spontaneous order.