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The structural perspective on China's prospect of democratization has three variants. The first emphasizes the structural requisites for the survival of the authoritarian state. It argues that the conditions, such as the governing capacity of the state and support from the Chinese people that used to sustain the authoritarian state, have deteriorated significantly and the authoritarian state cannot escape a collapse in the near future (Chang, 2001). The second focuses on the structural requisites for democratization. It holds that the rise of the middle class and the emerging spread of education in China will create favorable conditions for the country to head toward democratization (Gilley, 2004). The third stresses the resilience of China's authoritarian regime. It argues that the rise of democratic polity in Europe resulted from the special social structures of the continent in the feudal period. Since China's social structure in its premodern period was quite different, democracy did not become a solution even after the middle class emerged in China. For the same reason, China's political change will be most likely to move toward rule by law rather than democratization in the future (Pan, 2006).

Contemporary relations between the military and society in Spain can be traced back to the civil war period. Following 3 years of cruel, fratricidal combat, the victory of the insurgent troops led to the Spanish republic being converted into a totalitarian regime headed by Franco. The dictatorship of Franco was not a military dictatorship, but rather the dictatorship of a military man who built up a triangular structure of power at the apex of which he felt protected and from which he controlled society from all angles: the army, the church and the single fascist party FET-JONS.¹ Throughout almost 40 years of a totalitarian regime, millions of Spanish men spent a period of their lives as conscripts in military service under the orders of a fascist military and under the influence of an oppressive political power. The death of the dictator, in 1975, marked the start of the transition to democracy that represented a break with the stigmas of the past and, for the first time in Spanish history, ushered in a period of peaceful coexistence for the entire population. In the military domain, the reforms initiated by General Gutiérrez Mellado – the first Vice-President of the Government of Adolfo Suárez – are worthy of mention. It was through these that efforts were made to modernise the Armed Forces (hereafter AF) in Spain by distancing them from political power, transforming them into a military force administered to serve political structures, and reducing their size to a more coherent one in relation to the needs and threats of a democratic state surrounded by its partners in the same economic community. However, among the military, a small but still powerful nucleus existed, whose rejection of democracy and whose nostalgia for the Franco dictatorship led to a failed attempt at a coup d’état in 1981.

This chapter explores a number of relatively unknown aspects of the controversy over Milton Friedman’s March 1975 visit to Chile through the analytical framework provided by James M. Buchanan’s late 1950s assessment of the economist-physician analogy. The chapter draws upon a range of archival and neglected primary sources to show that the topics which generally rear their head in any contemporary discussion of Friedman’s visit to Chile – for example, whether it is appropriate to provide policy advice to a dictator – were aired in a largely private mid-1970s exchange between Friedman and a number of professional associates. In particular, the controversy over Friedman and Chile began several months before Friedman arrived in Santiago.

Starting from Gino Arias’s dictum on the uselessness of international trade theory for fascism, this contribution aims to demonstrate two main points. First, the free trade attitude displayed by fascism immediately before and after the “March on Rome” clashed with its nationalist origins. The nationalist movement had supported a strong protectionist policy starting from a rejection of the main principles of marginalist theory. This explains why some issues raised by Pareto and Barone which could have been used as arguments in favor of protectionism were neglected. In turn, this impasse played a major role in the rejection of Mihail Manoilescu’s theory in the thirties. The second point concerns the possibility of some – at least relatively – free theoretical debate on international trade theory and policy. When the regime set itself a clear objective, like the reduction of trade to begin with, and then autarky, the scope for free discussion narrowed to the point of eventually closing. In this context, refusing to support the regime’s choices in economic policy meant resigning oneself to becoming an outcast. A situation offering one more tessera in the complex mosaic of relations between science and politics in authoritarian regimes.

Civil–military relations in contemporary Spain can be traced back to the Civil War period. After three years of bloody fratricide war the victory of the insurgent forces saw the Spanish Republic turned into an authoritarian regime (totalitarian at the beginning) with General Franco at its head. Franco's dictatorship was not a military dictatorship, but rather the dictatorship of a military officer who developed a three-pillar power base upon which he felt secure and whose three sides – the armed forces, the Church and the single fascist party FET-JONS – offered him complete control over society. During the almost 40 years that the authoritarian regime lasted, millions of Spanish men spent part of their lives as conscripts to military service under the orders of predominantly fascist officers and subject to the rule of an oppressive political power. It is not surprising, therefore, that in Spain the armed forces are regarded as one of the pillars of an authoritarian regime rather than, as is the case in other European countries, as those brave troops who defended democracy against fascism during the Second World War. Civil–military relations in Spain are therefore difficult, and to this day they bear the marks of dictatorship – this despite the fact that since the first governments of the democratic period attempts have been made to improve them.

This symposium analyses the mutually constitutive relationship between economic knowledge and political order. Through a wide range of case studies from Europe, Africa, and Latin America, the essays collected shed new light on the choices and constraints faced by economists under authoritarian rule in the twentieth century. The contribution of the symposium is twofold. Firstly, it expands the geographical and chronological scope of the conversation on the politics of economics. Secondly, it encourages a more nuanced understanding of economists’ agency in their different guises as educators, party propagandists, policy-makers, model-builders, and dissidents.

The trajectory of François Perroux across the Vichy regime poses about all possible range of methodological issues to the historian of ideas: individual versus collective biography, ideational versus ideological reading, internal versus external analysis, etc. The chapter outlines key elements about Perroux’s trajectory showing the entanglements and boundaries of science and politics in the transition from democratic to authoritarian rule and vice versa. A particular emphasis on uncertainties and adjustments shows, against the tendency to a teleological explanation induced by a linear interpretation of his career, that different paths were considered by Perroux, but that his choices were nevertheless constrained by the forces of both the scientific and political fields.