The Structure of 18th Century French Society
📌 French society was divided into classes: the landowner class (clergy, nobility, king), merchants, and artisans (part of the Third Estate).
👩‍🔧 Artisans were organized into guilds, which regulated their profession, training, and even product pricing.
👨‍🌾 Farmers worked land they didn't own and were obligated to pay taxes to the king, a tithe to the pope, and rent to the landowner.

François Quesnay and the Birth of Physiocracy
👨‍⚕️ Dr. François Quesnay, a surgeon and first doctor to the king, interpreted the functioning of the social body using analogies from his studies on blood circulation.
📜 Quesnay’s most important work is the *Tableau Économique* (1758), which sought to explain economic relations between social classes based on natural laws.
🌍 Physiocrats believed that in France, wealth fundamentally resided in the field/agriculture, contrasting with England's growing industrial strength.

Physiocratic Economic Classification
🌾 Quesnay classified the farmer as belonging to the productive class because agricultural work is the only activity that creates new wealth from nature.
🚫 The artisan/manufacturer belonged to the sterile class because their activity only transforms existing wealth (agricultural products) without creating new value.
👑 The landowner belonged to the rent class, living off the surplus (rent) generated by the farmer.

Physiocratic Policy Recommendations
🗣️ Physiocrats strongly advocated for economic liberalism, opposing mercantilism's interventionist policies.
🛑 They demanded the state not intervene to modify natural laws, advocating for the complete freedom of agriculture.
💸 They proposed a single tax: the tax on land rent, as agriculture was the sole source of wealth.
📜 Key disciple Anne-Robert Jacques Turgot implemented physiocratic ideas, such as abolishing artisan guilds, and championed the phrase "Laissez faire, laissez passer" (Let it be, let it pass).

Key Contributions and Lasting Impact
🔄 A main contribution of physiocracy was viewing the economy as a whole system, unlike mercantilists who focused on isolated phenomena (like money or trade).
📊 The *Tableau Économique* graphically showed the continuous flow of exchanges between social classes, resembling a zigzag pattern.
💡 The central principle remains: Nature gives a gift to agriculture; agriculture is the only activity that produces wealth, which then circulates through society.

📸 Video summarized with SummaryTube.com on Oct 06, 2025, 22:33 UTC