The nineteenth century
After the coup d’etat of Gustav III in 1772, there was a standstill in the public discussion on economic matters, mainly as an effect of wars, pestilences, famines, the assassination of Gustav III in 1792, the dethroning of his son Gustav IV from power in 1809 and eventually the loss of Finland the same year.
Berch's increasingly dated textbook from 1747 continued to be read to Uppsala students, and was only replaced in 1829 by Professor Lars Georg Rabenius' Larobok i National—ekonomien. His book was an eclectic mixture of teachings from classical political economy (particularly Say) and contemporary German cameralism. While naming the subject ‘National Economy' from the German Nationalokonomi (still a term used in Sweden), he identified three different ‘economic systems', the mercantile, agricultural and industrial system. The first two of them had been surpassed by history, he thought. The third one, the ‘industrial' system, he connected with Adam Smith. According to Rabenius the base of this system was not individual liberty or the benefits of the invisible hand, but an insistence upon industry as the major generator of wealth. To support industry was thus a main task for the state and government.This dominance of German Nationalokonomi mixed up with a little Say was not shaken until the middle of the nineteenth century. The main translator of Say's economics for a Swedish economic audience was the Professor of ‘Economics and Botany' from 1812 to 1834, Carl Adolph Agardh in Lund. During the semester of 1821—2, he followed Say's lectures in Paris, and in his Granskning af Statseconomiens Grundlaror (1829) he says that he adheres to Smith's views — but only to a certain degree. His caution lay in that Smith gives a much too passive role in economic matters for the state. Practical men and politicians have already abandoned this ‘utopianism'.
Moreover, Smith put too much emphasis on the role of labour for economic wealth and neglected the role of natural resources. In Sweden during the nineteenth century both Ricardo and Malthus were looked upon with suspicion. Their gloomy predictions concerning a declining marginal rate of rent on land and population increase were regarded as not adaptable (like with the USA) to a country with a small population and ample natural resources.Perhaps not surprisingly the impetus for change came from outside academia. The liberal reform era of dismantling the old dirigiste economy started in the 1840s and included an abolition of guilds and freedom of enterprise. In the public discussion many of the old truths were questioned, but there is no evidence that they were particularly based upon economic theories (although the finance minister J.A. Gripenstedt had read Cobden and some French ‘harmony' economists). The first academic writer of a more principal laissez-faire stance was G.K. Hamilton, who held a chair in National Economy and Administrative Law in Uppsala. In his Om Politiska Ekonomins Utveckling och Begrepp (1858) he seems clearly inspired by Frederic Bastiat.
Another important importeur of French laissez-faire economics was Wolter Arnberg, a reader in national economy in Uppsala with his small booklet, Om Arbetets och Bytets Frihet (1864). Moreover, with the establishment of Nationalekonomiska foreningen in 1877 — with its mixture of academic economists and businessmen — the ground was laid for a more liberal economic discourse. However, there was a twist to Arnberg and the others' liberalism. De-regulation should not be carried too far, they argued. The visible hand of the state should help to introduce good regulations in order to promote economic growth. They proposed pragmatic liberalism, and one of the most vocal followers of Bastiat in Sweden, the finance minister Gripenstedt, did not hesitate to create a state-owned railway system in Sweden, as well as to save private banks from defaulting with public means.