Pressures conceivably could have emerged to strengthen mercantilistic regulations in response to the stresses created by competition and to the all-too-evident ills of industrialization. *** Smith was the first in a line of political economists whom we now identify as the classical school. Foremost of his followers was David Ricardo, a stockbroker, parliamentarian, and skilled essayist.
Among the most important criteria for judging the effectiveness of communications and transparency, then, is whether or not they impede making the best possible policy decisions. Transparency should not be allowed to inhibit the free give and take and the testing of ideas at meetings that are so important to reaching good decisions.