Modern Era
F. A. Hayek
1899–1992 · Spontaneous order
Knowledge is dispersed. Central planning is therefore presumption.
In their words
“The case for individual freedom rests chiefly on the recognition of the inevitable ignorance of all of us.”
Hayek's essay The Use of Knowledge in Society made the decisive point against central planning: the information a society needs exists nowhere in one place and can be carried only by prices. The Road to Serfdom traced how well-meaning planning ends in total control, and The Constitution of Liberty argued that liberty is a condition of discovery rather than a luxury of settled times.
Why it matters for freedom
His argument against central planning is an argument for humility: no ruler can know what free people discover.
Who they stood against
the planners who assumed they could know enough to direct a whole society