The French liberal school, also called the optimist school or the orthodox school, is a 19th-century school of economic thought that was centered on the French: [[Collège de France]]|italic=unset and the French: [[Institut de France]]|italic=unset. The French: [[Journal des Économistes]] was instrumental in promulgating the ideas of the school. Key thinkers include Frédéric Bastiat, Jean-Baptiste Say, Antoine Destutt de Tracy, Julien Freund, Pierre Manent and Gustave de Molinari.
The school voraciously defended free trade and French: [[laissez-faire]]. They were primary opponents of interventionist and protectionist ideas. This made the French school a forerunner of the modern Austrian school.[1]