Power

Wealth and Power: Mercantilism and Economic Nationalism

As we know there are a lot of theoretical perspectives but Mercantilism is one of the most important because it is based in the security ofthe state and the problems caused by the market in terms of security. We are a world that is in constant movement and this is why mercantilism has changed over the years.

Mercantilism could bedefined in a lot of forms; it depends of the point of view of everybody. Although in terms of International Political Economy is a theoretical perspective that puts security at the center of nationalconcerns. Everybody could relation the term mercantilism with a lot of ideas for example mercantilism is associated with realism because for both nation-state is the principal factor in theinternational system but there is tension between both terms because each one has different purpose. As this example there are a lot but mercantilism doesn’t lose the essence of security.

After read thechapter two, I understood that Mercantilism has three sides: history, philosophy and state policy. The period of history has relation with the idea of state building and the intervention in the economy forthe sake of the security on the nation-state. The political philosophy is very important because it arose during the period and from it derives the state policy.

As I mention in the first paragraphevery thing changes over the years and mercantilism has changed, the early form is known as: classical mercantilism, which is focused on maintaining wealth by promoting exports and discouragingimports. After this kind of mercantilism, new states adopt the objective to increase wealth and military power, implementing new forms to protect the market and the principal was the protectionism. Butmercantilism not just change it also adopted new conditions derived from economic and political environment and one example of that is the development of economic nationalism.

With this change,...