Filozofska istraživanja, Vol. 38 No. 3, 2018.
Preliminary communication
https://doi.org/10.21464/fi38301
Protectionism or Free Trade. Actuality of Johann Gottlieb Fichte's Closed Commercial State
Aneli Dragojević Mijatović
orcid.org/0000-0002-0880-6135
; Sveučilište u Rijeci, Filozofski fakultet, Sveučilisna avenija 4, HR-51000 Rijeka
Abstract
Johann Gottlieb Fichte in his work The Closed Commercial State (1800) argued for economic autarky as the next reform of protectionism. German-American economist Friedrich List published The National System of Political Economy (1840) which is considered to be the “Bible of protectionism”. List was the opponent of Adam Smith's theses on the importance of free trade and international market. The advocate in a shift from open to closed economy is actual in the globalized world, which is determined by growing inequality and other social and political anomalies. Protectionism is imposed as a possible response to the discontents of globalization. The paper attempts to answer if there is a link between global capitalism and economic nationalism, and how are left and right political parties related to that possible link. Recently, in the days of political dissatisfaction, the alternative between left and right positions is replaced by the opposition between system and anti-system or protest parties. While system parties are criticized for keeping a status quo of neoliberal agenda, protest parties slide into nationalism and populism.
Keywords
protectionism; free trade; Johann Gottlieb Fichte; Georg Friedrich List; Friedrich August von Hayek; John Maynard Keynes
Hrčak ID:
214949
URI
Publication date:
13.11.2018.
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