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>Protectionism is a valid strategy to help boost domestic economic development and it's fairly arrogant and imperialistic to assert that we as fully developed f

>Protectionism is a valid strategy to help boost domestic economic development and it's fairly arrogant and imperialistic to assert that we as fully developed foreigners have any right to exploit markets in less developed areas. Any time there is a tariff, it's essentially being practiced. What you are putting forward is essentially a rhetorically-colored version of this argument: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infant_industry_argument https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infant_industry_argument . It was dubious at best when it was first proposed and it's more dubious still now.

RodericDay 10y ago
How is it dubious exactly? I just wrapped up Hamilton's biography and lengthy parts of it are devoted to Alexander Hamilton practising the "Infant industry argument" on America itself. > On March 24, 1791, the U.S. government granted patents for Parkinson's flax mill, even though he had admitted that they were "improvements upon the mill or machinery ... in Great Britain". Clearly, the U.S. government condoned something that, in modern phraseology, could be termed industrial espionage. > "The extreme embarrasments of the United States during the late war, from an incapacity of supplying themselves, are still matter of keen recollection" > His opponents cited abundant land and deficient capital and labor as reasons that America should remain a rural democracy.
- ocb 10y ago
  So? That's just an appeal to (200 year old) authority.
  - smallnamespace 10y ago
    Well, given that economics doesn't amend itself to double-blind experimental verification, what sort of evidence would you even expect to find? Keep in mind that economists tend to focus on problems that their own societies face -- if protectionism was only really useful to small, underdeveloped economies, you wouldn't really expect mainstream US or European economists to get a lot of funding to look into it, would you? Note that this is an idea that has been tried under many guises with different names and details: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Import_substitution_industrialization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Import_substitution_industrial... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prebisch%E2%80%93Singer_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prebisch%E2%80%93Singer_hypoth... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercantilism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercantilism Maybe the real answer is that whether these efforts are beneficial for their countries depends on the context, and that sweeping generalizations aren't helpful?
ethbro 10y ago
The Wikipedia article seems largely sourced from a South Korean economist, "Many countries have successfully industrialized behind tariff barriers. [...] Despite this, infant industry protection is controversial as a policy recommendation." I'd call that mixed opinion. PS: Side note, apparent "post-autistic economics" is a label that people self applied? Not sure on the branding on that one (they've since changed) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-autistic_economics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-autistic_economics
dredmorbius 10y ago
The idea of nurturing a nascent industrial base has been active for much of the past 200 years. It also breaks down on highly predictable lines: Economically dominant nations are in favour of free trade. England / the UK in the 19th century. The United States since the 1950s. Economically less-developed or backwards nations tend to oppose it, or at least, unrestricted free trade. The United States through much of the 19th century. The UK from about 1919 through the 1970s. Ha-Joon Chang has been one of the louder voices for this recently, but his own scholarship points to many earlier instances. Friedrich List (mentioned in your article) wrote a book on the topic (The National System of Political Economy), available at the Internet Archive. Among List's American publishers was J.B. Lippencott, who among other works also printed the authorised version of Chamber's Encyclopaedia. As I've just noted in another comment, there's a particularly illuminating bit of editorial umbrage expressed by the British publishers (Chambers) of some apparently unauthorised rewriting of select articles within the American edition: https://archive.org/stream/chambersencyclo00unkngoog#page/n13/mode/1up https://archive.org/stream/chambersencyclo00unkngoog#page/n1... In the interests of literature, and in defence of their rights as authors, Messrs Chambers have to make the following Satement regarding an American edition of their Encyclopaedia: After a time, the American publishers began to make extensive alterations to the articles, a thing which had not been contemplated in the agreement. ...[I]t is a serious matter when, in a re-issue of a work, statements and opinions are introduced which are repudiated and hateful to the original proprietors... The first "hateful" example was the article on free trade. British: "This term, when used so late as twenty years ago, expressed a diputed proposition, and was the badge of a political party; it now expresses the most important and fundamental truth in political economy..." American: "a dogma of modern growth, industriously taught by British manufacturers and their commercial agents...." Also covered, "Protection -- Protection Duty" (tariffs), rather predictably "Slavery", and containing "a slanderous imputation concerning His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, which we should be ashamed to copy" among other offenses, an article on Elizabeth I. I find this interesting on multiple grounds, both in the debates over economics, and in light of claims that Wikipedia's highly visible edit wars are somehow anomolous. I've long maintained they're not by virtue of existence but rather visibility, and feel rather vindicated by this evidence.

RodericDay 10y ago

How is it dubious exactly? I just wrapped up Hamilton's biography and lengthy parts of it are devoted to Alexander Hamilton practising the "Infant industry argument" on America itself. > On March 24, 1791, the U.S. government granted patents for Parkinson's flax mill, even though he had admitted that they were "improvements upon the mill or machinery ... in Great Britain". Clearly, the U.S. government condoned something that, in modern phraseology, could be termed industrial espionage. > "The extreme embarrasments of the United States during the late war, from an incapacity of supplying themselves, are still matter of keen recollection" > His opponents cited abundant land and deficient capital and labor as reasons that America should remain a rural democracy.

ocb 10y ago
So? That's just an appeal to (200 year old) authority.
- smallnamespace 10y ago
  Well, given that economics doesn't amend itself to double-blind experimental verification, what sort of evidence would you even expect to find? Keep in mind that economists tend to focus on problems that their own societies face -- if protectionism was only really useful to small, underdeveloped economies, you wouldn't really expect mainstream US or European economists to get a lot of funding to look into it, would you? Note that this is an idea that has been tried under many guises with different names and details: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Import_substitution_industrialization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Import_substitution_industrial... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prebisch%E2%80%93Singer_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prebisch%E2%80%93Singer_hypoth... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercantilism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercantilism Maybe the real answer is that whether these efforts are beneficial for their countries depends on the context, and that sweeping generalizations aren't helpful?

ethbro 10y ago

The Wikipedia article seems largely sourced from a South Korean economist, "Many countries have successfully industrialized behind tariff barriers. [...] Despite this, infant industry protection is controversial as a policy recommendation." I'd call that mixed opinion. PS: Side note, apparent "post-autistic economics" is a label that people self applied? Not sure on the branding on that one (they've since changed) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-autistic_economics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-autistic_economics

dredmorbius 10y ago

The idea of nurturing a nascent industrial base has been active for much of the past 200 years. It also breaks down on highly predictable lines: Economically dominant nations are in favour of free trade. England / the UK in the 19th century. The United States since the 1950s. Economically less-developed or backwards nations tend to oppose it, or at least, unrestricted free trade. The United States through much of the 19th century. The UK from about 1919 through the 1970s. Ha-Joon Chang has been one of the louder voices for this recently, but his own scholarship points to many earlier instances. Friedrich List (mentioned in your article) wrote a book on the topic (The National System of Political Economy), available at the Internet Archive. Among List's American publishers was J.B. Lippencott, who among other works also printed the authorised version of Chamber's Encyclopaedia. As I've just noted in another comment, there's a particularly illuminating bit of editorial umbrage expressed by the British publishers (Chambers) of some apparently unauthorised rewriting of select articles within the American edition: https://archive.org/stream/chambersencyclo00unkngoog#page/n13/mode/1up https://archive.org/stream/chambersencyclo00unkngoog#page/n1... In the interests of literature, and in defence of their rights as authors, Messrs Chambers have to make the following Satement regarding an American edition of their Encyclopaedia: After a time, the American publishers began to make extensive alterations to the articles, a thing which had not been contemplated in the agreement. ...[I]t is a serious matter when, in a re-issue of a work, statements and opinions are introduced which are repudiated and hateful to the original proprietors... The first "hateful" example was the article on free trade. British: "This term, when used so late as twenty years ago, expressed a diputed proposition, and was the badge of a political party; it now expresses the most important and fundamental truth in political economy..." American: "a dogma of modern growth, industriously taught by British manufacturers and their commercial agents...." Also covered, "Protection -- Protection Duty" (tariffs), rather predictably "Slavery", and containing "a slanderous imputation concerning His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, which we should be ashamed to copy" among other offenses, an article on Elizabeth I. I find this interesting on multiple grounds, both in the debates over economics, and in light of claims that Wikipedia's highly visible edit wars are somehow anomolous. I've long maintained they're not by virtue of existence but rather visibility, and feel rather vindicated by this evidence.