The power of nations : theoretical foundations for economic nationalism

• Main Author: Nakano, Takeshi
• Published: University of Edinburgh 2004
• Subjects: 330.015195
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.659863

The aim of this work is to provide a systematic theoretical basis for economic nationalism, and to defend this as an appropriate analytical framework for political economy. In the first part of the work, the author reviews relevant literatures on economic nationalism and defines it as <i>the view that the primary aim of economic policy is establish, maintain or strengthen the power of an actual or potential nation. </i>Next, the author examines Friedrich List’s political economy and shows that his approach is cultural, historical, institutional, political, dynamic and geographical. The second part of this work examines David Hume’s political economy, philosophy of social science and political theory. The author show that Hume’s economic thought significantly shares the characteristics of List’s political economy and argues that it is best understood as economic nationalism. Although they have often been misunderstood, Hume’s ideas – institutional economics, symbolist theory of social action, interpretive approach to social science, and political conservatism – are argued to provide appropriate philosophical foundations for economic nationalism. The third part shows that key elements of economic nationalism are evident in the political and economic thought of Edmund Burke, Alexander Hamilton and G. W. F. Hegel. Under the ideological dominance of economic liberalism, economic nationalism has been regarded as economic heresy. However, a heresy in economics turns out to be an orthodoxy of the Western intellectual tradition. In the fourth part, the author constructs a general theory for economic nationalism by drawing upon Émile Durkheim’s political sociology and recent contributions to the study of nationalism and political economy, and discusses its practical implications for the contemporary world of globalisation. It is argued that economic nationalism is a preferable alternative to economic liberalism.