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In a sense, the new protectionism is not protectionism at all, at least not in the traditional sense of the term. The old protectionism referred only to traderestricting and tradeexpanding devices, such as the tariff or export subsidy. The new protectionism is much broader than this; it includes interventions into foreign trade but is not limited to them. 1.The new protectionism, in fact, refers to how the whole of government intervention into the private economy affects international trade. The emphasis on trade is still there, thus came the term“protection”. But what is new is the realization that virtually all government activities can affect international economic relations.
2.The emergence of the new protectionism in the Western world reflects the victory of the interventionist, or welfare economy over the market economy. Jab Tumiler writes,“The old protectionism...coexisted, without any apparent intellectual difficulty with the acceptable of the market as a national as well as an international economic distribution mechanismindeed, protectionists as well as ( if only not more than) free traders stood for laissez-faire (放任政策). 3.Now, as in the 1930’s, protectionism is an expression of a profound skepticism as to the ability of the market to distribute resources and incomes to societies’ satisfaction.”
It is precisely this profound skepticism of the market economy that is responsible for the protectionism. In a market economy, economic change of various colors implies redistribution of resources and incomes. The same opinion in many communities apparently is that such redistributions often are not proper. Therefore, the government intervenes to bring about a more desired result.
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