Nation Building

A detailed Summary of Nation Building


Between 1400 and 1800 most of the states of Western Europe were heavily influenced by an "economic" policy known as mercantilism. No general definition of mercantilism is entirely satisfactory, but for the purposes of this paper it is thought of as a collection of policies designed to keep the state prosperous by economic regulation. Secondly, it was a series of economic controls intended to strengthen the military and colonies of a country, against other antagonistic empires. These two principles of mercantilism are interconnected, and they give an accurate view of the common attitude that shaped this time period. This concept has been coined as "nation building."

Before this time period commerce was literally viewed as a sin. There was no moral/ethical allowance for merchants to make any profit from trade. This was reflected by the Church's control over economic dealings. But the decline of the medieval feudal economy gave rise to nation-states, bringing forth a revolution in commercial activity. This revolution sparked new thinking in wealth accumulation. Instead of viewing money as a mortal sin, it was now seen as the ma


With the rise of the nation-state, there was awareness that the central government could become more powerful if they could accumulate more wealth through trade. The driving force behind virtually all trade was the merchant. Merchants slowly adopted a doctrine called the "balance of trade theory", which says that the source of wealth comes from selling more than one bought, especially in regards to other nations. Therefore, international trade was passionately pursued, to enhance the accumulation of wealth. As the economist Thomas Mun suggested, the domestic consumption of imports should be reduced while exports and re-exports should be increased. Domestic industries would then have to be encouraged to rework imported raw materials into finished goods to be exported. This reworking of foreign raw materials and their resale was another aspect of the cycle of trade. This brought merchants to fully understand their dependency on the government for policies surrounding import tariffs and export incentives. (Davies pp. 523-525) They needed the government to intervene to help reduce foreign imports of finished goods and in turn ass

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Approximate Word count = 767
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: History

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