From Mercantilism to Managed Prosperity: The long arc of global economic history has often pivoted on the fulcrum of trade—its expansion or constraint and the ideologies that underpin it. In the centuries preceding World War II, mercantilism dominated statecraft. Nations competed fiercely for gold, colonies, and captive markets, viewing trade as a zero-sum game. The relentless pursuit of surpluses and barriers to imports became the norm. These self-reinforcing nationalistic instincts culminated in a cascade of tariffs, economic fragmentation, and a global depression that accelerated the descent into war. It was not just economic shortsightedness but a systemic collapse of global cooperation that caused the architecture of prosperity to crumble. Protectionism, national insecurity, and imperial rivalry fermented into one of humanity’s darkest periods.

Rebuilding the Future: In the aftermath of World War II, a new consensus emerged. The United States, now the dominant global force, spearheaded the creation of institutions that would enshrine global interdependence: the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and, eventually, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), later transformed into the World Trade Organisation.

This was the era of managed prosperity—where economic liberalism was tempered with multilateral safeguards, and trade became a mechanism of peace. The post-war consensus believed that prosperity shared was prosperity secured. Tariffs fell, supply chains crossed borders, and the movement of goods, capital, and increasingly, ideas, became the new global glue.

Trade and Liberalism Ascendant: The period from the 1980s to the early 2000s marked an extraordinary flowering of global investment and trade. Liberalisation spread like a force of nature—driven by new communication technologies, logistical infrastructure, financial........

© Free Press Journal