THE REBOUND OF MERCANTILISM AND GLOBALIZATION DEFICIT IN THE CONTEMPORARY POLITICS OF INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC RELATIONS

Abstract

The global economic system has traversed mercantilism through liberalism to the globalization of the international system. However, this paper observed centripetal and centrifugal forces towards globalization. The objective of the study to unravel the nuances and intricacies tend to sustain the inherent trappings of mercantilism militate against the socio-political and economic projections of globalization in the world. Our data were garnered from secondary source, through Documentary Method of data collection and were analyzed with Content Analysis. Theoretically, we adopted Games Theory as a fulcrum around which this study revolved. The theory maintained among other propositions that the actions of the actors (states) in the international arena are fundamentally determined by the calculated payoffs. Decipherable from the study is that in spite of the projections of lofty principles and packages of globalization to the state actors, mercantilism holds sway because the players (state) in the international arena believed that for the economy to grow, there will be some influence or meddlesomeness of the state, therefore, they adopted different types of protectionism to enhance payoff which is at variance with the stipulations of globalization. However, we suggested among others that the states should moderate the classical mercantilism which is more antagonistic and destructive to have benign mercantilism by adopting constructive protectionist principles.