"The Rationality of Economic Nationalism" With Ian Fletcher

Join PALLADIUM Magazine in San Francisco to hear a lecture by Ian Fletcher, author of "The Economic Foundations of Industrial Policy." The article was featured in our print edition PALLADIUM 02: Industrial Civilization.

Economic nationalism is back in the news in the U.S., in Canada, in China, and elsewhere. But it is usually regarded as merely the clash of self-interest between nation states. And for the entire neoliberal era, it has had no credibility as sound policy. Intellectually respectable economics has pointed the other way, to the idea that national borders were just arbitrary lines on a map, even to the idea that the nation state was deservedly doomed by the forces of globalization.

This position poses many political and even ethical issues. Yet perhaps the most fundamental issue is an economic one: That the nation can be understood as a functional, operational economic entity, and nationhood is a significant part of how successful economies work. Because while the free market explains a lot of what happens and how to optimize it, a successful market economy massively depends on non-market dynamics. First, it depends on flows of value that are not directly monetizable. Second, it depends on emergent properties of the economic system that are not reducible to the actions of individual players.

These dynamics can be implemented by nonprofit organizations or even by sustained cultural practices. But only the state can optimize them systematically, above all because only it can allocate their costs and pay for these costs by recouping the benefits at the level of the entire economy. And nationhood is the only source of legitimate state authority. This makes nationhood an intrinsic part of the most successful economies, a fact with vast implications.

Ian Fletcher is the author of Free Trade Doesn’t Work and the coauthor of Industrial Policy for the United States. He is a member of the Advisory Board of the Coalition for a Prosperous America and has been a research fellow at the U.S. Business and Industry Council, an economist in private practice, and an IT consultant. He was educated at Columbia University and the University of Chicago, and lives in San Francisco.

Dress code: Formal. Jackets required for men. Equivalent for women.

Arrive at 7:00 pm. Lecture begins at 7:30 pm. Doors lock at 8:00 pm.

​A reception with drinks and refreshments will follow the talk. This is a ticketed event, those without tickets or violation of the dress code will be turned away.

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