Developing A Critical Approach Towards Contrasting Protectionist and Free-Trade Paradigms

Abstract

This paper utilizes critical theory to interrogate the normative ontological and epistemological assumptions undergirding free-trade and protectionist paradigms, the two dominant paradigms within Western economic orthodoxy. In comparing both paradigms, this paper argues that protectionism better aligns with critical economics' agenda of remaining responsive and aware of theory’s undergirded, normative assumptions. This argument is inductively corroborated using the empirics of the 1994 EZLN uprising. Ultimately, given a binary between free-trade and protectionist paradigms, as per Western economic orthodoxy, critical economists should advocate for protectionist measures as they better align with their political project.