World trade is observed through a lens of aggregate actors, usually sovereign states, protecting or liberalizing access to their technology and endowments. Unfortunately, this is not consistent with a reality where actors or organizations can exert pressure on the institutional processes of governance (Chase 2008). This is a single scope survey of modern protectionism in the context of evolving trade theories. It attempts to answer the questions: 1) Why would a government advocate protectionism? And, 2) Is it ever optimal? Research curated for Feenstra and Taylor (2012), acts as a guidepost to explore concepts related to optimal trade policies with respect to imperfect competition, infant industries and trade agreements. When addressing whether protectionism is ever optimal, it should address the question of optimal for whom? Continue Reading