ABSTRACT
The countries in whose early economic development foreign trade played a most obvious role were England and Japan. When English wool proved to be better or cheaper than that which was produced elsewhere a kind of ‘geographical’ specialization began to develop which led to a new process of social and economic integration. Towns were drawn together with their rural hinterland and with other towns with similar trading interests. Power that could be gained by an ‘increase of population, the protection of agriculture and industry, the economy of low wages, a favorable balance of trade, the development of colonial systems, the accumulation of capital with the resulting low rate of interest and a reform of the revenue system.’ So, mercantilism was the expression and legitimization of the practice and ideology that stimulated the accumulation and concentration of wealth which preceded and accompanied Englands’ early economic growth.
