ABSTRACT
Protection implies a global waste of resources, since they are not used in the most efficient way. Protectionism is the set of public means of coercion to prohibit or to limit the purchase of goods abroad by the residents of a country or to increase their price. Producers in the concerned country are protected against competition from foreign producers. Protectionism necessarily implies a less good use of productive resources. As protectionism aims at bringing relative prices in international exchange closer to domestic relative prices in isolation, it makes international exchange less desirable. Protectionism does not reduce only imports; it simultaneously reduces exports. If a small country had to meet by itself all the needs of its inhabitants, it would necessarily do it in a very inefficient way. This is why the protectionist policies adopted by most of the less developed countries - which are small countries from an economic point of view - are particularly harmful.
