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Was Italy a protectionist country?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 September 2006

Giovanni Federico  and
Antonio Tena
Giovanni Federico
Affiliation:
Dipartimento di Storia Moderna e Contemporanea, Università degli studi di Pisa, Piazza Torricelli, 3/A, 56126, Pisa, Italy
Antonio Tena
Affiliation:
Departmento de Historia e Istituciones Economicas, Universidad Carlos III, c/Madrid 126, Getafe 28903, Spain
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Abstract

This paper aims at measuring as precisely as possible the changes in the level of protection in Italy from the 1870s to the 1920s – i.e. during the first phase of the country's industrialisation. It shows that, contrary to conventional wisdom, protection was quite low – with the possible exception of a short spell of time in the late 1880s–90s. Therefore the static welfare losses were small, but also the alleged dynamic role of protection in fostering industrialisation seems small as well. In the last section of the paper we speculate on the implications of these findings for other countries. This evidence is not conclusive, but it does cast some doubts on the relevance of protection in 19th century Europe.

Type
Articles
Information
European Review of Economic History , Volume 2 , Issue 1 , April 1998 , pp. 73 - 97
Copyright
Cambridge University Press 1998

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