Economic Nationalism is the idea that a country should treat its economy as a national project, and use state power to shape markets in the national interest rather than treating global free trade as the default - wikipedia 
# What It Looks Like in Practice
Economic nationalism usually shows up as protection and promotion of domestic capacity, using tools like tariffs, quotas, subsidies, local-content rules, public procurement preferences, and strategic investment screening - britannica.com
It often reframes trade and industry as national security issues, where resilience, supply chains, and technological leadership matter as much as prices and efficiency - sciencedirect.com
# Historical Roots
Economic nationalism has older cousins in mercantilism and “national system” thinking, where the state tries to build productive capacity and strategic independence rather than maximizing short-term consumer welfare - globalpolicyjournal.com
In the US story it is often linked to early arguments for building domestic manufacturing capacity and using the state to grow national industry, which later influenced protectionist and developmental traditions - jstor.org
# The Modern Moment In the 2010s and 2020s, economic nationalism became a common label for a shift toward trade restrictions, industrial policy, and strategic competition, especially around China, energy, semiconductors, and critical minerals.
Different administrations can pursue it with different vibes, but the underlying move is similar: accept a more interventionist state role in the economy, justified by security, jobs, and national competitiveness rather than pure market efficiency - wita.org
# Critiques and Risks
Critics warn that economic nationalism can raise prices, invite retaliation, distort incentives, and harden blocs that make cooperation harder, especially if it turns into permanent tit-for-tat escalation - britannica.com
It can also become a political style: a language of “the nation” that makes compromise look like betrayal, and makes policy debates feel like loyalty tests rather than trade-offs, which is why it often appears in the same threat-model neighborhood as Flooding the Zone - reuters.com