Foreign trade policy and its role in the economic growth of the national economy are considered through the prism of history and comparison of the formation of the industrial economy in the Russian Empire and the North American United States. The author compares the protectionism of D. I. Mendeleev, described in his economic works, and the free trade thinking of the American scholar W. Sumner, who formulated the “misconceptions” of protectionism. Mendeleev’s proper protectionism is grounded on the basic principles (incentivizing internal competition, growth of consumption, bringing up of new industries ), which are relevant for contemporary Russia. The author gives a typical example of the formation and decline of the factory industry using the case of mirror factories in the Ryazan province. These historical analogies, the paper argues, are necessary for the correct assessment of the current situation and for coming up with valid solutions aimed at the development of the Russian economy.
