Mercantilism refers to an “economic theory and practice common in Europe from the 16th to the 18th century that promoted governmental regulation of a nation’s economy for the purpose of augmenting state power at the expense of rival national powers”. As a policy, it was developed in Western Europe between the Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution and holds that states should increase their exports and decrease their imports. It was closely related to the evolution of the state-system of Europe insofar as it advanced a state-centered structure of international relations.