He’s right, the economy is sick – and businesses like Trump’s are part of the disease | Mariana Mazzucato

Protectionism and infrastructure projects aren't the cure for a system built on asset stripping, minimal job security and low pay

" Become a Guardian supporter or make a contribution

Trump won because he unashamedly stood as the champion of the dispossessed. More than the 16 Republican rivals he left in his wake, and more than the Democratic party standard-bearer he defeated, he led the cry of those who felt they had been left behind by globalisation. He channelled and inflamed inchoate anger, inflamed racial divisions and exploited a sense of burning injustice at a system "rigged" against the little guy. He was the self-styled winner who knew how to play the system, the strong man who alone could fix it.

To Trump, as to the Brexiteers, the enemy was the outsider: the Mexicans, the Chinese (the biggest "theft" in human history), Muslims, even Nato allies. His economic and security messages melded together: it was time to circle the wagons, to put America and Americans first. Trump won because he offered what seemed to the ears of many a plausible narrative about the failures of US economic policy that left so many behind- failures stretching back three decades before the collapse of the economy in 2008.

Related: My journeys in Trumpland