International limits designed to protect American economic system (10)

'economic system' is the definition.
(I know that capitalism is a type of free enterprise)

'international limits designed to protect american' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'international' could be 'cap' (sportsperson who competes internationally) and 'cap' is found in the answer.
'american' could be 'a' (common abbreviation - e.g. in organisation names) and 'a' is found within the answer.
an anagram of 'limits' is 'itlism' which is within the remaining letters.
This accounts for all the letters.
This explanation may well be incorrect...

Can you help me to learn more?