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2021 | OriginalPaper | Chapter

10. Ordoliberalism and the Rethinking of Liberal Rationality

Author : Timo Miettinen

Published in: Political Economy and International Order in Interwar Europe

Publisher: Springer International Publishing

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Abstract

Ordoliberalism is often referred to as the German version of neoliberalism and the dominant economic ideology behind the European economic constitution. Following the German experience of the interwar period, ordoliberal theory is best known for its emphasis on state and rule-based coordination for a functioning market economy. This article deals with the intellectual genealogy of ordoliberalism. It challenges conventional interpretations that frame ordoliberalism as a reaction to historical events, political ideologies, or competing economic theories. Instead of a political or economic doctrine, the project examines ordoliberalism as a philosophical and moral program that formulated itself in opposition to classical liberalism.

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previous chapter Pluralism and Political Economy in Interwar Britain: G. D. H. Cole on Economic Planning
next chapter Classical Liberalism, Non-interventionism and the Origins of European Integration: Luigi Einaudi, Friedrich A. von Hayek, Wilhelm Röpke
Footnotes
1
In the context of the EMU, the influence of ordoliberalism is present in at least three central components: (i) The Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) that focuses on fiscal discipline; (ii) the rejection of joint liability in the Treaties (e.g., Art. 123 & 125 TFEU); and (iii) the mandate of the European Central Bank that focuses on price stability. See also Biebricher (2013) and Ryner (2015).
 
2
In more popular debates, ordoliberalism is often scorned for being “wacky economics” (Financial Times 16.11.2014) that is slowly “decoupling […] Germany from the rest of the world” (The Economist 9.5.2015). For a critical analysis on the recent emphasis on ordoliberalism, see Hien (2013), Hien and Joerges (2018), Wegmann (2000).
 
3
For an extensive comparison between ordoliberals and the Austrian School, see Kolev (2015).
 
4
See especially Eucken’s manuscript Morphologische Studien, BL 21–23, Walter-Eucken-Archiv, Jena. See also Johnson (1989).
 
5
As already Michel Foucault already noted in his Collège de France lectures on biopolitics, the ordoliberal idea of science was based on a radical critique of classical liberalism. This critique, he argued, was founded on the refutation of a particular “naturalistic naivety” (Foucault 2008, 172) of liberal thinkers on the basis of which they treated the market economy as a spontaneous order. For the ordoliberals, however, the very idea of market order was to be treated as fundamentally un-natural, as something that arises only on the basis of voluntary decisions to construct it. Science plays a key role in delineating the conditions for a functioning economic constitution.
 
6
See also Eucken’s reference to Husserl’s Philosophy as Rigorous Science in Eucken (1950, 321).
 
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Metadata
Title
Ordoliberalism and the Rethinking of Liberal Rationality
Author
Timo Miettinen
Copyright Year
2021
Book
Political Economy and International Order in Interwar Europe

Print ISBN: 978-3-030-47101-9

Electronic ISBN: 978-3-030-47102-6

Copyright Year: 2021

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-47102-6_10