Page 56 - The Making of the German Post-war Economy

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ACADEMIC CONCEPTS

BETWEEN NEO-LIBERALISM AND
NEO-SOCIALISM

Liberalism was to all intents and purposes dead in Germany.
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And it was socialism that had killed it.
(Friedrich August von Hayek, 1943)

In the aftermath of the Second World War, the socio-political and
economic reorganisation of Germany was intensely disputed by politicians
and public alike. Thus continued the debate and development of
economic models, which had their origins in opposition circles to
National Socialism, in exile, or even in the Weimar Republic. Certain
historical experiences and guiding principles characterised the discussion:
the reaction of anarchy and utopia on the one hand, and also of a past
which, though repudiated, was necessarily present and ubiquitous,
together with an uncertain future to be shaped amid immediately pressing
material needs. Furthermore, the framework for the definition of the
individual concepts was set by a common starting point and political
prerequisites: by Germany’s preoccupation with the social question since
the late nineteenth century embodied in the both anti-socialist and anti-
free-market Verein für Socialpolitik (Association for Social Policy), by the
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criticism of liberal capitalism triggered by the world economic crisis of the
early 1930s, by a pronounced anti-totalitarianism as well as anti-
collectivism formed by the experiences of the Third Reich, and, finally, by
the emphasis on human dignity and personal freedom. Whereas Marxism
and Leninism could not be debated due to guidelines issued by the Allied
military authorities, the concepts of neo-liberalism, democratic socialism,
and Catholic social doctrine provided a third way between the antagonism
of capitalism and socialism.