ORDO Liberalism and the Social Market Economy

Abstract

Is economic analysis sensitive to the theological predispositions of its practitioners? I have chosen to approach this question posed by the editors by sampling some of the scholarship on economic policy associated with ORDO liberalism and its conceptualization of a social market economy. If there is a Chicago school of economics, as many have claimed, ORDO liberalism could well be called the Freiburg school. It emerged in the 1930s under the influence of economist Walter Eucken and lawyer Franz Bohm. Indeed, Hollerbach (1988, p. 84) declares that “the cooperation in research and teaching between lawyers and economists at the University of Freiburg during the third and fourth decades of this century provides the foundation of what is called the Freiburg School.” Those associated with the school were generally strong opponents of national socialism; they developed a distinctive approach to economic analysis and its place within the humane studies, and Eucken and Bohm founded the Yearbook ORDO in 1948. Just as people associated with the Chicago school might be found in many locations, so, too, would those associated with the Freiburg school of ORDO liberalism.