The ordoliberalisation of the European Union?

ABSTRACT

For the first time, this paper investigates the influence of ordoliberalism (OL) at both the ideational and regulative levels of European integration processes regarding agricultural policy (i.e. CAP), competition policy, and economic and monetary policy (i.e. EMU) in comparison. The analytical key is an operationalisation of OL into five elements. The paper generally confirms the hypotheses proposed that OL was and remains an ideational influence of some importance, without exaggerating this influence, for European integration processes, both at the constitutive level as well as – but less so – at the practical level. However, there are differences in the degree of influence across the various policy areas. The influence is weakest in CAP and strongest in competition policy, but only since the Internal Market was proposed in the mid-1980s.

KEYWORDS:

• Ordoliberalism
• European Union
• CAP
• competition policy
• EMU

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the editor and two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on earlier versions of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. This is a translation of the key concept of ordoliberalism, namely Ordnungspolitik. The literal translation would be ‘politics of ordering’; however, this sounds too authoritarian in many English-speaking ears compared to what is meant by the concept. Therefore, ‘politics by rules’ is better in that it gets closer to the meaning of the Ordnungspolitik concept.

2. See Bonefeld (2017) for an analysis hereof.

3. This section draws on Nedergaard (2013).

4. These two articles are traditionally the ones that are claimed to be the most directly ordoliberal (Fejø 2009).

5. This section draws on Nedergaard (2013).

6. EcoFin is the Council of Ministers for Economics and Finance Ministers of the EU.