The Making of the German Post-War Economy: Political Communication and Public Reception of the Social Market Economy after World War II

In 1948, the journalist and economist Marion Countess Dönhoff remarked about Ludwig Erhard's concept of a so-called ‘Social Market Economy’, which he had introduced in April that year: If Germany was not ruined yet, this man with his absurd plan to abandon all rationing will manage to do so. May God prevent him becoming Minister for Economic Affairs. After Hitler, and the fragmentation of Germany, this would be a third catastrophe! Other members of the press, even those who had previously supported the policy of the future first Minister for Economic Affairs of the Federal Republic, had strong doubts about Erhard's intention to abandon rationing and about market economic measures in general. Given the fact that Germany, since the unconditional surrender of the Third Reich in May 1945, had been in shambles both economically and morally, this hesitation was understandable. After the defeat of Nazi Germany, life in occupied Germany was dominated by a sense of stupor and by an instinctive search for a direction. As Christian L. Glossner notes in his stimulating The Making of the German Post-war Economy, the war had changed everything and a return of the pre-1933 period was out of the question, including the former capitalist system. In Glossner's words: As the latter was associated with the great depression … the waste of unemployment, the inequalities, injustices, inefficiencies and the discredited politics of the interwar years, governmental planning and the enhanced role of the state in social and economic affairs became the political religion in postwar Germany in 1945. (p. 117)