The Geneva School and its Ordoglobalists

by Stefan Kolev

Four cities are usually considered the birthplaces of neoliberalism: Vienna, London, Chicago, and Freiburg. In his new book, “Globalists. The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism” (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 2018, 393 pages), historian Quinn Slobodian points out that an important place is missing in this series: Geneva. The Genevan melting pot of neoliberal ideas in the immediate vicinity of major international institutions was formative in the various attempts to establish an order for the global economy over the past nine decades.