Ordnung und Vertrauen – Zentralbank und Staat in der Eurokrise

The management of the euro crisis, i.e. the ECB’s lender of last resort activities for crisis countries and crisis banks, as well as the establishment of the European Stability Mechanism and a European banking union, has been severely criticized by economists following the German ordo-liberal tradition. They argue that crisis management violates key principles of economic policy, namely the principle of liability and the principle of stable money. Accordingly, euro crisis management undermines private sector confidence in the market economy and in the currency. This article argues that this view neglects the fact that the crisis itself reflects a loss of confidence. Thus, crisis management has to restore confidence first, which can only be achieved by measures that inherently conflict with ordo-liberalism. As a result, the critique of euro crisis management is misplaced as ordo-liberal principles provide a useful guideline for economic policies only after confidence has been restored.