About the lecture
Gerhard’s PhD focused on the introduction of the norm of shareholder value in the company laws of European countries during the 1980s and 1990s. His recent research focuses on the return of the state as an interventionist – at times, authoritarian – economic actor. These two trends are often seen as opposites: the former a process of liberalisation of state coordinated economies; the latter, a backlash against globalisation.
So, during the past decades, are we simply witnessing a return to more state-led economies and hence a healthy correction to excessive neo-liberalisation and the emergence of authoritarian liberalism?
In his lecture, Gerhard will draw on his research to argue that – rather than a swing of the Polanyian pendulum – dis-embedding capitalism and the illiberal backlash constitute a dialectic movement that poses a fundamental challenge to the modern liberal order by increasing the risk of political entrepreneurs capturing the state for their private benefit rather than the public good.
Therefore, the return of the state may not be a return to a relatively benign post-war welfare state, but rather a return to a pre-modern form of personalised power used for private benefit. He will close his lecture by drawing lessons for the future of democracy as well as public outreach events.