ABSTRACT
Contrary to Margaret Thatcher’s well-known slogan that ‘there is no alternative’ to a radical market liberalism, not all liberal theories support the simplistic idea that the ‘government is the problem’. A core example is ordoliberalism. The aim of this chapter is to engage with the defining features of ordoliberal theory 1 and distinguish it from other varieties of liberalism. By comparing ordoliberalism to other varieties of liberal theory we also show that it is not an isolated theory that mattered only in Germany from the 1930s to the 1960s but that it is closely related to other liberal and institutional concepts.
