Somma, Alessandro --- "At the Roots of European Private Law: Social Justice, Solidarity and Conflict in the Proprietary Order" [2011] ELECD 674; in Micklitz, Hans-W. (ed), "The Many Concepts of Social Justice in European Private Law" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: The Many Concepts of Social Justice in European Private Law

Editor(s): Micklitz, Hans-W.

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781849802604

Section: Chapter 9

Section Title: At the Roots of European Private Law: Social Justice, Solidarity and Conflict in the Proprietary Order

Author(s): Somma, Alessandro

Number of pages: 27

Extract:

9. At the roots of European private law:
social justice, solidarity and conflict in
the proprietary order
Alessandro Somma


1 THE EUROPEAN UNION AS A PROPRIETARY ORDER
1.1 The Social Market Economy as an Irenic Order

The `social market economy', now indicated by the Treaty of the European
Union as its cornerstone (art. 3), has a history which, though frequently
concealed, deserves to be touched upon. The expression `social market econ-
omy' was coined in the context of the inflamed debate regarding the economic
constitution that Germany had to adopt after the fall of Nazism. Two alterna-
tive ideas were confronted: `social democracy', which favored economic plan-
ning and direct State intervention,1 and `neoliberal democracy', whereby
intervention was indirect in the sense that it meant developing the normative
framework to assure market competition.2 Even though social democracy was
met with favor by the main German political parties, neoliberal democracy
was chosen, due to the pressures from the US occupation forces and the logic
of cold war.3
The neoliberal perspective is a systemic one: economic freedoms are
fostered when they promote competition and are opposed when they hinder it.4
This view draws from ordoliberalism, developed in the Nazi era and widely
employed by the regime within the reform of economic freedoms. For this


1 Arndt, A. (1946), `Planwirtschaft', Süddeutsche Juristenzeitung, 1, 169 ff.
2 Böhm, F. (1946), `Die Bedeutung der Wirtschaftsordnung für die politische
Verfassung', Süddeutsche Juristenzeitung, 1, 141 ff.
3 See ...