The Curse of Bigness

Today, economic grievances are again giving way to angry, populist and nationalist answers around the world. People are blaming their economic woes on immigrants, Jews, Muslims, Christians, the Chinese, or whomever, giving rise to a new generation of xenophobic, nationalist and racist politics. We have witnessed a return to the politics of outrage and violence, stoked by the humiliation of being poorer than one’s own parents, and by the real prospect of falling through the cracks. We may be just one hard economic crash away from the end of democracy as we’ve known it.

Understanding the role of the state may help clarify Ordoliberalism. If believers in laissez-faire wanted the state to get out of the way, and if socialists and fascists believed in state-commanded economy, the Ordoliberals were among the first to call for a ‘third way’. They wanted a state that was strong enough to break private power, but not so strong as to take over society. They wanted the state to guarantee certain economic securities, but to leave the provisioning of most goods to the market process. In their work, the Ordoliberals often compared the ideal state to a good gardener, who, by cutting back on overgrowth, created the conditions for prosperity and human thriving.

There are real risks implicit in a governmental embrace of firms like Facebook, Apple and Google that should not be ignored. Take Facebook and Google together. These two firms hold more private information about the world’s population than any other entities on earth. They also, collectively, have an apparent power to influence elections; perhaps not to decide them, but enough to swing a close vote. Should that power come into the hands of an entity determined to stay in office forever, the consequences could be truly alarming. It may begin, innocuously enough, with the idea that tech is doing its national duty as it aids the state. But it is apparent, based on the history of monopoly in the last century, that this is indeed the road to serfdom.