The ‘First Post-war’: Elite Networks in a Time of Crisis (1924–1933)

The Chapter reveals the existence of a well-developed neoliberal network during the late 1920s, centred around Alexander Rüstow in Berlin and intricately engaged in political affairs. The first part of the chapter will focus on some of the turning points in the lives of this cohort of scholars—the first-generation neoliberals—and the early-twentieth century intellectual currents that made an impression on them. The second part will take a closer look at the various academic but also—and especially—political endeavours pursued during the Weimar Republic. This aspect has been sidelined by scholarship thus far but deserves as much attention, as neoliberals’ efforts as scholars and intellectuals. Outlining the interwar activities also shows that cooperation already extended beyond the German borders and included such scholars as Friedrich Hayek, Fritz Machlup(-Wolf) and Ludwig Mises. Chapter two thus shows that the 1920s and early 1930s were already a time of direct neoliberal activism with the basic strategy and resources of a liberal think tank already in place. German neoliberalism, the chapter shows, has to be taken seriously as a political project that started during the interwar years and that was successfully revived after the end of World War Two.