Yet little work has been done to establish what the networks of ordoliberalism—or, more precisely, German neoliberalism—have been since 1945 and what role they played in German economic policy. This chapter provides evidence that German neoliberal thought had a persistent and strong impact on German economic policy in the postwar period up to the financial and economic crisis policies of 2008 and after. It begins with a reflection on German neoliberalism as a central component in the common neoliberal thought collective, before introducing the category of a “performative footprint of economists” (PFP) in order to operationalize the “external,” non-academic influence of economists. It then highlights the close connections of ordoliberal economists with politics in relation to three important phases, or turning points, in German politico-economic history. The final section uses the PFP methodology to show the persistent dominance of German neoliberalism in German economic policy after World War II compared to Keynesian networks.

Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, loc. 611