The Rise and Fall of the ‘World Economy’ in Weimar Germany

Abstract

Recent studies have emphasized the role of international institutions in the emergence of a transnational culture of economic experts in the interwar period. According to this view, collaboration over the difficulties of international trade in goods and finance was driven by a common language of problem diagnosis and solution finding. This interpretation has pushed the relevance of the domestic context for ‘agents of the international’ into the background. The World Economic Conference in Geneva organized by the League of Nations in 1927 shows that Weimar business representatives saw their participation as an opportunity to improve their position in their national federations and vis-à-vis the Reich government. Therefore, on the one hand, they sought to be appointed by state authorities to participate in the Geneva discussions. On the other hand, they stressed the relevance of the World Economy as well as their competence in solving world economic problems. As a consequence, immediately before and after the meeting in Geneva, the World Economy was a prominent topic among Weimar’s business representatives. However, this strategy counted on the implementation of the conference’s economic policy proposals by national governments. As it became apparent that the Geneva recommendations would not have lasting impact, interest in the World Economy waned and its spokesmen turned to other forms of international cooperation, in particular regional customs alliances and cartel agreements. The rise and fall of the topic of the World Economy among German business representatives cannot be understood independently of its interaction with the domestic context of Weimar Germany.