T he current financial and economic crisis is apparently sweeping aside many established ideas of how societies should run their economies. In Germany, the crisis has ballooned into the worst recession in postwar history. By way of diagnosis, some say we are observing the end of the financial world as we know it. Not so long ago some had heralded the era of Alan Greenspan, former US Federal Reserve chairman, as the realisation of a new economic paradigm. By way of therapy, some have called for the renaissance of state-monopoly capitalism, sometimes labelled “new capitalism”. The crisis should have a cathartic impact on the financial sector but there is a risk that responses to it will overshoot.
由於當前的金融和經濟危機，許多有關經濟應如何運行的固有觀念顯然已被擱在了一邊。在德國，危機已升級爲戰後最嚴重的經濟衰退。有人診斷道：正如我們所知，我們正目睹金融世界的終結。而就在不久前，還有人爲美聯準(Fed)前出席艾倫•葛林斯潘(Alan Greenspan)時代歡呼，稱其實現了新的經濟形式。有人開出了藥方，呼籲復興國家壟斷資本主義——有時也被稱作「新資本主義」。危機應該會成爲金融行業的一劑「瀉藥」，但也存在對危機反應過度的風險。