DIAS x Word Festival Event: The International Chamber of Commerce and neoliberal globalisation (1980-2000)

The last two decades of the twentieth century witnessed a tremendous growth in global economic exchange. World exports exploded. The movement of capital across national boundaries was even more impressive. This globalization went hand in hand with the rise of a neoliberal order grounded “in the belief that market forces had to be liberated from government regulatory controls.” (Gerstle, Gary. The rise and fall of the neoliberal order: America and the world in the free market era. Oxford University Press, 2022:2.) The literature has emphasized that specific actors played a very important role in this neoliberal globalisation.The United States have been the primary driver of this phenomenon. Recent studies have also emphasized the role of other countries, such as France and Germany. International organisations, such as the World Bank, the IMF, the World Trade Organisation, as well as the United Nations, have also been influential by changing the rules of the architecture of global governance. Multinationals also promoted this neoliberal globalisation through their business activities and their lobbying campaigns on national governments and international organisation to accelerate the circulation of goods and capital. However, historiography has neglected the contribution of Business Interests Associations.

My presentation will focus on the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in this neoliberal globalization. Established in 1920, the ICC became the preeminent international business association—a status it has maintained to the present day.  

About Thomas David
Thomas David is Professor of Contemporary International History at the University of Lausanne. He was previously Dean of the College of Humanities at EPFL, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne.His research focuses on the actors shaping global capitalism in the 19th and 20th centuries, in particular economic elites and corporate networks. He is currently writing a book entitled “Business of the World, Unite! The International Chamber of Commerce and Global Capitalism in the Twentieth Century”. He is also working on a project with Ann-Kristin Bergquist (Uppsala University) on the role of business associations in international environmental governance from Stockholm (1972) to Kyoto (1997), focusing on sustainable development and climate change. He is also interested in Switzerland's global and colonial history in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Venue
The DIAS Auditorium, SDU Campus Odense

This event is open for all. No registration needed.