Economic growth, defined as increased production of goods and services, was assumed in the 1900s and early 2000s to be the key to ever-improving living conditions. The more a country could increase total output, in terms of GDP, the higher the rate of growth – and the more each individual produced with given factors of production, the higher the productivity.

The fact that an open economy would promote the desired economic growth was considered indisputable.

Trust, predictability, lack of corruption, strong property protection, functioning justice systems, good health and education were seen as important drivers for economic growth and fundamental for economic operators to account for an ever-increasing production of goods and services.

Therefore, supranational bodies were created to ensure macroeconomic stability, a liberal trade regime, strong private sector and market economic incentives. The equally important public sector with overall responsibility for health, education, the environment and infrastructure was handed over to the nation states, whose power over their economic policies was at the same time radically circumvented by this supranational structure.

The institutional framework of growth thus had as its main objective the free movement of capital and labor, and was based on the belief that a market economy with free competition is the best of all possible economic systems.

We all know how it went. But we also miss the intoxication that growth gave us.