Political Economy in France and Germany

Apparently, economics education in at least two European countries is political economy, with a heavy emphasis on the political and substantially less on the economics. So says a current piece in Foreign Policy. According to the author, Stefan Theil, "In both France and Germany, for instance, schools have helped ingrain a serious aversion to capitalism. In one 2005 poll, just 36 percent of French citizens said they supported the free-enterprise system, the only one of 22 countries polled that showed minority support for this cornerstone of global commerce. In Germany, meanwhile, support for socialist ideals is running at all-time highs—47 percent in 2007 versus 36 percent in 1991."

Theil suggests that anti-capitalist, pro-socialist views are a consequence of how economics is taught in primary and secondary school. Drawing on a sample of French and German textbooks, he suggests that the emphasis is on explaining why capitalism is bad with little attention to economic theory or what might be viewed as positive consequences of economic competition.

One example: “Economic growth imposes a hectic form of life, producing overwork, stress, nervous depression, cardiovascular disease and, according to some, even the development of cancer,” asserts the three-volume Histoire du XXe siècle, a set of texts memorized by countless French high school students as they prepare for entrance exams to Sciences Po and other prestigious French universities. The past 20 years have “doubled wealth, doubled unemployment, poverty, and exclusion, whose ill effects constitute the background for a profound social malaise,” the text continues. Because the 21st century begins with “an awareness of the limits to growth and the risks posed to humanity [by economic growth],” any future prosperity “depends on the regulation of capitalism on a planetary scale.” Capitalism itself is described at various points in the text as “brutal,” “savage,” “neoliberal,” and “American.”

My favorite example, taken from what Theil says is a German math workbook for 4th graders in Berlin: "In 2004, the cost of a bread roll was 40 cents. From the wheat that went into it, the farmer received only 2 cents. What do you think about this?"

I would have done much better in math if my word problems had taken this form...

I did not go to school in France or Germany, so I do not know how to evaluate the claims Theil makes about the content of standard textbooks used to teach "economics" in France and Germany. Are the books he cites typical examples, or is he sampling from the from the extremes of the distribution?

Moreover, is he right to connect European skepticism about global markets to the content of primary and secondary textbooks?