Norbert Häring (50) works as an economics correspondent for Handelsblatt, the German business newspaper, since 2002. He is co-founder and co-director of the World Economics Association and co-editor of the World Economic Review, both aiming at promoting pluralism and inclusiveness in economic research. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Saarbrücken in Germany. He is the author of Economics and the Powerful: Convenient Truths, Distorted Facts, Ample Rewards (with Niall Douglas) and a number of popular books on economics in German, including the prize-winning Ökonomie 2.0. (with Olaf Storbeck), which was translated into English, Chinese, Korean, Italian and Japanese. For Handelsblatt he convened the Shadow ECB Council in 2002 and has chaired the monthly meetings of this ECB-watchers group of 15 prominent European economists for the last ten years.
Before going into journalism in 1998, Norbert Häring worked for Commerzbank, first in the economics department and later writing speeches and producing the bank’s annual report. He was trained as a neoclassical economist. After slowly losing his firm belief in the eternal truths of mainstream economic theory over the decades, he is now an enthusiastic proponent of more pluralism in economics. He strongly believes that there is no correct theory to the exclusion of others, but rather that there are many (possibly mutually inconsistent) schools of thought and theories that can each produce valuable insight into important economic problems.
Norbert Haring
