Money and Markets: Essays in Honor of Leland B. Yeager

120 Jürgen G. Backhausincorporated, and actual awareness of power andfreedom, a feeling that man in general has reachedcompletion. This man who is now free and who reallydoes have the right to make a promise, this master ofthe free will, this sovereign – how could he remainignorant of this superiority over everybody who doesnot have the right to make a promise or answer forhimself, how much trust, fear and respect he arouses– he “merits” all three – and how could he, with his selfmastery,not realize that he has necessarily been givenmastery over circumstances, over nature and over allcreatures with a less durable and reliable will? The“free” man, the professor of a durable, unbreak ablewill, thus has his own standard of value: in the possessionof such a will, viewing others from his standpoint, herespects or despises; and just as he will necessarilyrespect his peers, the strong and the reliable (thosewith the right to give their word), – that is everyone whomakes promises like a sovereign, ponderously, seldom,slowly, and is sparing with his trust, who confersan honour when he places his trust, who gives his wordas something which can be relied on, because he isstrong enough to remain upright in the face of mishapor even “in the face of fate”-: so he will necessarily beready to kick the febrile whippets who make a promisewhen they have no right to do so, and will save the rodfor the liar who breaks his word in the very moment itpasses his lips. The proud realization of the extraordinaryprivilege of respon sibility, the awareness of thisrare freedom and power over himself and his destiny,has penetrated him to the depths and become aninstinct, his dominant instinct: – what will he call hisdominant instinct, assuming that he needs a word forit? No doubt about the answer: this sovereign mancalls it his conscience . . .(Nietzsche 1994)Nietzsche even comesclose to the concept ofproducer and consumersovereignty.Again, he returns to thecrucial role of liability ineconomic affairs.Even somewhat goingbeyond Eucken, heemphasizes theimportance of trust forefficient marketexchange.Although Nietzsche does not fully work out the basic institutions of a marketeconomy, the key notions are present and could readily be further developed.III The basic institutions of a market economy –reconsidered: price indicesYet, read on. If man is the animal that can make and keep promises, and currencyis the language in which these promises can be kept, how about the state (of all