Cardinal Reinhard Marx

German Cardinal Reinhard Marx called for a “social market economy” in the wake of the fiscal crisis that has gripped much of Europe over the past year.

In a May 30 talk at Georgetown University in Washington, Marx, the archbishop of Munich and Freising, said the economy needed to move “beyond capitalism” in order to be more fair.

He said he was not calling for the abolition of capitalism, since capitalism was “an element” in the social market economy he has in mind.

But he said it was the practice of “financial capitalism” in the era since the tearing down of the Iron Curtain that had brought Europe to its crisis point today.

“The world became free from communism. As a consequence, it became free for financial capitalism.”