At this point, the real functional significance of social market economy as a concept comes into play. Bridging the conceptual/practical divide was largely left to Müller-Armack, who turned this seeming deficiency into a thorough practical strategy of implementing a new liberalism in Western Germany. … Müller-Armack's aim was to promote the social market economy as a strategy for transferring the principles of new liberalism into potentially hostile political and societal spheres without neglecting the ultimate neoliberal objective of creating a new kind of strong state.

Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, loc. 553