Neoliberal states thus depart from liberal ones as they become radically economic in a triple sense: The state secures, advances, and props the economy; the state’s purpose is to facilitate the economy, and the state’s legitimacy is linked to the growth of the economy—as an overt actor on behalf of the economy, the state also becomes responsible for the economy. State action, state purpose, and state legitimacy: each is economized by neoliberalism. The Ordoliberals carried this even further: the market economy should also be the principle of the state’s internal regulation and organization. Reversing the liberal formulation in which a free market is defined and supervised by the state, for them, the state should be defined and supervised by the market. In short, the state itself should be economized.

Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, loc. 113