It is already a symptom of the vanishing value and lexicon for public things that such questions today are generally converted to a different one, namely, the role of government versus the private sector for the provision of goods and services. In this conversion, government is not identified with the public, but only as an alternate market actor. Citizens, meanwhile, are rendered as investors or consumers, not as members of a democratic polity who share power and certain common goods, spaces, and experiences.

Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, loc. 358