What is Neoliberalism? The Concept and The Person
Neoliberalism gets thrown about a lot — usually with a raised eyebrow and a knowing nod. Under the jargon, it’s both a set of economic ideas and, in 2025, a recognisable type of policy-minded person. It shapes how states regulate, how firms invest, and, indirectly, why your train fare, rent, or energy bill looks the way it does.
At its simplest, neoliberalism is the view that society works best when markets do most of the organising and the state sets clear, light-touch rules. It prizes competition to push prices down and quality up; private ownership and privatisation where feasible; deregulation to strip out red tape that blocks new entrants; free trade so goods, money, and ideas cross borders easily; lower, simpler taxes to spur investment; and an emphasis on individual responsibility over blanket state provision.
Government doesn’t vanish. It behaves more like a referee than an absolute monarch — funding a basic safety net, enforcing contracts and property rights, fixing obvious market failures, and leaving most (but not all!) day-to-day delivery to businesses, charities, and social enterprises.
From Free Markets to Fleeces
Neoliberalism accelerated in the late 20th century with an apparently simple recipe: freer markets, privatisation, deregulation, lower taxes, and open trade. Thatcher and Reagan made it mainstream; academics like F. A. Hayek and Milton Friedman supplied much of the theoretical spine.
Fast-forward to today and the rhetoric is gentler. The modern neoliberalite talks of public–private partnerships, innovation, and impact — but the underlying instinct remains familiar: set predictable rules, then let markets do most of the work. In Europe, that instinct is codified in the Single Market, which the European Commission estimates has lifted EU GDP by 3–4% and created around 3.6 million jobs since its creation (see the Commission’s overview of Single Market Strategy).
How it works in practice
In practice, governments outsource more, tender more, and incentivise private capital to build infrastructure. Britain’s clean-power drive is the textbook case: the Contracts for Difference scheme gives low-carbon generators long-term price certainty, pulling billions into offshore wind and other renewables (see the UK government’s CfD scheme hub).
The results are visible in the grid mix. Official statistics show renewables supplied just over half of UK electricity in 2024 — the first time on record — with wind the leading source. (Quarterly swings still happen; weather matters.) For regular releases, see the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero’s Energy Trends.
The Person: A Constructivist Glance
Beyond policy, neoliberalism shows up as a way of being. The economy isn’t the only thing marketised; people start to organise themselves like small firms. You’re nudged to be an “entrepreneur of the self” — polishing a personal brand, turning skills into “offerings”, and treating education, health, even leisure as investments with a return. For a clear primer on this strand of thinking, see the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy on Foucault. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Public life shifts too. Citizens become customers of public services — in England, for instance, patients have a legal right to choose aspects of their NHS care — while success is tracked by metrics (rankings, ratings, KPIs). Risk moves from institutions to individuals: flexible labour markets can expand choice, but also shift security onto workers — a point flagged in the OECD Employment Outlook — while around 1.03 million people (≈3.1%) in the UK were on zero-hours contracts in Apr–Jun 2024.
The case for
Proponents argue liberalisation and trade have underpinned decades of growth and helped reduce extreme poverty. The World Bank notes that more than a billion people have moved out of extreme poverty since 1990, with nowcasts projecting further reductions once post-pandemic disruptions fade (see the Bank’s poverty overview). Markets, they say, are still the best engine for innovation and rising living standards — provided rules ensure competition.
They also point to the Single Market’s measurable gains as evidence that removing barriers and standardising rules can raise productivity and wages across a continent (see the Commission’s Single Market at 30).
The case against
Critics counter that, while GDP rises, the benefits don’t reliably trickle down. Research associated with the IMF has warned that some hallmark policies — notably unfettered capital flows and aggressive fiscal consolidation — have raised inequality and, in turn, can weaken durable growth (see Finance & Development: “Neoliberalism: Oversold?”). Others see privatisation as too often swapping public service aims for shareholder returns, unless guardrails are strong.
Post-pandemic data add a caution: progress on poverty stalled and, in the poorest countries, went into reverse — a reminder that market reforms need active social policy if the gains are to be broadly shared (see the World Bank’s poverty updates).
Real-world flavours (and the person behind them)
You’ll find neoliberal design across party lines: centre-right trade policy, centrist infrastructure finance, and Third Way blends that marry market competition with a welfare floor — think New Labour–era orthodoxy updated for the ESG age. The modern neoliberalite isn’t a caricature so much as a compass: pro-competition by default, relaxed about private delivery of public goals, fluent in the language of sustainability and inclusion.
Neoliberalism no longer kicks the door in; it rewrites the brief — and still hands the keys to the market.
