Neoliberalism greatly expanded the dominance of market forces through deregulation, privatization, and regressive forms of taxation, while significantly reducing the state’s role in the economy through cuts to labor, welfare, and social protections.
Behind these economic reforms sat a new idea of what constitutes a good and free society—a concept about what direction we should all be striving in to become the best versions of ourselves. In the new neoliberal era, then, success would be reframed as a product of having exceptional individual qualities (rather than exceptional social privileges and advantages), while failure would be rooted in some kind of personal deficit (rather than in lack of opportunity, equality, or social support).