Internal Structure of the Neoliberal State

This concluding chapter of the book discusses whether the neoliberal state can be described as a specific institutional configuration. We do not take for granted that the neoliberal state represents a real historical phenomenon or a conceptually consistent state model. The chapter instead asks these questions precisely. Can we find theoretical and empirical validation for the neoliberal state as a historical and sociological type? To address the issue, the chapter begins by discussing the concept of “internal structure” of the state, which was established by German scholar Otto Hintze as the foundational principle for state-building as a discipline. The chapter compares the neoliberal state to other state formations: the liberal state of the nineteenth century and the developmental state of the twentieth century. In contrast to the neoliberal state, these two other state formations are generally accepted as valid historical and sociological types by the scholarly literature. Finally, the chapter summarizes empirical results and theoretical discussions introduced by the previous chapters of the volume, as well as additional empirical research, in order to find whether neoliberal states in Latin America and Spain have demonstrated their own specific characteristics of internal structure in the sense of Hintze discussed at the beginning of the chapter.