Best practices exemplify neoliberal governance’s soft power and antipolitics

Evidence

The ubiquitous concept of best practices and its close cousin and predecessor, “benchmarking,” are exemplary of many features of neoliberal governance — its emphasis on soft power, antipolitics, buy-ins, consensus, teamwork, market metrics, and rejection of external regulation, command, partisan interest, and ideology. — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 262

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Technocratic illusion legitimizes depoliticization by presenting policy as mere administration — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 2699; Governance by incentives and benchmarks replaces top-down law and rule — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s…, 56; Neoliberalism now governs through soft power and common sense, not force — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s…, 58 (+8 more)

Broader Connections

• Neoliberals rejected the pure state-versus-market binary as a false dichotomy #expands (0.80) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 9
• Neoliberalism operates through systematic contradiction and disavowal of its own practices #corroborates (0.78) — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 81
• Neoliberals conditioned self-government on accepting market discipline #expands (0.75) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 297
• Neoliberalism claims to liberate while actually eroding political sovereignty #complicates (0.72) — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 211