There are many key questions concerning the current status of the notion of neoliberalism. What is it? Is it an appropriate concept to describe a political and intellectual movement or form of state? What are its prospects as a framework of public policy after the global financial crisis? The article proposes a way of answering these questions by regarding neoliberalism as a definite ‘thought collective’ and a regime of government of and by the state. It exemplifies these by shifts within neoliberalism regarding the question of monopoly, its relationship to classical liberalism and its approach to crisis management. In regard to the latter, it further proposes an emergent rationality of the government of and by the state concerning the fostering of resilience in the anticipation of catastrophe.