Ryan Murphy’s comment on “The East Asian Challenge for Market Liberalism” argued that Singapore doesn’t exhibit a high degree of state intervention and concluded that “it is unclear what challenge East Asia presents for market liberalism.” Bryan Cheang responds that Murphy’s comment fails to appreciate the nature of his earlier argument and exhibits the very myopia that motivated it. Murphy’s comment misunderstands the developmental state form of capitalism, simplistically reducing it to discrete policies like government spending, ownership, and levels of protectionism, which aren’t sufficient conditions that define this institutional variety.