2 - The State as a Social Relation

Summary

This chapter advocates shifting state-theoretical attention from the state apparatus to state power and elaborates the enigmatic claim that “the state is a social relation”. This involves treating the state in terms of the exercise of state power as an institutionally- and discursively-mediated reflection and refraction of a changing balance of forces that seek to influence the forms, purposes, and content of the polity, politics, and policy in specific political conjunctures and the wider natural and social environment. To illustrate the heuristic potential of this “strategic-relational approach”, this chapter revisits the well-known difficulties of defining the state; examines the implications of this approach for analysing structure and agency in relation to the state and state power; and presents six dimensions of the state considered as a institutionally-mediated strategic relation. The chapter concludes with four guidelines for studying these complex issues.