The state of things

State History and Theory Reconfigured

Bibliographic Data

ID2059713
AuthorsPatrick Joyce (0000-0003-1058-7901, University of Manchester, corresponding author), Chandra Mukerji (University of California San Diego)
Year2017
Volume46
Issue1
Pages1-19
Publication date2017-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueTheory and Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0304-2421 • E-ISSN: 1573-7853
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s11186-017-9282-6
OpenAlexW2610727102
LanguageEN
Citations received22
References cited55

This article looks at the relationship between logistical power and the assemblages of sites that constitute modern states. Rather than treating states as centralizing institutions and singular sites of power, we treat them as multi-sited. They gain power by using logistical methods of problem solving, using infrastructures to enforce and depersonalize relations of domination and limit the autonomy of elites. But states necessarily solve diverse problems by different means in multiple locations. So, educating children is not continuous with governing colonies even though both are necessary to nineteenth-century states. For this reason, states use logistical means of coordination to link sites, and they make the power of the state seem unitary even though the exercise of state power is not

Autonomy · Limit (mathematics · Physics · Political science · Power (physics · Sociology · State (computer science · Unitary state · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Computer Science · Law · Mathematics