This paper argues against the dominant tendency in social theory to speak of “the state”. It distinguishes two types of state: the capstone state sitting on top of societies, blocking alternative sources of power, and the organic state allowing and encouraging the co-operation of different power sources, which is held to be characteristic of European development. The main argument of the paper is that the latter type of polity was a necessary feature in the complex that allowed the endogenous creation of a broadly capitalist dynamic in the Occident.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Anderson, P. (1974) Passages from Antiquity to Feudalism, London: New Left Books.
2.
Baechler, J. (1975) The Origins of Capitalism, Oxford: Blackwell.
3.
Balazs, E. (1964) Chinese Civilisation and Bureaucracy, New Haven: Yale University Press.
4.
Brown, P. (1967) St. Augustine, London: Faber.
5.
Cipolla, C. (1976) Before the Industrial Revolution, London: Methuen.
6.
Duby, G. (1974) The Early Growth of the Medieval Economy, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
7.
Elvin, M. (1973) The Pattern of the Chinese Past, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
8.
Engel, D. (1978) Alexander the Great and the Logistics of the Macedonian Army, Berkeley: University of California Press.
9.
Eisenstadt, S.N. (1969) The Political Systems of Empires, New York: The Free Press.
10.
Hall, J.A. (1985) Powers and Liberties: The Causes and Consequences of the Rise of the West, Oxford: Blackwell.
11.
Hall, J.A, (1985a) `Religion and the Rise of Capitalism', European Journal of Sociology.
12.
Hartwell, R. (1966) `Markets, Technology and the Structure of Enterprise in the Development of the Eleventh Century Chinese Iron and Steel Industry', Journal of Economic History, vol. 26.
13.
Hartwell, R. (1967) `A Cycle of Economic Change in Imperial China: Coal and Iron in Northeast China, 750-1350', Journal of Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. 10.
14.
Hartwell, R. (1971) `Financial Expertise, Examinations and the Formulation of Economic Policy in Northern Sung China', Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 30.
15.
Huang, R. (1974) Taxation and Governmental Finance in Sixteenth Century Ming China, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
16.
Huang, R. (1981) 1587, New Haven: Yale University Press.
17.
Jones, A.H.M. (1973) The Later Roman Empire, Oxford: Blackwell.
18.
Jones, E.L. (1981) The European Miracle, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
19.
Ma, L.J.C. (1971) Commercial Development and Urban Change in Sung China, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
20.
Mann, M. (1977) `States, Ancient and Modern'European Journal of Sociology, vol. 18.
21.
Mann, M. (1980) `State and Society, 1130-1815: an analysis of English state finances' in Zeitlin, M. (ed) Political Power and Social Theory, vol. 1, Connecticut: JAI Press.
22.
Mann, M. (1985) Sources of Social Power. vol. 1: A History of Power in Agrarian Societies, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
23.
McNeill, W.H. (1982) The Pursuit of Power, Oxford: Blackwell.
24.
Myers, A.R. (1975) Parliaments and Estates in Europe to 1789, London: Thames and Hudson.
25.
Nef, J.U. (1950) War and Human Progress, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.
26.
Postan, M.M. (1975) Medieval Economy and Society, London: Penguin.
27.
Rodinski, W. (1983) The Walled Kingdom, London: Flamingo.
28.
Smith, A. (1976) The Wealth of Nations, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
29.
Ste Croix, G. de (1981) Class Struggle in the Ancient Greek World, London: Duckworth.
30.
Turner, B. (1981) For Weber, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
31.
Weber, M. (1951) The Religion of China, New York: The Free Press.
32.
Weber, M. (1978) The Agrarian Sociology of Ancient Civilisations, London: New Left Books.
33.
Winch, D.N. (1978) Adam Smith's Politics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
34.
Wittfogel, K. (1957) Oriental Despotism, New Haven: Yale University Press
35.
Yoshinobu, S. (1970) Commerce and Society in Sung China, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
