Unpacking the Strength of the State: The Utility of State Infrastructural Power

Studies in Comparative International Development volume 43, Article number: 219 (2008) Cite this article

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Some of the examples in this paragraph draw on the work of the Crisis States Research Centre (2005).

  2. 2.

    In Peru the inability of the state to provide for its citizens is reflected in the failed 2005 census, which had to be repeated in October 2007, and required a national restriction on daily activity for its implementation. See news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071021/wl_nm//Peru_census_dc.

  3. 3.

    Centeno (2002) uses the national census as a proxy for the infrastructural power of the state.

  4. 4.

    Mann (1984) first developed the idea of infrastructural power in his 1984 essay, and further elaborated on it in his two-volume history of social power (1986, 1993).

  5. 5.

    Some scholars have fruitfully employed Mann’s concept. See for example Ziblatt (2006), who shows that levels of subnational infrastructural power explain the divergent state structures of Germany and Italy, and Weiss (2006), who shows that increased levels of infrastructural power help to explain economic development in North East Asia.

  6. 6.

    Among many scholars making this argument is Kline (1999).

  7. 7.

    The relationship between Mann’s framework and Weber’s analysis of the state is developed further in Soifer’s essay in this issue.

  8. 8.

    In other words, there is a distinction between bureaucratic professionalism and state capacity: the latter encompasses the former as well as the infrastructural power of the state.

  9. 9.

    Schensul suggests in his essay that infrastructural power can instead act in the absence of organizational entwining (embeddedness or synergy) to allow states to effectively implement policy.

  10. 10.

    We are grateful to Miguel Angel Centeno for this idea.

  11. 11.

    These categorical differences create bounded networks, and the ability of the state to exercise control and implement decisions across those patterned social relations may vary (see Tilly 1998).

  12. 12.

    We are grateful to James Mahon for highlighting this issue, and for this wording.

  13. 13.

    This distinction is particularly important when evaluating the new institutional economics and economic history (e.g., Coatsworth 1998; North 1981) and its focus on public good provision as a necessary condition for economic development. By failing to distinguish between public goods and state infrastructural power, this literature ignores major motivations for state development by narrowly focusing on economic growth as the only impetus behind the expansion of state control.

  14. 14.

    It is not surprising then that Mann’s (2005) later work focuses on the role of states in genocide and ethnic cleansing.

  15. 15.

    The relationship between power and outcomes, which has been a central issue in the philosophical debate about power, is discussed in more detail in Soifer’s essay.

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Acknowledgements

The editors thank the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard University and the Faculty Development Fund of Bates College for supporting this project.

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Affiliations

  1. Department of Politics, Princeton University, 039 Corwin Hall, Princeton, NJ, 08544, USA

    Hillel Soifer

  2. Brooks World Poverty Institute, The University of Manchester, Humanities Bridgeford Street Building, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL, UK

    Matthias vom Hau

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  1. Hillel Soifer
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  2. Matthias vom Hau
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Hillel Soifer.

Additional information

The order of authorship is alphabetical. The two editors contributed equally to this introductory essay. Thanks to Fulya Apaydin, Dan Slater, Daniel Ziblatt, and the two reviewers for helpful comments and suggestions.

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Soifer, H., vom Hau, M. Unpacking the Strength of the State: The Utility of State Infrastructural Power. St Comp Int Dev 43, 219 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12116-008-9030-z

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Keywords

  • Infrastructural power
  • State strength
  • State capacity