Towards a political ontology of state power: a comment on C olin H ay's article
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This article offers some critical realist, strategic‐relational comments on C olin H ay's proposal to treat the state as an ‘as‐if‐real’ concept. The critique first develops an alternative account of ontology, which is more suited to analyses of the state and state power; it then distinguishes the ‘intransitive’ properties of the real world as an object of investigation from the ‘transitive’ features of its scientific investigation and thereby provides a clearer understanding of what is at stake in ‘as‐if‐realism’; and it ends with the suggestion that a concern with the modalities of state power rather than with the state per se offers a more fruitful approach to the genuine issues raised in H ay's article and in his earlier strategic‐relational contributions to political analysis.
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Positions that reject state censorship are based on a specific understanding of the state as a single, gravity-like mechanism with causal powers that generates a corresponding set of actual effects.
“Positions that reject state censorship are based on a specific understanding of the state as “a single, gravity-like mechanism with causal powers that generates a corresponding set of 'actual' effects” (Jessop, 2014, 483).”
From The Death of Leviathan: Feminist Dilemmas and State Phobia (2021) · cites this paper as Jessop, 2014
In “Ontology/ontologies” (page not supplied), Jessop calls the claim that the state is a single gravity-like mechanism a mistaken characterization of philosophical realism. He says the real need not consist of one such mechanism and describes state effects as arising from interacting mechanisms. The paper does not address positions on state censorship. (LLM, conf=0.88)
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Cites
Notes on the Difficulty of Studying the State (1977)
ABRAMS, P. (1988) · Journal of Historical Sociology · doi:10.1111/j.1467-6443.1988.tb00004.x · Cited by 2,463 · see citing works
The Oxford companion to philosophy
Honderich, T. (1996) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.33-2495 · Cited by 1,551 · see citing works
State Theory: Putting Capitalist States in their Place
(1991) · Capital & Class · doi:10.1177/030981689104400110 · Cited by 748 · see citing works
The capitalist state: Marxist theories and methods
Jessop, B. (1982) · Lancaster EPrints (Lancaster University) · Cited by 464 · see citing works
Self-citationBartelson, J. (2001) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511490170 · Cited by 197 · see citing works
Critical Realism and the Strategic-Relational Approach.
Jessop, B. (2005) · Lancaster EPrints (Lancaster University) · Cited by 191 · see citing works
Self-citationNeither real nor fictitious but ‘as if real'? A political ontology of the state
Hay, C. (2014) · British Journal of Sociology · doi:10.1111/1468-4446.12082 · Cited by 69 · see citing works
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Research works printed but not linked: 1
- [3]3. Bourdieu, P. 2014 On the State. Lectures at the Collège de France, 1989-1992, Cambridge: Polity [first published in French in 2012]
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The Death of Leviathan: Feminist Dilemmas and State Phobia
Dhawan, N. (2021) · Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State & Society · doi:10.1093/sp/jxz031 · Cited by 11 · see citing works
- Authors
- Jessop, B.
- Affiliations
- Lancaster University (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Jessop, Bob
- ORCID
- Jessop, Bob
- Venue
- The British Journal of Sociology
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2014-09
- Volume
- 65
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 481-486
- ISSN
- 0007-1315 (ISSN-L)
- 1468-4446
- OpenAlex
- W1903839720
- Semantic Scholar
- 019871b6c2bc42cfc4165c571d609db17e0b0ff0
- Cited by
- 22
- References
- 7
- Citations by year
- 2025: 10 · 2024: 1 · 2022: 1 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 1 · 2016: 2 · 2015: 1 · 2014: 1
- FWCI
- 4.33
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- eprints.lancs.ac.uk
- Locations
- British Journal of Sociology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Lancaster EPrints (Lancaster University) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Economic and Social Research Council (ES/H004653/1)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Critical Realism in Sociology
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Political Science Research and Education
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Philosophy › Marxism and Critical Theory
- Keywords
- state power, ontology of the state, critical realism, transitivity, political ontology
- MeSH terms
- Government, Humans, Politics, Power, Psychological, Social Theory
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