Coercion, Capital, and European States, A.D. 990–1990

Abstract

This chapter looks at how widely the trajectories of European state formation varied as a function of the geography of coercion and capital, the organization of major power-holders, and pressure from other states. It examines how a long series of unequal struggles among rulers, other powerholders, and ordinary people created specific state institutions and claims on the state. Great power competition and intervention play no more than supporting parts in any particular coup and in the maintenance of any particular military regime. The chapter explains how much the eventual organizational convergence of European states resulted from competition among them, both within Europe and in the rest of world. After centuries of divergences among capital-intensive, coercion-intensive, and capitalized-coercion paths of state formation, European states began to converge a few centuries ago; war and mutual influence caused convergence. World War II transformed the state system and the states within it.