Couton, Keeping the State Going

Keeping the State Going
Philippe Couton
Trent University
pcouton@trentu.ca

One of the most exciting and productive developments of the past two decades in the social sciences had been the rejuvenation of research on the state. That research has been of truly exceptional quality and relevance. One of my main hopes at this stage of my career is to see this direction maintained, but also to help it take on a broader perspective, which includes more debates between alternative views that too often ignore, or worse, scorn each other.

The state, contrary to Durkheimian or Hegelian social determinism, is no mere reflection of some general collective will. Throughout history and still today it is, in its various incarnations, the object of debates and struggles by antagonistic social movements, individuals, political ideologies, and other socioeconomic forces. The outcome of these processes in turn deeply affects all aspects of social reality. The very banality of this statement should serve as a reminder of its importance: arguments about the “superstructural” nature of the state, or instead pointing to its neutral administrative role were dominant in the not very distant past. Similar accounts persist today, tending to depict the central political authority mostly as a unilateral, usually repressive source of economic, political, and discursive power.

But debates about the role of the state are more diverse and balanced now than ever before. This is largely due to the resurgence of empirically grounded and theoretically sophisticated political sociology, which I have been fortunate to study throughout my formative university career. Key works by sociologists including Charles Tilly, John A. Hall (my thesis supervisor, in the interest of full disclosure!), Michael Mann, Theda Skocpol, as well as Canadian-grown "new" political economy, which places politics and the state within their proper economic context (e.g. Clement, 1997), figure prominently on my list of major influences. The principal merit of this school of political and historical sociology has been to reinvigorate interest in the study of the state and its societal importance. Related fields have benefited tremendously from this injection of scholarly étatisme, including the study of social movements, inequality, labour relations, nationalism and ethnic relations, development, and so on.

Despite this widespread influence, one of the main challenges facing state-centred sociology remains to extend its reach and in so doing avoid typecasting as strictly high scholarship, restricted to the study of very large processes, and concerned only with great historical sweeps. A related task is to address competing scholarly developments more fruitfully, if only to enrich current debates and combat the isolating effect of excessive academic specialism. This is already being done to some extent, in a number of fields, and I will briefly mention some examples below, as well as suggest further avenues of possible investigation, focusing on the topics I know best.

Two of the substantive and intimately related areas that have sustained my interest in recent years are nationalism and immigration. That they are related is not immediately obvious, but both have been acutely constrained by the emergence and consolidation of the nation-state. Nationalism is by now fairly well understood as a sort of enculturation of the state. That is to say, a process whereby the state becomes “of and for” a particular nation (a phrase used by Brubaker, 1996) instead of an instrument of dynastic ambition. This fusion of state and nation, frequently coterminous with the advent of the welfare state, has had innumerable consequences on the societies it affects. Many of these transformations have been richly studied, in states across the world (e.g., Hobsbawm, 1990; Anderson, 1991), but much work remains to be done. Recent research for instance shows that welfare states throughout the developed world emerged and continue to operate on a basis of gender dualism (Orloff, 1993; Skocpol, 1992). This has strongly affected both what we often conceive as "national" cultures (particularly as they relate to gender relations) and the way social policy is institutionalized (in some of the most blatant cases adopting a powerful "home and soil" ideology mixing natalism and jingoism).

International migration has likewise been strongly affected by the development of the nation-state. In fact, what we understand now as immigration has largely been a creation of the social closure institutions of the state (borders, passports, social statistics). Immigration to Canada remains today a heavily (an in many ways unavoidably) bureaucratized process. Since Canada is likely to remain an immigration country for the foreseeable future, how this works or fails and why is crucial to understand. Are we for instance creating new immigrant social categories out of pure bureaucratic constructs (skilled workers, refugees, live-in caregivers)? How is this affecting the lives of the individuals concerned and the communities where they settle? The historical record shows that state action, often in alliance with corporate interests has created resilient ethno-classes from the beginnings of mass labour migration at the end of the 19th century, in Canada and elsewhere (see Stasiulis, 1999). Is current immigration policy having the same effect?

These questions bring to mind conflicting perspectives that have addressed the role of the state and related institutions over the past decades. Although I am most indebted to the more traditional analysis of state institutional structures, I would like to see more debates with other, equally influential perspectives. Two related claims in particular come to mind and could be usefully discussed and expanded. The first is that states easily fall victim to ideological inertia (as self-sustaining discursive formations). The other holds that states typically rely less on outright repression than on organized consent (hegemony). Both are important inferences that could usefully inform more traditional approaches, but that could also benefit from more detailed research (States, for instance routinely botch attempts at establishing consensus. How and why does this happen?).

References:
Anderson, Benedict. 1991. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso.
Brubaker, Rogers. 1996 Nationalism Reframed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Clement, Wallace. 1997. Understanding Canada: Building on the New Canadian Economy. McGill-Queen's University Press.
Eric J. Hobsbawm, Eric J. 1990. Nations and Nationalism since 1780. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Orloff, Ann Shola. 1993. The Politics of Pensions: A Comparative Analysis of Britain, Canada, and the United States, 1880-1940. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
Skocpol, Theda. 1992. Protecting Soldiers and Mothers. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Stasiulis, Daiva. 1999. "The Political Economy of Race, Ethnicity, and Migration." Pp.141-171 in Wallace Clement (ed.) Understanding Canada: Building on the New Canadian Economy. McGill-Queen's University Press.



		Canadian Journal of Sociology Online November - December 2002 Keeping the State Going Philippe Couton Trent University pcouton@trentu.ca One of the most exciting and productive developments of the past two decades in the social sciences had been the rejuvenation of research on the state. That research has been of truly exceptional quality and relevance. One of my main hopes at this stage of my career is to see this direction maintained, but also to help it take on a broader perspective, which includes more debates between alternative views that too often ignore, or worse, scorn each other. The state, contrary to Durkheimian or Hegelian social determinism, is no mere reflection of some general collective will. Throughout history and still today it is, in its various incarnations, the object of debates and struggles by antagonistic social movements, individuals, political ideologies, and other socioeconomic forces. The outcome of these processes in turn deeply affects all aspects of social reality. The very banality of this statement should serve as a reminder of its importance: arguments about the “superstructural” nature of the state, or instead pointing to its neutral administrative role were dominant in the not very distant past. Similar accounts persist today, tending to depict the central political authority mostly as a unilateral, usually repressive source of economic, political, and discursive power. But debates about the role of the state are more diverse and balanced now than ever before. This is largely due to the resurgence of empirically grounded and theoretically sophisticated political sociology, which I have been fortunate to study throughout my formative university career. Key works by sociologists including Charles Tilly, John A. Hall (my thesis supervisor, in the interest of full disclosure!), Michael Mann, Theda Skocpol, as well as Canadian-grown "new" political economy, which places politics and the state within their proper economic context (e.g. Clement, 1997), figure prominently on my list of major influences. The principal merit of this school of political and historical sociology has been to reinvigorate interest in the study of the state and its societal importance. Related fields have benefited tremendously from this injection of scholarly étatisme, including the study of social movements, inequality, labour relations, nationalism and ethnic relations, development, and so on. Despite this widespread influence, one of the main challenges facing state-centred sociology remains to extend its reach and in so doing avoid typecasting as strictly high scholarship, restricted to the study of very large processes, and concerned only with great historical sweeps. A related task is to address competing scholarly developments more fruitfully, if only to enrich current debates and combat the isolating effect of excessive academic specialism. This is already being done to some extent, in a number of fields, and I will briefly mention some examples below, as well as suggest further avenues of possible investigation, focusing on the topics I know best. Two of the substantive and intimately related areas that have sustained my interest in recent years are nationalism and immigration. That they are related is not immediately obvious, but both have been acutely constrained by the emergence and consolidation of the nation-state. Nationalism is by now fairly well understood as a sort of enculturation of the state. That is to say, a process whereby the state becomes “of and for” a particular nation (a phrase used by Brubaker, 1996) instead of an instrument of dynastic ambition. This fusion of state and nation, frequently coterminous with the advent of the welfare state, has had innumerable consequences on the societies it affects. Many of these transformations have been richly studied, in states across the world (e.g., Hobsbawm, 1990; Anderson, 1991), but much work remains to be done. Recent research for instance shows that welfare states throughout the developed world emerged and continue to operate on a basis of gender dualism (Orloff, 1993; Skocpol, 1992). This has strongly affected both what we often conceive as "national" cultures (particularly as they relate to gender relations) and the way social policy is institutionalized (in some of the most blatant cases adopting a powerful "home and soil" ideology mixing natalism and jingoism). International migration has likewise been strongly affected by the development of the nation-state. In fact, what we understand now as immigration has largely been a creation of the social closure institutions of the state (borders, passports, social statistics). Immigration to Canada remains today a heavily (an in many ways unavoidably) bureaucratized process. Since Canada is likely to remain an immigration country for the foreseeable future, how this works or fails and why is crucial to understand. Are we for instance creating new immigrant social categories out of pure bureaucratic constructs (skilled workers, refugees, live-in caregivers)? How is this affecting the lives of the individuals concerned and the communities where they settle? The historical record shows that state action, often in alliance with corporate interests has created resilient ethno-classes from the beginnings of mass labour migration at the end of the 19th century, in Canada and elsewhere (see Stasiulis, 1999). Is current immigration policy having the same effect? These questions bring to mind conflicting perspectives that have addressed the role of the state and related institutions over the past decades. Although I am most indebted to the more traditional analysis of state institutional structures, I would like to see more debates with other, equally influential perspectives. Two related claims in particular come to mind and could be usefully discussed and expanded. The first is that states easily fall victim to ideological inertia (as self-sustaining discursive formations). The other holds that states typically rely less on outright repression than on organized consent (hegemony). Both are important inferences that could usefully inform more traditional approaches, but that could also benefit from more detailed research (States, for instance routinely botch attempts at establishing consensus. How and why does this happen?). References: Anderson, Benedict. 1991. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso. Brubaker, Rogers. 1996 Nationalism Reframed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Clement, Wallace. 1997. Understanding Canada: Building on the New Canadian Economy. McGill-Queen's University Press. Eric J. Hobsbawm, Eric J. 1990. Nations and Nationalism since 1780. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Orloff, Ann Shola. 1993. The Politics of Pensions: A Comparative Analysis of Britain, Canada, and the United States, 1880-1940. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. Skocpol, Theda. 1992. Protecting Soldiers and Mothers. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Stasiulis, Daiva. 1999. "The Political Economy of Race, Ethnicity, and Migration." Pp.141-171 in Wallace Clement (ed.) Understanding Canada: Building on the New Canadian Economy. McGill-Queen's University Press. http://www.arts.ualberta.ca/cjscopy/newmill/couton.html November 2002 © CJS Online Click here to download PDF file < Back to "Sociologists for a New Millennium" Index < Back to Current Table of Contents