state

Examples of state in the following topics:

• Characteristics of the State

  • A state is an organized political community acting under a government.
  • States may be classified as sovereign if they are not dependent on, or subject to, any other power or state.
  • Other states are subject to external sovereignty or hegemony where ultimate sovereignty lies in another state.
  • Such states differ from sovereign states, in that they have transferred a portion of their sovereign powers to a federal government.
  • In the United States, the state is governed by a government headed by an elected president.

• State Formation

  • Thus, states, as an institution, were a social invention.
  • Political sociologists continue to debate the origins of the state and the processes of state formation.
  • According to one early theory of state formation, the centralized state was developed to administer large public works systems (such as irrigation systems) and to regulate complex economies.
  • Since then, states have continued to grow more rational and bureaucratic, with expanding executive bureaucracies, such as the extensive cabinet system in the United States.
  • Discuss the formation of states and centralization of authority in modern history

• Functions of the State

  • Many people consider the United States to be a pluralist state.
  • States may be classified as sovereign if they are not dependent on, or subject to, any other power or state.
  • States are considered to be subject to external sovereignty, or hegemony, if their ultimate sovereignty lies in another state.
  • Such states differ from sovereign states, in that they have transferred a portion of their sovereign powers to a federal government .
  • Dahl called this kind of state a polyarchy.

• Authority and Legitimate Violence

  • Max Weber conceived of the state as a monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force.
  • Max Weber's theory about states and violence can help explain why states would want to enact policies like gun control.
  • By controlling access to guns, the state furthers this objective.
  • According to Weber, the state is that entity that "upholds the claim to the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force in the enforcement of its order. " The state's authority is derived from this: the state can enforce its precepts through force without losing its legitimate authority.
  • Territory is necessary because it defines the scope of the state's authority: use of force is acceptable, but only in the jurisdiction specified by the state's lands.

• Democracy in the U.S.

  • The United States is a federal constitutional republic in which the federal government shares sovereignty with the state governments.
  • In the United States, suffrage is nearly universal for citizens 18 years of age and older.
  • The United States is a federal constitutional republic in which the President of the United States (the head of state and government), Congress, and judiciary share powers reserved to the national government, and the federal government shares sovereignty with the state governments.
  • All states and the District of Columbia contribute to the electoral vote for president.
  • These two parties have won every United States presidential election since 1852, and have controlled the United States Congress since at least 1856.

• Formal Means of Control

  • When the state kills Katie, it is enacting its authority to use the death penalty to protect society.
  • Weber writes of the definitional relationship between the state and violence in the early twentieth century in his essay "Politics as Vocation. " Weber concludes that the state is that which has a monopoloy on violence.
  • Weber uses this definition to define what constitutes the state.
  • The formal means of social control and the monopoly on violence serve a similar role in defining the state—they both illustrate the unique relationship between the state and its subjects.
  • Explain the relationship between formal means of social control and state authority

• State-Centered Theories

  • According to state-centered theories of inequality, the government should regulate the distribution of resources to protect workers.
  • This latter period reflects a belief in state-centered theories of inequality, as the state sought to regulate the economy to reduce the exploitation of workers.
  • State-centered theories assert that intentional state policies must be aimed at equitably distributing resources and opportunities.
  • Socialism and communism operate on the assumption that states can regulate (and potentially eliminate) inequality.
  • This map of all states to declare themselves officially socialist at some point in history illustrates the spread of state-centered theories of inequality.

• New State Spaces

  • States are not necessarily the same as nations.
  • Another example of a new state space is the European Union, a confederation of 27 European states that encourages political and economic cooperation among its members.
  • But states are not necessary the same as nations, and state boundaries will not necessarily always be the same as national boundaries.
  • The European Union is a confederation of 27 European states.
  • State power is not restricted to the national level.

• Homeschooling

  • In the United States education is compulsory.
  • Today, homeschooling is legal in all 50 states, although it is regulated in different ways by each state.
  • First, in some states, homeschooling is treated like a type of private school.
  • Access to interscholastic athletic competition varies from state to state.
  • In such states, homeschoolers may only compete amongst other homeschoolers or against schools that are not members of the state's interscholastic athletic federation.

• Types of Governments

  • Currently, 44 nations in the world have monarchs as heads of state, 16 of which are Commonwealth realms that recognise the monarch of the United Kingdom as their head of state.
  • A Communist state is a state with a form of government characterized by single-party rule of a Communist party and a professed allegiance to an ideology of communism as the guiding principle of the state.
  • For Marxist-Leninists, the state and the Communist Party claim to act in accordance with the wishes of the industrial working class; for Maoists, the state and party claim to act in accordance to the peasantry.
  • In most Communist states, governments assert that they represent the democratic dictatorship of the proletariat.
  • A map showing the current Communist states.