Chapter 2, State as the Maker of World Politics

Question 1

according to Tilly’s theory, how did the sovereign state emerge?

Answer 1

because sovereignty implies a concentration of power that makes sovereign states better prepared for war. they could extract the resources necessary to build more efficient armies.

Question 2

what are the three types of competing states?

Answer 2

capital-intensive, coercion-intensive, and capital-coercive.

Question 3

what is the capital-intensive state?

Answer 3

this type of state has a lot of capital to extract, but not enough power to extract it. indeed, the state’s capital is concentrated in a few hands, but the state is not powerful enough to dominate the capitalist class and have them give up some of their resources.

Question 4

what is the coercion-intensive state?

Answer 4

this type of state has a lot of power, but not a lot of capital to extract. the state could coerce people into giving up their resources or put people to work, but it didn’t have capital to extract.

Question 5

what is the capital-coercive state?

Answer 5

this type of state has a lot of capital to extract, and a lot of power to extract it. the state had an important capitalist class, which could be coerced by the state into giving away some of its resources.

Question 6

according to Tilly’s theory, how did the sovereign state become predominant?

Answer 6

capital-coercive states implied sovereignty, in order to have enough power to coerce the capitalist class into giving away some of its resources. with their new capital, the state could build bigger and more efficient armies, making them more likely to win wars.

Question 7

according to Spruyt’s theory, how did the sovereign state emerge?

Answer 7

in order to overcome the barriers that prevented them from becoming wealthier, the economically successful class gave some of their resources to the centralized power. in exchange, the centralized power set up standardized rules and built infrastructures, such as roads, to help economic development. because other states weren’t as organized, they stood no chance to centralized sovereign states.

Question 8

according to Spruyt’s theory, how did the sovereign state become predominant?

Answer 8

sovereign states had an institutional advantage, which made them more efficient at fighting wars. because the rules of the game didn't have to be constantly renegotiated, the transaction costs were cheaper, making the capitalist class even wealthier, extracting more and more resources to help the central power raise bigger armies.
moreover, because the central authority enforced commitment, problems between states that had a central authority were non-existant.