Introduction to Political Theory

of monopolisation of politics, so that political activity outside the state is

downgraded. Others argue that the term is so complex that it is fruitless to try and

define it. Richard Ashley, a postmodernist or poststructuralist in international

relations, takes the view that it is impossible to ‘decide what the state is’ (1988:

249), while Pringle and Watson quote the words of the French postmodernist,

Michel Foucault, that ‘to place the state above or outside society is to focus on a

homogeneity which is not there’ (1992: 55). The state, says Foucault, is ‘a mythical

abstraction whose importance is a lot more limited than many of us think’ (Hoffman,

1995: 162). Pringle and Watson, for their part, find the state too erratic and

disconnected to evoke as an entity (1992: 63), while a feminist, Judith Allen, takes

the view that the state is too abstract, unitary and unspecific to be of use in

addressing the disaggregated, diverse, specific or local sites which require feminist

attention (Allen, 1990: 22).

Chapter 1 The state 19

Behaviouralism

Not to be confused with behaviourism – a psychological theory – behaviouralism developed

in the USA after the Second World War as an intellectual concept that stressed precision, systems

theory and pure science. The idea is that all living things behave in regular ways and it is

possible to see them as adjusting to their environment as a result of the inputs they receive

and the outputs they produce. Generalisations can be made that can be verified through

methods that have no ethical implications. Theory must be scientific in the sense that no values

are involved, and the social sciences do not involve any special approaches that are not relevant

to the natural sciences. Indeed, the notion of behaviour makes it possible to examine all living

things since humans express themselves through regularities which can be scientifically

investigated. The behavioural ‘revolution’ (as its supporters called it) reached its height in the

1960s, but it was accused of taking the politics out of politics by its critics who felt that

the methods of natural science were not appropriate to the social sciences, and that the notion

anyway that science could be value-free is naive and superficial.

Focus

The radicals agree with the linguistic analysts and the behaviouralists that the

concept of the state should be abandoned. Their particular argument is that the

notion discourages participation and involvement at local levels and in social

institutions, and is therefore an unhelpful term.

Problems with the argument against the state

Many of the points that the critics of the concept of the state make are useful. It

is certainly odd to identify politics with the state and, therefore, to take the view

that families, tribes, voluntary organisations from cricket clubs to churches and