restored, competitive party systems established and economic liberalism
enforced (Cammack et al., 1993, p. 79).
The dialectical approach brings to the fore important interrelationships
between state and civil society. But it does not distinguish itself sufficiently
from other approaches to politics which also understand that the state is
structured by its environment, that states are actors in the international
arena, that strategically placed élites are capable under some circumstances
of taking control by military force, that state élites, especially professional
bureaucrats, make contributions to foreign and domestic public policy that
are more influential than those made by political parties and pressure
groups, and that autonomous state action is motivated in part by the desire
of state élites to reinforce their power and prerogatives.
There is also a danger that the state will be reified when construed as an
autonomous actor influencing and being influenced by international and
domestic contexts. However, the theory does suggest some potentially fruit-
ful lines of further inquiry in its interpretation of the impact of state inter-
vention on the mobilization of political interests and the form that such
mobilization might take. Critiques which attempt to restore socio-economic
factors as the determinants of politics (such as Migdal et al., 1994) not only
need to show how their approach differs. They also have to avoid confusing
state powerlessness with state incompetence. The damaging consequences
of economic mismanagement do not indicate a loss of power on the part of
state authorities so much as demonstrate the dreadful influence of powerful
but venal and incompetent state leadership.
While it is debatable how far nation-states have ever not had to share
power or contend with forces cutting across national boundaries, there is no
doubt that the international economic and governmental system is more
complex, ‘influencing institutional agendas’ and changing the balance
between national, regional and international legal frameworks (Held et al.,
1999, p. 81). However, the nation-state remains at the centre of these com-
plexities and takes the lead in managing their domestic and international
consequences.
The concept of globalization may also provide states and governments
with a convenient myth with which to discipline society to meet what is pre-
sented as the inevitable, impersonal and unalterable requirements of the
global marketplace (Held and McGrew, 2000, p. 5). If governments cave in
under pressure from multinational corporations over investment rights,
environmental regulation, or food production, it is because they choose to
favour corporate interests, not because they are subject to the natural laws of
the international order. And if international governance is needed to deal
The State in the Third World 133