also introduces a distinctiveevolutionaryperspective into the analysis of the state and
state power in order to discover how the generic evolutionary mechanisms of
selection, variation, and retention may operate in speciWc conditions to produce
relatively coherent and durable structures and strategies. This implies that oppor-
tunities for reorganizing speciWc structures and for strategic reorientation are
themselves subject to structurally-inscribed strategic selectivities and therefore
have path-dependent as well as path-shaping aspects. For example, it may be neces-
sary to pursue strategies over several spatial and temporal horizons of action and to
mobilize diVerent sets of social forces in diVerent contexts to eliminate or modify
speciWc constraints and opportunities linked to particular state structures. Moreover,
as such strategies are pursued, political forces will be more or less well-equipped to
learn from their experiences and to adapt their conduct to changing conjunctures.
Over time there is a tendency for reXexively reorganized structures and recursively
selected strategies and tactics to co-evolve to produce a relatively stable order, but this
may still collapse owing to the inherent structural contradictions, strategic dilemmas,
and discursive biases characteristic of complex social formations. Moreover, because
structures are strategically selective rather than absolutely constraining, there is always
scope for actions to overXow or circumvent structural constraints. Likewise, because
subjects are never unitary, never fully aware of the conditions of strategic action,
never fully equipped to realize their preferred strategies, and may always meet oppos-
ition from actors pursuing other strategies or tactics; failure is an ever-present
possibility. This approach is intended as a heuristic and many analyses of the state
can be easily reinterpreted in strategic-relational terms even if they do not explicitly
adopt these or equivalent terms. But the development of a strategic-relationalresearch
programmewill also require many detailed comparative historical analyses to work
out the speciWc selectivities that operate in types of state, state forms, political
regimes, and particular conjunctures (for an illustration, see Jessop 2002 ).
9NewDirectionsofResearch
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Notwithstanding declining interest in the more esoteric and abstract modes of state
theorizing, substantive research on states and state power exploded from the 1990 s
onwards. Among the main themes are: the historical variability of statehood (or
stateness); the relative strength or weakness of states; the future of the national state
in an era of globalization and regionalization; the changing forms and functions
of the state; issues of scale, space, territoriality, and the state; and the rise of
governance and its articulation with government.
state and state-building 125