Response #1

In response to “Weber Blog”, I’d like to point out that Weber expands his definition of a state to mean “a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory”. Though violent non-state actors were in shorter supply in 1918 than they are now, they did exist during Weber’s time, and I’m sure the author was fully aware of them. Still, the question of whether Weber—or anyone, for that matter—would consider Blackwater a purveyor of “legitimate” force is interesting, considering the business’s legal status is still unclear.

To take Jackie up on her suggestion, I’d now like to consider how Weber’s definition of the state compares to that of Aristotle. Most obviously, Weber bases his definition on words like “force” (as was already mentioned), “violence”, and “domination”, whereas Aristotle focuses on concepts such as “common interests” and the “highest good”. Aristotle characterizes the state as a completely naturally occurring association, based on two assertions: 1) the individual is not self-sufficient, therefore a state is needed to satisfy individuals’ common needs and interests; and 2) each individual—and by extension each community—aims at the good, therefore the state (which is the highest political community) aims at the highest good.

Rather than characterizing the state as something naturally occurring, Weber (arguably) uses a Marxist interpretation of the evolution of political structures, starting with the autonomous vassals of the “estate” system and ending with the modern state, which consolidates all the “material means of administrative organization” under a single leadership. These means are described in economic terms. (The interpretation is not surprising, considering the Bolshevik Revolution tore through Russia a year prior to his writing “Politics as a Vocation”.) So while Aristotle argues that we essentially opt to form a state on our own grounds and for our own interests, Weber suggests that a state is formed when a single leadership entity creates complete “separateness” in terms of political means between the ruler and the ruled.