Today in class we got talking about the Hobbsian state creating and how it creates deterrence politics… that the purpose of the state is to constrain violence, and thus the state becomes a legitimate wielder of power to cause violence. And this of course is the classical definition of the state, that the state is a legitimate monopoly over violence (Max Weber).
Thus territorial lines are drawn to keep violence out and we chest thump our sovereignty and applaud our militaries. And this is not just an extreme right position. Liberals and on left and right create and support policies and practice propose security to discipline and order the state and thus laws are used as instruments for the government and not the people. In fact this is Michel Foucault’s view of the French Physiocrats of the 18th century who laid the foundation for economic change and discontent right before the French Revolution… a time when International Relations was still a toddler. Today, it is an impulsive youth whose most publicized arguments keep giving us slap-on-the-face reasons for why the world is the way it is.
Development and progress thus are not going to happen without security, and thus those best at this race, keep ‘us’ out. And well they have the sovereignty (common to liberals and realists)/rights (common to liberalism)/capability (neo-realists especially) to do so.
Got this image from http://i.imgur.com/Fqw2e.jpg
Pakistani Penguintellectual 