The State: Its History and Development Viewed Sociologically

The author traces the origin of centralized political power to conquest and class domination rather than to a voluntary social contract, arguing that organized rule emerges when one group subjugates another and seizes resources. Drawing on comparative historical and sociological evidence, he shows how war, expropriation, and economic accumulation give rise to ruling classes and institutional instruments such as taxation, law, and bureaucracy. The work critiques contractarian and gradual-growth accounts, formulates a principle connecting prior economic accumulation to state formation, and considers cooperative and associative arrangements as alternatives to coercive governance.