A state is the entity that successfully claims sole authority to use violence within a territory.
Weber's 1919 definition, and the operative word is successfully. Where the claim is not made good — in areas run by militias or cartels — the entity may hold the title of state without holding the substance.
In practice
- A region where a militia collects the taxes and settles the disputes has a state in name and not in substance.
- A company town where one employer resolves every conflict has assumed a function the formal institutions have vacated.
- Subject
- Law & Politics
- Essay
- Competing accounts of how power works