The Nation-State and Violence: Volume Two of a Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism.

Abstract

'The twentieth century is' as Anthony Giddens reminds us in his introduction (p. 3), 'a bloody and frightening one'. And the violence has not, for the most part, been the result of the fierce class struggles anticipated by Marx. Not only modem Marxists but social scientists of all persuasions have failed to adequately address the contrast between the 'long peace' of the nineteenth century and the horrors, actual and potential, of our century. This is because the immediate roots of our social science lie in this 'long peace' when so-called peaceful industrial society seemed so far advanced on the warlike military societies of Europe's past. Such an optimistic contrast between present and past is clearly no longer tenable and yet we continue to neglect the role of the nation state and its violence in our social