This course aims to take a closer look at a familiar term, “the state” – an imagined entity that has sovereign right to regulate its people’s actions and purposes within its territory. The state is one of the most mysterious entities in politics and society. We recognise what it does, but not its formation, stability, strength, and many other features that command a grand consolidation of authority and life. The course will demonstrate, through a series of readings from state theory as well as from cases in development practice that the state and development are best understood in processual rather than in static or finished terms.

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