Whither the state?

Political studies conference takes on the state

Tessa Vanderhart Staff

“Reports of the death of the state are greatly exaggerated,” said political studies professor James Ferguson, taking a line from Mark Twain.

Ferguson was making the closing remarks of the 22nd Annual Political Studies Students’ Conference, entitled “The State of the State,” held from Feb. 1-3.

“I must say that I’m skeptical when people say that the state is eroding . . . more and more of my meager paycheque appears to be going to the benefit of the state, not to the benefit of you and I,” said professor Paul Buteux.

Barbara Van Haute, a doctoral candidate at Carleton University, asked the big question: “Is the state becoming a threat to itself? Is it imploding?” she asked. “Does a state, any state, have the ability to threaten future state sovereignty?”

Stephen McBride, director of the Centre of Global Political Economy at Simon Fraser University, presented the opening keynote address, entitled “Globalization, Neoliberalism, and the State.”

Despite the “rather grand” title of globalization, he said, the idea that the state is withering has largely been dispelled. Still, he noted, it is simply too easy to say that the state is not changing: it is internationalizing and privatizing, and could soon be unrecognizable.

“Why would the nation-states of the world, especially the powerful ones, create a situation in which they were about to disappear?” asked McBride.

McBride added that while NAFTA and other international agreements have not weakened the welfare state, they are demonstrative of the increasing importance of international agreements, which become so powerful that they affect the constitutions of nations.

“In effect, decision-making is being privatized,” said McBride. Decisions from NAFTA arbitrators cannot be changed unless they are “completely irrational,” he noted.

What does this mean for the state?

According to McBride, “there’s no doubt that the neoliberals won, big time.”

James Keely, a professor at the University of Calgary, said that if the global community is analysed, in terms of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, it appears that something is being done right: “[Some nations] have tiptoed to the brink, others have voluntarily receded: Australia, Iraq . . . .”

The conference was capped off with a special presentation by Lieutenant-Colonel Mike Voith, commanding officer of the Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) of the Canadian Forces. It was organized by co-coordinators Leanne Vercaigne and Elliott Brown, both graduate students, and attended by students and volunteers looking for the answer to the question: whither the state?

“I don’t think sovereignty comes in degrees . . . you’ve either got it, or you don’t,” said Ferguson.

He cited the “Phantom Menace” of the U.S. — the creator and beneficiary of globalization — as the main reason Canadians are concerned about the state of the state.

“States are everywhere,” noted Ferguson. “To disagree . . . certainly bites the hand that feeds you.”