ABSTRACT
The state is an artifact, a crafted institution designed with an end in view. Understood as an artificial construction geared toward an end, its robustness or ill health becomes then a function of how well, or to what extent, it manages to accomplish that which it was set up to accomplish. As we look through history, we will find that states have been geared toward a multiplicity of ends. Thus there has been talk of the warfare state, the theocratic state, the socialist or capitalistic state, and, most recently, the democratic state.
