ABSTRACT
A growing number of world order theorists have highlighted the declining importance of the state by drawing attention to several contemporary trends, notably the erosion of traditional national boundaries, the blurring of the dividing line between domestic and international politics and the ineffectiveness of government in many critical areas of policy. Conventional wisdom has it that the nation-state enjoys or at least enjoyed in nineteenth-century Europe, a considerable degree of independence in international decision-making. The traditional national/international dichotomy-appears to have lost much of its former relevance, especially at a time when capital is outgrowing national boundaries, thereby creating new tensions between the political and economic organization of the world. The chapter examines the systemic crisis from the perspective of the advanced capitalist state, without in any way implying that states in the periphery or semi-periphery of the world economy are less deserving of attention.
