ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses a conceptualization of state strength that identifies determinants of strength appropriate for comparative analyses of a range of questions regarding political, social, and economic change both within the region and across regions. To specify the determinants of state strength, one can begin with the structural characteristics of the set of institutions that constitute the state. In many other ways, however, the international system can weaken individual states. To draw out the implications of determinants of state strength, it is clear that state strength is not only a relational, contingent quality, but that, in addition to structural characteristics of the state apparatus itself. the location of the state in the international economy and its relationship to international controllers of capital and to other states has an impact on its capacities. This also implies that a global assessment such as "the Brazilian state is stronger than the Peruvian state" is problematic.
