ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the rise of the state in relation to the postliberal claim of a lost sense of transcendentally anchored solidarity. It highlights key sociological and anthropological theories of the state and places these into dialogue with the development of the state in the Anglo-Saxon West. It then explores how structural arrangements enable and inhibit the development of solidarity at the grassroots. In particular, it highlights the importance of awakening to transcendent ideals and the myths through which they are articulated as a means of resisting the iron cage of bureaucracy.
