ABSTRACT
Theda Skocpol's States and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analysis of France, Russia, and China was widely read and discussed on publication; the first criticism came from a Marxist, the British sociologist Michael Burawoy. The sociologist William H. Sewell Jr. argues that she rejection of ideology is an "extreme position and a very difficult one to sustain". He suggests that Skocpol's treatment of ideology is an unfair simplification. Sewell's criticism, she takes on board. Skocpol accepts that her treatment of ideology did not give it its due. She thinks, however, that Sewell's argumentᾹthat ideology as a "cultural system" held by everyone and no one, rather than identifiable individualsᾹis still too broad. Skocpol brings the role of ideas back to her analysis in a similar way to her method of bringing in class conflict: by considering how they are related to the breakdown of the state and the centralization of power.
