The birth of the deep state

Abstract

A number of political scientists believe that the ‘deep state’ originated simultaneously with the state itself. But in fact, the authors of the article prove that the first effective ‘deep state’ in modern history appeared in England during the time of Henry VIII. Then, having nationalized the church, the king added to his powers the right to create and interpret norms. In response, reacting to the imbalance of the political system created by the king, the English aristocracy set out to control the monarch. The newly created network of influence was based on corruption: belonging to it guaranteed, to an official in the king’s service, additional benefits and career perspectives. The mean of internal control of the network was ‘ritual compromising evidence’, when other members witnessed the violating of generally accepted norms and rules. This guaranteed that in case of betrayal the reputation and future of any potential renegade would be destroyed. However, this triggered the processes of ‘normalization of violations,’ which culminated in the Cromwellian revolution and the Westminster Confession, which not only nullified out all compromising evidence, but also abolished the concept of sin in general. After recovering from the upheaval, England managed to summarize and theorize its experience. In the following century, it started to extrapolate it to France, which was its main geopolitical rival, mastering the techniques of cognitive programming. The same processes, that had spontaneously developed in England a century earlier, were launched in France, but in a controlled and guided form. England managed to create its own ‘deep state’ in France, which, in fact, inspired and supported the French Enlightenment by introducing into the public discourse concepts, which were in fact, cognitive operators: their implementation led to the natural conclusion of the backwardness of France compared to England. At the same time, the ‘deep state’ became a stable construct: thus, classical institutionalism assumes it as an integral part of the secular political system. In particular, this was realized, and promoted as a norm, by J.-J. Rousseau. The authors draw a number of conclusions on the construction of the deep state. It is always a network of influence, an alternative to power, which actively uses corruption as an instrument of stimulation and employs compromising evidence as an instrument of control.