The National Causes of State Construction in France, Russia and China

Abstract

General lessons about state construction are drawn from concentration on the ‘Terror’ years of three post-revolutionary regimes: the Jacobin in France, 1793–4; the Bolshevik in Russia, 1918–21; and the Chinese, 1950–3. These three cases are chosen in order to develop a direct challenge to Skocpol's claims about state building in States and Social Revolutions. The findings show that early state building is not, primarily, a rational, centralizing, mobilizing, response to war and foreign war in particular. It is civil war which is of greater importance to an understanding of the development of revolutionary states and it is only after civil war is over that permanent state construction can begin. Comparison for differences, as well as similarity, at this crucial point at the end of civil war shows that, along with the importance of practical domestic policies as a basis for support, the essential foundation for the post-revolutionary state is central control over the revolutionary forces of internal coercion.