The Strategic Relational Approach in Retrospect and Prospect
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This article reviews the origins and subsequent development of the strategic-relational approach (SRA). It was first developed in relation to contrasting theories of the state, namely, capital logic and class struggle perspectives. I argued that the exercise of state power could not be derived logically from capitalist interests, nor could it be explained in terms of conflicting social forces. The SRA enables the state and state power to be ‘put in their place’ in a more comprehensive analysis of the development of social formations. This enabled the state to be understood as a social relation whereby state power reflects the changing balance of forces in political and politically-relevant struggle more generally and the institutional architecture of the state shapes these forces’ capacity to pursue their interest in the light of their changing goals, strategies and tactics. Given social contradictions and political struggles as well as internal conflicts and rivalries among its branches, one cannot understand the state’s capacity to act as a unified political force – to the extent that it ever does – without referring to political strategies. This approach was applied to the distinction between normal and exceptional regimes. Subsequently, the SRA was extended beyond its state-theoretical origins to include a more general account of the complex interaction of structure-agency relations and the idea of governance and metagovernance. It was later developed to explore the dialectic between path dependency and path-shaping, the relation between structural contradictions and strategic dilemmas, and the relation between structure and conjuncture through periodization. The latest step was to develop the cultural political economy approach, which takes structuration and meaning-making as the twin bases of social relations, and explores their co-evolution in terms of structural, agential, technological and discursive constraints and opportunities. The article considers all these issues and reflects on how the approach can be further developed.
Abstract
This article reviews the origins and subsequent development of the strategic-relational approach (SRA). It was first developed in relation to contrasting theories of the state, namely, capital logic and class struggle perspectives. I argued that the exercise of state power could not be derived logically from capitalist interests, nor could it be explained in terms of conflicting social forces. The SRA enables the state and state power to be ‘put in their place’ in a more comprehensive analysis of the development of social formations. This enabled the state to be understood as a social relation whereby state power reflects the changing balance of forces in political and politically-relevant struggle more generally and the institutional architecture of the state shapes these forces’ capacity to pursue their interest in the light of their changing goals, strategies and tactics. Given social contradictions and political struggles as well as internal conflicts and rivalries among its branches, one cannot understand the state’s capacity to act as a unified political force – to the extent that it ever does – without referring to political strategies. This approach was applied to the distinction between normal and exceptional regimes. Subsequently, the SRA was extended beyond its state-theoretical origins to include a more general account of the complex interaction of structure-agency relations and the idea of governance and metagovernance. It was later developed to explore the dialectic between path dependency and path-shaping, the relation between structural contradictions and strategic dilemmas, and the relation between structure and conjuncture through periodization. The latest step was to develop the cultural political economy approach, which takes structuration and meaning-making as the twin bases of social relations, and explores their co-evolution in terms of structural, agential, technological and discursive constraints and opportunities. The article considers all these issues and reflects on how the approach can be further developed.