State Theory and Andean Politics presents an innovative approach to the study of rule by focusing on state-making efforts in the Andes. This book is organised into 13 chapters authored by 12 scholars who discuss the idea that the state is, in terms of Andersen (2006), as ‘imagined’ as it is real. Editors Krupa and Nugent look to present the book as a ‘non-realist approach’ to the study of the state. Readers are encouraged to stop reifying an ‘objective’ state, and rather begin to understand the representations of the state as a process that ‘legitimizes the illegitimate’ (p. 4). This study is a significant effort to account for how these imaginaries about the state are constructed (p. 14), as well as how they have both an ‘effect’ and ‘affect’ on people. With daily interactions, the state not only creates material enforcements, but also generates affective bonds and emotions by ‘maintaining social order and facilitating capital accumulation’ (p. 21), as Krupa and Nugent argue. The book is organised into five parts (1) Critical Phenomenologies of Rule, (2) Off-centred Morphologies of the State, (3) Fear, Fantasy and Delusion, (4) Cross-border Processes of Statecraft, and (5) Theoretical Reflections.
The first part of the book presents three critical phenomenologies of rule, which have in common the analysis of how the geography of state power is reshaped. Ramírez shows how the lack of state presence in certain areas of Colombia, such as the Putumayo, does not express merely the ‘disability’ of state capacities, but also how the state itself uses this discourse of ‘statelessness’ to exercise its power in other forms, such as the extraction of resources with violence (p. 35). Fabricant examines shifts in geographical state power in Bolivia. She argues that elites in Santa Cruz historically located at the centre of state power felt threatened by the large-scale reforms of the Morales’ government. As a consequence, they have struggled to reshape the balance between central and local state levels. Finally, Gill closes this first section with a historical analysis of the oil-refining centre of Barrancabermeja by showing how the state acts unevenly and purposely across territory. In a context of political conflict, policies intended to bring ‘the state back in’ end up ‘fragmenting’ state sovereignty’ (p. 88).
The second part of this book presents three cases in Ecuador in which the state has attempted to reorganise its relationship with indigenous populations. Drawing upon the case of Cayambé, Krupa analyses the reorganisation of the cadastral system as a means for incorporation (p. 99). These instruments, however, are not neutral, altering the power of different actors. Reorganisation revived antagonisms between landowners and indigenous people. In the following article, Clark provides an insightful study of state construction through the provision of health. The state was able to redefine its relationship with the indigenous population as it projected an image of neutrality, care, and compassion (p. 141). Finally, Prieto shows how the state is constructed as itinerant with repeated performances of ‘episode contacts’ with local populations. Through sporadic legal inspections and literacy campaigns, the state generated in consequence ‘partial state subjects’ (p. 163).
The third section explores the role of fantasy and imagination in the process of state formation. While the state produces performances to create ‘illusions’, it is also subject to its own illusions. On the one hand, Silverblatt argues that the making of the Andes colonial state was completed with great public performances, such as the ‘Gran Auto de Fe’, in which the main goal was to instigate fear in the population while the state sought to build a new social order and maintain the empire's cultural domination. Nugent, on the other hand, presents an interesting account of how the state failed to modernise Chachapoyas in Peru. The state created an ‘illusion’ of its ability to successfully accomplish proposed goals in a largely unknown territory. However, state failure, was attributed to the pre-modern ‘Indian’ peasantry characterised as subversive, which was later used as justification for further authoritarian interventions.
The fourth section discusses cross-border processes of state crafting with the goal of showing that the state has developed historically in connection with abroad. Spalding argues, ‘both the monarchy in Spain and the colonial state in the Andes developed at the same time’ (p. 217). By analysing the discussion of ‘law and justice’ on both sides of the Atlantic, Spalding shows how the conflict between the centre and periphery affected each other closely. In the next chapter, Tate's analysis of the Putumayo in Colombia demonstrates how criminalised populations such as the cocaleros have sought to safeguard the civil liberties, rights and freedoms of citizens by establishing multiple international alliances in a context of competing and contradictory projects of rule; cocaleros thus take on a role typically assumed by the central state.
This book ends with theoretical reflections from two distinguished scholars. Pandey asserts that the collection of articles provides three important lessons: (1) the state is a claim to legitimacy; (2) the state is not an entity, ‘but a process, a project, a claim to authority that is never fully realized’ (p. 261); and (3) the states are off-centred, that is, they are always disarticulated and displaced, in other words, ‘not what it pretends to be, or what people dealing with the state, or talking of the state, imagine it to be’ (p. 262). Finally, Gupta highlights, through a comparative approach, the differences between the Spanish and Portuguese from English colonialism and raises two interesting questions. Is there a legacy from the fact that Iberian colonialism was inexperienced in its colonising project, in contrast with its British counterpart; and, second, can the difference possibly be explained in terms of the different racial ideologies that each of them had?
Throughout the book, the authors follow the argument that the state should be studied more as the population ‘imagines’ it. Despite the difficulty of easily identifying common ground across the chapters, they agree on four general points: (1) the state does not act equally across different geographical territories; (2) discourse on state absence can also be a disguise for other forms of state interventions; (3) statecraft is also based on the construction of ‘illusions’ to justify whether the state is able to perform a task, or reasons why it failed; and (4) the state is created with transnational connections made at both the top and bottom.
The imagined state is a subject that continues to be of debate and interest to scholars. With its off-centred and non-realist approach, this book misses the opportunity to offer an account on how the state is imagined by its own bureaucrats. Also, while the chapters clearly address the ‘effects’ and ‘affects’ of the projected state on subjects, the book lacks a more comprehensive systematisation of the outcomes and configurations of both processes. Nevertheless, this collection is a mandatory volume to consult while studying state formation in the Andes.
