State building can be viewed as the historical process by which groups outside of the state are able to get domains organized by the state to make ru… - Neil Fligstein

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State building can be viewed as the historical process by which groups outside of the state are able to get domains organized by the state to make rules for some set of societal fields. These rules reflect the interests of the most powerful groups in various fields. Politically oriented social movements are, by definition, outside of some established field of a given state. They are oriented toward either creating a new domain where they will have power, or taking over and transforming an existing domain or even the entire state. At any given moment, there are political projects in the fields that make up states (i.e., “normal politics”) and social movements oriented toward altering incumbents’ ability to set rules.