Media, Information and Technoculture 3375F/G Lecture Notes - Nationstates, Limited Government
13 Jan 2013
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Document Summary
The modern state was formed through the peace of westphalia (1648) Peace of westphalia series of treaties to end the thirty years" war signed by the holy roman. Emperor: established a system of sovereign nation-states, each claiming absolute autonomy. Charles tilly"s three features specific to nation-states emerged in the 17th century: cultural homogeneity, peasant way of life, extensive, decentralized, but relatively uniform political structures. Peasants resisted any help from state makers, fuelled by taxation: state makers used taxation to raise revenues to finance their expanding armies. Cyclical dynamic of state formation also suggests the existence of a causal relationship between war making and state making. Machiavelli, bodin and hobbes articulated the concept of sovereignty as indivisible. John locke articulated the concepts of individual rights and a limited government. Once the concept of secular sovereignty because entrenched, the struggle to include individual rights emerged as rallying points of the american and french revolutions. Took shape mainly between the two world wards.
