The concept of the state in British and French political thought

The importance of the concept of state in British political thought has rec ently been re-assessed, and Dyson's contrast between a continental 'state t radition' and an Anglo-American 'stateless tradition' has been put into que stion. Yet this paper argues that there remain crucial differences in the w ay in which French and British political thinkers have understood the conce pt of state. Focusing on a critical moment in the crystallization of the me aning of 'state', the turn of the twentieth century, and in particular on t he anti-statist pluralist school, it analyses how state critics were influe nced by national intellectual traditions. French thought has been permeated by the idea of the autonomy of the stale vis-a-vis society at large, while British thought has remained committed to an ideal of fluidity between sta te and society.