Customer Reviews

On the Medieval Origins of the Modern State

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This is a classic, both for it's clarity and for its brevity(110 pages!). Strayer was a professor at Princeton and worked for the CIA on the side. In his book, "the invention of the middle ages", Norman Cantor describes his life as a graduate student at Princeton under Strayer. Apparently he was always running off to advise the government on one thing or another. It's an amusing thought.

Strayer's analysis is heavy on the bureaucratic development of france and england, light on everything else. Basically, he contrasts the centralist state of England with the "mosaic" state of France, and demonstrates how the heavy bureaucracy of france (and other contiental states of europe) can be attributed to the need of a weak central government to integrate provinces with their own "national" identities. This goal was accomplished by layering different sorts of councils and administrators on top of one another, with the King at the top.

This is contrasted with England, which functioned, in Strayer's mind as a "large french province", with the King at the top of an abbreviated hierarchy.

His institutional focus is on the development of law courts and the finance ministry- these were the first departments to come of age in the west. The law courts because the king's original power was as court of last resort, the finance ministry because... well, every prince needs money.

As the title says, this is a book about the state, not the nation. There is no mention of culture in here, so don't look for it.

This book, as is well known, is a small classic among history books on Medieval Europe since its publication in the early 19seventies. There is a clear and distinct approach of rational government building in 11-14th century England and France, and how the modern state has roots shaped by the lessons and experiences of that time. Although the treatise is short, it is very clearly and concisely written. Obviously, the writer has deep knowledge of what he is talking about, and reading the book gives a stong impression that there is much more behind the analysis that he gives. The idea of more-or-less rational institutional building of government functions in middle-to late Medieval times does leave out a lot of other human elements shaping human governance at that time, while i got a distinct impression of the smoothness of the whole process overall. This seems certainly very debatable. Nevertheless, perhaps the sharp focus is what makes the book so very clear, informative and enjoyable to read. A definite must for any serious Medieval history buff...

Strayer's depth of knowledge and simplicity of thought are seldom combined in books with a challenging thesis that is still debated today. For example, the recent President of the American Historical Associate(James J. Sheehan) presented a Presidential Address(AHR Feb.2006) that challenges Strayer's analysis of the origins of sovereignty in Western Europe and more than a few recent historians have criticized Strayer's Anglophile framework for analyzing the evolving types of governing entities found in France and England in the 1300's. Not bad for a book that is a little over 100 pages long and written nearly 40 years ago. A suberb example of concise and erudite scholarship!

Strayer's classic work on the medieval origins of what we today refer to as "the state" is universally recognized as a key work that straddles (as its title implies) both the medieval and modern worlds. Based on a series of lectures Strayer gave at Princeton in the very early 1960's, the book concisely--and clearly, it must be said--makes the case that the modern state as we know it is the direct descendant of medieval patterns from western Europe in the 12th through 17th centuries. It's a thought that some have pointed out may seem so obvious as to be unnecessary to write up, but Strayer's work here helps establish the thought and then provides the basis for which it can be explored and analyzed. The work was so influential that it remains to this day a required text in many political science and medieval history programs (where it might seem odd at first blush that either of these fields would have any overlap at all), and is also similarly one of those rare works that had, and continued to have, a large impact on the theoretical areas of these fields and is yet the size of a very small trade paperback. If you think the book is trivial in nature, I encourage you to read it. It's depth is wonderfully woven into a parsimonious account that is intellectually stimulating and rewarding.

If you are a medievalist, this classic work helps further establish a solid connection between the medieval and the modern (at least, for the western world), and if you a political scientist, this book helps explain the origins of the very bodies that today make up so much of world discourse. Individuals in both groups should likewise both find the work a compelling and intellectually powerful achievement, as well as a rare book that is short, but deserves repeated readings. This is a six star book on every measure.

The true mark of a genius is in developing an idea that, when put forth seems obvious, yet is an original idea. This book is Strayer's work of genius. Being so short, Strayer's book should be mandatory reading in the public school system. No one else has come close to explaining the unique origin of the state system in the modern West.