State Capacity and its Discontents

Konstantin Kisin and Francis Foster — the comedian-co-hosts of popular chat-show Triggernometry — always close out their interviews with the same question: “what’s the one thing we’re not talking about that we should be talking about?”

In my most recent go-round with the pair (last month), my chosen “thing we’re not talking about” was a concept brought across from economic history: state capacity.

State capacity refers to a nation-state’s ability to project power evenly and equally over its own population. It’s nothing to do with having a strong military or being in charge of an empire. Instead, it asks how well governments do the job they have to do in their own backyard.