Capitalist states enable capital reproduction rather than serving it functionally

Evidence

A state can be called capitalist, then, primarily in the structural sense of enabling the reproduction of capital overall, of mediating in some general and contingent sense the contradictions that capital and its fractious factions almost inevitably generate. So states are not in any narrow sense functional for capital’s reproduction, or for the extension and expansion of accumulation. Rather, capitalist states constitute at most the terrain of struggle over the range of selected strategies (what Jessop calls “strategic selectivity”) for capital’s reproduction and accumulability locally and globally, short and long term. They offer the field for fashioning the sort of underlying hegemony, the (re)production of consent, that would sustain overall such reproduction and accumulation across classes (Jessop, 1990:9-10). — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1669

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines ‘capitalist state’ via structural reproduction of capital and Jessop’s ‘strategic selectivity’, useful against instrumentalist readings.
• XREF: Qualifies how the vault’s Marxist state theory is applied; the structural-not-functional distinction echoes prior Frankfurt/state-capital readings. — connects to: States are capitalist by structural position, not class composition — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1666; Neoliberalism subordinates the state to capital rather than freeing markets — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 1720; The Welfare State functions as capital’s flexible adjustment mechanism, not labor’s victory — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the…, 205 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• States are capitalist by structural position, not class composition #expands (0.85) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1666
• Neoliberalism subordinates the state to capital rather than freeing markets #corroborates (0.80) — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 1720
• Neoliberalism intensifies rather than breaks with capitalist state form #corroborates (0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1748
• The Welfare State functions as capital’s flexible adjustment mechanism, not labor’s victory #expands (0.78) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 205
• Globalization theory overlooks that nation-states still serve their own capital #expands (0.75) — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 441