여전히 국가는 유효한 분석단위인가? 비교정치연구에서의 세계화와 국가

Abstract

Globalization poses potential challenges to comparative political analysis based on the state as the primary unit of analysis. When the diffusion of universal political and economic institutions, ideas, and norms across borders occurs the basis for comparison might be lost because the units being compared are not separate instances of the phenomenon we wish to study. Nor is it reasonable to make the conventional assumption that a country’s political institutions and policy outputs result primarily from the interplay of forces within that country. Under the pressures of neoliberal marketization, the state's policymaking autonomy and command over its territory is asserted to be considerably undermined as well. This paper analyzes the methodological and empirical challenges that globalization has posed on the state as a unit of analysis, and argues that the "challenges" are neither new nor fatal. The challenges have enabled the state to reinforce its capacity and brought the comparative scholarly interest back to the state.