End of the State and Basis of Sovereignty

Hobbes, Austin and others talk about sovereign authority of the State. Underlying principle in this is that power is an important ingredient of the State. However, MacIver holds that power in itself has no meaning for the State unless it is lawful. He says, ‘in the last resort force can be entrusted to the State, that it may be everywhere subjected to law.’ And further, coercive power of the State may be its criterion but cannot be its essence. As such, supremacy of the State should not be built around the concept of sovereignty and power. The State, according to MacIver, should be known by the service it renders. For him, service is the end of State and his ‘service state’ is an agent of society, which has the function of guaranteeing rights and unity of social relationship and order in society. Power is only an instrument or means of these services. As service rendered by the State is limited, its power must also be limited. The State commands only because it serves; it owns only because it owes.

MacIver’s views on primacy of society, multiplicity of associations and depth of loyalties of their members, authority and supremacy of law and limitation on power or sovereignty of the State appear in his book The Modern State, which Bottomore terms as ‘one of the major statements of a pluralist view’.⁶⁰ To sum up MacIver’s position, we may quote him, ‘the organization of the state is not all social organization; the ends for which the state stands are not all the ends which humanity seeks; and quite obviously, the ways in which the state pursues its objects are only some of the ways in which within society men strive for the objects of their desire.’⁶¹ In MacIver, we find a clear presentation of pluralist position from sociological point of view.