An Academic History of the War and State Building

In social science research, the theory of “war-making states” from Charles Tilly has important academic influence. From 1975 to 1990, Tilly revised his earlier views several times, eventually complete his theory in 1990. Tilly’s theory of “war-making states” is a middle-level theory with conditional and explanatory boundaries based on European experience, and at the same time, this theory also contains the expression of (causal) mechanism. It is precisely because of the historicization of this theory that scholars from different countries have tested this theory and achieved a series of high-quality works. However, the duality of Tilly’s thought in the process of producing this theory were ignored by some scholars. The problem consciousness of some scholars still fall into extreme between experience and theory. For example, some scholars only emphasize the difference between European experience and non-European experience, thus completely ignoring the general generalization of this theory; other scholars ask questions based on the (causal) mechanism of “war makes states, states make war”, thereby ignoring key differences between European and non-European contexts. For Chinese social sciences, establishing a middle-level theory that embodies experience and generalization may be the solution to the dilemma of localization and universalization of social sciences.