By Jeffrey A. Tucker at Brownstone dot org.

What is the state, from whence does it come, and who controls it? One might suppose these questions have obvious answers. In reality the answer is elusive, not easily identified even by those who are part of the system.

Trump found this out in his first term. He naturally assumed that the president would be in charge, at least as regards the executive branch. He found out otherwise when the agencies worked closely with the media to undermine him at every step. After a four-year hiatus, he came back with a real determination to be the president.

It's easier said than done. Cabinet-level appointees frequently complain in private that they face intractable bureaucracies with all institutional knowledge. They often feel like stand-ins or mannequins. Trump is the unusual president who has even attempted to be in charge. Most are just happy for the emoluments of office and the plaudits that come with it.

In any case, anyone who reaches the heights in any state apparatus discovers that it is something different from anything described in the textbooks.

Plato conceived of the state as organic to life itself, mirroring the structure of the human soul. The polity was divided between the rulers (philosopher-kings), the guardians (warriors), and the producers (workers). The state exists to achieve justice, where each class performs its designated role harmoniously.

Aristotle offered a more realistic view. While the state is organic, it is not soulful. It has definite functions to promote the well-being of all through laws and education, balancing the interests of different classes. Aristotle favored a mixed government to prevent tyranny and promote stability.

Moving forward to the Enlightenment period, theories of the state in the West evolved with the advance of technology and economics. Thomas Hobbes saw the state as essential for stopping civil war between factions. Without it, life would be solitary, nasty, brutish, and short. To be sure, he was writing in the midst of the English Civil War.

John Locke in his Second Treatise on Government also saw the state as essential but extremely limited. Its job was to protect property and essential rights. It could also be overthrown under conditions of tyranny. The issue was personal to him as a victim of the trauma of war, revolution, and censorship.

Locke was the author of the template of what later became the Declaration of Independence. Here we find the view that the state is the "necessary evil," a perspective largely accepted as true by the US Founding Fathers.

Soon after, the Hegelian view was born within the Platonic tradition. G.W.F. Hegel valorized the state as god marching on earth, the gathering force of social firmament to bend history to the inevitable conquest of rightful victors. This view was picked up on the right (national socialism) and left (international socialism) to infuse other conceptions of the state with an air of inevitability.

All this talk of the organic and essential character of the state struck a more radical tradition of thought as hopelessly naive. Franz Oppenheimer wrote that the state is an inorganic invading force, a conquering force, and always unwelcome, an institution exogenous to society itself.

This view was pushed by Albert Jay Nock and later Murray Rothbard, both of whom saw the state as inherently exploitative. The solution was simple: get rid of it once and for all, but not in the way Marx imagined. The result of the absence of the state would not be utopia but something closer to what Locke imagined: a well-functioning and peaceful society organized based on ownership and voluntary cooperation.

A deeply informed historical perspective on the state is offered by Bertrand de Jouvenel. In his view, the state is organized out of the firmament of society itself as natural elites gain the confidence of the public in matters of settling disputes. The elites constitute themselves as arbiters and cultural fig...