The substantive character of the state lies in its expropriation of power from the mass of the people and its monopolization by a small minority. It is this aspect of the state that Lenin caught so well in State and Revolution: the state is a special force alienated from society, a public power which arises out of society but places itself above it. As an armed force, the state is not the people armed but the separation of armed force from the people and its monopolization by the state. As a police, the state is not the self-regulation of society by its own members but rather the alien regulation of society by a police hierarchy.

As law, the state is not merely the administration of justice but rather the expropriation of the means of administering justice by the state. As economic regulator, the state is not just planner of production and distribution but represents the loss of these functions for the people themselves. In short, the state is an alien power separated from the mass of the people.

Although the state is an alien force above society, this alienation is not fixed. The democratic republic has a degree of alienation quite distinct from a monarchy, apartheid or a fascist dictatorship. Police accountability to representative bodies; citizen access to state secrets; bureaucratic subordination to parliament and courts; court openness to the public; public participation in the administration of justice; public scrutiny of what goes on inside police stations and prisons; rights of citizens not to be subjected by the police to arbitrary search, detention and interrogation; rights of citizens to organize themselves independently of the state — all such matters inhibit the alienation of the state from society, and their erosion worsens the relationship between the state and society.

At the same time the police, the courts and the bureaucracy remain, in society’s eyes, alien powers over which society may exercise more or less influence but which belong to that which is opposed to society, the state.

And Another

The Holy Grail by Monty Python

King Arthur: Old woman!
Peasant: Man.
KA: Man. I’m sorry. Old man, what knight lives in that castle?
P: I’m 37.
KA: What?
P: I’m only 37 ... I’m not old.
KA: Well, I can’t just say: “Hey, man!”
P: You could say: “Dennis”.
KA: I didn’t know you were called Dennis.
P: You didn’t bother to find out, did you?
KA: I’ve said I’m sorry about the old woman, but from behind you looked...
P: What I object to is that you automatically treat me as an inferior.
KA: Please, please good person, I am in haste. What knight lives in that castle?
P: No one lives there.
KA: Well, who is your lord?
P: We don’t have a lord.
KA: What?
P: I told you, we’re an anarcho-syndicalist commune. We take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the week ...
KA: ... yes ...
P: ... but all the decisions of that officer ...
KA: ... yes, I see ...
P: ... must be approved at a bi-weekly meeting by a simple majority in the case of purely internal affairs ...
KA: ... be quiet ...
P: ... but a two-thirds majority ...
KA: Be quiet! I order you to shut up.
P: Order, eh? Who do you think you are?
KA: I am your King.
P: Well, I didn’t vote for you.
KA: You don’t vote for kings.
P: Well, how did you become King then?
KA: The Lady of the Lake, her arm clad in purest shimmering samite, held Excalibur aloft from the bosom of the waters to signify that by Divine Providence, I, Arthur, was to carry Excalibur. That is why I am your King.
P: Look, strange women lying on their backs in ponds handing over swords, that’s no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.
KA: Be quiet!
P: You can’t expect to wield supreme executive power just because some watery tart threw a sword at you.
KA: Shut up!
P: I mean, if I went around saying I was an Emperor because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, people would put me away.
KA: (grabbing him by the collar) Shut up, will you. Shut up!
P: Ah! Now we see the violence inherent in the system.
KA: Shut up!
P: Come and see the violence inherent in the system. Help, help, I’m being repressed. [Other peasants arrive. KA notices.]
KA: Bloody peasant. (drops peasant)
P: Oooh! Did you hear that? What a giveaway.
KA: Come on, Patsy. (they leave)
P: Did you see him repressing me, then? That’s what I’ve been on about.