Italy and Spain: Different Patterns of State/Society Complexes in the Contemporary Era

What conclusions can we draw from an analysis of transnational capital and classes, if we want to understand the State and its relations with society in contemporary Italy and Spain? The article reconstructs the interactions between the expansive waves of the ‘heartland’ of Western capital and the ‘State/society’ configurations in the two countries, and argues that in both of them transnational factors have played a key role. Some clear differences emerge. Italy's State had its origins in complex negotiations between transnational and national elites, and an often concealed ‘state class’ has usually provided the link between the ‘heartland’ and the country. Spain, on the other hand, underwent long periods of isolation, which she has mainly overcome with the help of a developmental authoritarian state. Both cases, however, illustrate how States, far from being monolythic, clear-cut entities, are rather complex historical agglomerations of ‘domestic’ and ‘external’ dynamics and interests.