"So what is the role for which the State is uniquely suited, which sets states apart from non-states? A variety of answers have been suggested at various times. Plato held that the State exists to bring out the best in human nature. Aristotle held a similar view, although the two philosophers differed sharply as to what sort of state would best achieve that goal. Hobbes contended that the rationale for the State's existence was that without it, all humans would be in a perpetual state of war with each other, even if for some time they were not actively doing battle. More optimistic than Hobbes, Locke thought that social cooperation could occur in the "state of nature," but that the State would enhance "natural" society by providing a stable body of law, by designating official, impartial judges to resolve disputes, and by giving the law teeth through its overwhelming preponderance of force compared to any individual miscreant. The American Declaration of Independence claimed that "Governments are instituted among Men" to secure "certain unalienable Rights" possessed by every human being, including the rights to "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." More recently, political philosophers such as John Rawls have agreed with the American founders that the State's primary purpose is to protect the rights of its citizens, while significantly expanding the set of rights in question by including, for example, a right to a particular, minimum level of material well being. Although a thorough examination of even one of the above ideas could fill a book, I will now offer my one paragraph survey of the history of political philosophy, indicating briefly why I think each of them misses the mark. Far from promoting human virtue, the State, and especially holding the reins of government power, has tended to bring out the worst in people, as they descend to lobbying for their special interests, bullying their neighbors into acceding to their will through politics, and employing whatever political power they hold to satisfy their personal desires. Far from bringing peace to human society, states have engaged in almost ceaseless warfare. Rather than protecting the rights of their citizens, states have been the foremost violators of those rights. Furthermore, each of the roles listed above has been filled successfully by institutions other than the State. Philosophers and spiritual leaders have had better luck promoting human virtue than have government officials. Peace has more often come about when the citizens of warring states became so war weary that their governments could no longer persuade or compel sufficient numbers of them to fight. Rights have done far better by individuals and private organizations who resisted the power of the State than they have by governments. Even the social safety net beloved by modern political thinkers has been provided successfully by non-governmental means. What role, then, can the State fill better than any alternative institution? I believe it is the following: Humans have hit upon no social arrangement that is superior to the State as a means by which a powerful elite can routinely and systematically plunder the rest of their society in order to acquire wealth and status for themselves. Furthermore, the continued existence of any particular state ultimately depends on how well it performs that function, since it is the flow of personal benefits it directs to those who hold power that keeps them at work enhancing the scope of government and developing and promoting ideologies that justify the existence of the State. ... If my analysis of the essential nature of the State is correct, then even the most sincere "soul searching" over Abu Ghraib – or over the Gulag, or Auschwitz, or the fire bombing of Dresden, or the Cambodian killing fields, or Hiroshima – while obviously better than either blithely accepting or nonchalantly shrugging off such events, is superficial unless the search extends far enough to reveal what lies at the heart of the State. If I am right, then such blatant recourses to force come about when a state feels threatened enough to risk exposing its continual reliance on violence.