Unnatural States is a radical critique of international theory, in particular, of the assumption of state agency--that states act in the world in their own right. Peter Lomas argues that since the universal states system is inequitable and rigid, and not all states are democracies anyway, this assumption is unreal, and to adopt it means reinforcing an unjust status quo.

Looking at the concepts of state, nation, and agency, Lomas sees populations struggling to find an agreed model of the state, owing to inherited material differences; and unsurprisingly, among theorists of...