Goerlitz Hermann

An extensive body of research has been assembled by modern social science on the interaction of state power and big business, yet despite this the relevance of a thorough theoretical review of these relations has not diminished in recent decades. This article analyzes a number of paradigms that defi ne value criteria, worldviews and theoretical and methodological standards aff ecting both scholarly research in this area and the development of state policy and actual politics. These are rational-critical, corporatist and neo-corporatist paradigms, that of the “new state management,” and such critical theories as neo-Marxism and the theory of political networks. When analyzing these paradigms, the author pays special attention to the operationalization of key concepts and the defi nition of basic interpretations, models and concepts of corporate-state interaction. The study of theoretical-methodological approaches contributes to the systematization of the results of research in the study of applied mechanisms of interaction between government and big business. The author concludes that the paradigms cited to a certain extent only coexist and actualize depending on the situation in the world economy, the political relations of individual states or their alliances, cultural characteristics and other factors.