In this working paper Strange links her approach laid out in **States and Markets (1988)** and links it to the research she had recently published on the role of firms in the global system **Rival States, Rival Firms (with John M. Stopford, 1991)**. This leads her to conclude that a greater role for firms (and their decision-makers, their managers) must be recognised by social science, and that the 'nation state' is less and less useful as a concept for the study of the global system. Once again Strange's frustration with the myopia of her colleagues is scarcely concealed.