The aim of the course is to evaluate the development and administrative characteristics of forms of social organization within the framework of an analytical method, taking into account their economic, social, and administrative conditions; and to examine the emergence of the modern state, along with the thinkers who produced theoretical knowledge regarding the concept of the state and the administrative sphere during this process, while also considering the social, economic, and administrative characteristics of the historical period they observed, along with its historical milestones.

The course begins by focusing on methodological discussions regarding what the concept of the state signifies and how it can be analyzed (such as the hypothetical approach, the historical approach, and the sociological approach). Within an economic-political framework, the development of forms of social organization experienced by humanity from antiquity to the present is explained, and the general trajectory of the concept of the state—from the earliest forms of social organization to the modern state—is evaluated. Following this, economic and social organization in antiquity and the concept of the state are examined, with a focus on the approaches to the state and governance of Plato and Aristotle. Subsequently, the concept of the state in the Roman Empire and Roman Law—which has left a legacy to the present day—are examined in terms of their general characteristics, and information is provided about figures who observed and reflected on the state and law in Rome (Polybius, Cicero, and Ulpian).