The state is for the most part a key political concept in the minds of lawyers. It is often "devoid" of history: they use the same term to name ancient and modern political associations (Polis, Republic, Empire, national state), without noticing the fundamental difference between them. The paper emphasizes the difference between "universalist" and "critical" approaches to the state. The former seeks to see the birth of the state in the second Millennium BC, trying to link the emergence of law with the emergence of the state. The latter emphasizes the historical contextuality of the emergence of the state — a unique social institution that appeared in Europe during the early Modern period. The state is a modern (modern) social construct, and its reality is determined not only by the presence of a certain idea in the minds of people, but also by stable, typified social practices. In the modern world, law is mediated by the state, and in many cases, it is monopolized by it. In this perspective, the history of the state is often inseparable from the history of law, and the theory of law from the theory of the state. The author of the paper adheres to the second approach and agrees that law is a phenomenon whose existence has not been determined by the state for a long time.The author presumes that for many reasons, the state continues to be a priori political category in the minds of lawyers who observe daily manifestations of power mechanisms. To denounce this "naturalness" of the state, critical approaches to the concept and origin of the state are necessary. The paper presents various critical concepts of the state: from radical political evolutionism to critical conceptual history.