The state for us is as natural as the change of seasons: from birth to death, we are connected with it by many of its institutions, from which there is no escape. However, the historic advance of statehood that began thousands of years ago was neither widespread nor irreversible. The book of Doctor of Historical Sciences Anatoly Alekseevich Shtyrbul is an attempt to generalize the experience of stateless societies precisely in the era of statehood, to identify their potential, limits of efficiency and possible perspective.