In his recent article ‘The State as Person in International Theory’, Alexander Wendt advocates explicitly ‘personifying the state’. In his philosophical argument, he opposes a ‘physicalism’ which would reduce states to their individual members with his own ‘thin version of personhood’ derived from social theory. But this approach, neglecting normative criteria, sets up an opposition between false extremes, as well as being false to the full nature of human beings. It is doubtful whether the state is ever, in practice, the perfect corporate agent of Wendt's prescription, and it would be suspect if it were.