I think there's a niche for libraries that allow you to update the DOM declaratively without any requirements on how you manage state. My understanding is that React looks at props / hooks in order to diff the state of your app and selectively recompute the virtual DOM. An alternative is to naively recompute the entire virtual DOM. I think this is how Mithril.js does it? It may be less efficient for large apps but it lets you manage state however you like.
