The genesis of this volume lay in the individual writings of the authors. All ten participants had written about states in various corners of the world, noting how susceptible to the influence of their societies these states were. Over a period of nearly three years, these authors worked together – first in a preparatory meeting (of the editors plus Catherine Boone) in Princeton and then in two full-fledged workshops in Seattle and Austin – to develop a common approach to the study of state and society. This book is the product of those deliberations.

Although we came together from diverse intellectual backgrounds and studied a remarkably heterogeneous set of societies, we came to share a state-in-society approach. Joel Migdal's essay in Part I served as the initial discussion piece and intellectual framework at the workshops, generating debate, highlighting differences among us, and clarifying our points of agreement. We concurred that the struggles for domination in society do not always begin – and certainly do not end – at the commanding heights of the state. Nor are such battles always among large-scale social forces (the entire state organization, well-organized interest groups, various social classes, civil society, and the like) operating on some grand level. Many of the most important encounters determining who dominates in societies and how those societies change take place far from what scholars and journalists have usually considered the center of action.