Table of Contents

Preface

Introduction: States of Imagination / Thomas Blom Hansen and Finn Stepputat

I. State and Governance

“Demonic Societies”: Liberalism, Biopolitics, and Sovereignty / Mitchell Dean

Governing Population: The Integrated Child Development Services Program in India / Akhil Gupta

The Battlefield and the Prize: ANC’s Bid to Reform the South African State / Steffen Jensen

Imagining the State as a Space: Territoriality and the Formation of the State in Ecuador / Sarah A. Radcliffe

II. State and Justice

The South African Truth and Reconcilliation Commission: A Technique of Nation-State Formation / Lars Buur

Reconstructing National Identity and Renegotiating Memory: The Work of the TRC / Aletta J. Norval

Rethinking Citizenship: Reforming the Law in Postwar Guatemala / Rachel Sieder

Governance and State Mythologies in Mumbai / Thomas Blom Hansen

III. State and Community

Before History and Prior to Politics: Time, Space, and Territory in the Modern Peruvian Nation-State / David Nugent

Urbanizing the Countryside: Armed Conflict, State Formation, and the Politics of Place in Contemporary Guatemala / Finn Stepputat

In the Name of the State? Schools and Teachers in an Andean Province / Fiona Wilson

The Captive State: Corruption, Intelligence Agencies, and Ethnicity in Pakistan / Oskar Verkaaik

Public Secrets, Conscious Amnesia, and the Celebration of Autonomy for Ladakh / Martijn van Beek

Bibliography

About the Contributors

Index

About the Author

Thomas Blom Hansen is a Reader in the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of Edinburgh.

Finn Stepputat is Senior Researcher at the Center for Development Research in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Reviews

"This outstanding volume contains an excellent introductory discussion of current trends of thinking and research on the state. The first-rate articles by a mix of well- and less-known scholars are sophisticated, nuanced, and accessible." - George Marcus, author of Ethnography Through Thick and Thin