Although state borders remained remarkably stable during the Cold War, states have disappeared, splintered, consolidated, and blended into supra-national communities since 1990. The articles in this volume look at borders in a new way, stressing their impermanence. In particular, the study looks at the tension between the actual borders of states and other virtual boundaries that frame human communities. The contributors include political scientists, sociologists, geographers, and historians who write about the Middle East, Europe, China, North America, and Asia.

List of contributors; Preface and Acknowledgements; Part I. Introduction: 1. Mental maps and virtual checkpoints: struggles to construct and maintain State and social boundaries Joel S. Migdal; Part II. On the Eve of the Nation-State: The Ottoman Empire: 2. Do states always favor stasis? Changing status of tribes in the Ottoman empire Resart Kasaba; 3. The preamble boundaries of Ottoman jewry Sarah Abrevya Stein; Part III. The State and 'Dangerous Populations': 4. 'Dangerous populations': state territoriality and the constitution of national minorities Adriana Kemp; 5. Making Myanmars: language, territory, and belonging in post-socialist Burma Mary Callahan; 6. Institutionalizing virtual Kurdistan West: pro-Kurdish politics in Western Europe Nicole Watts; Part IV. Inscribing Membership and Contesting Membership in the Nation: 7. Challenging boundaries and belongings: 'mixed blood' allotment disputes at the turn of the twentieth century Lauren Basson; 8. Belonging and not: civil boundaries in Rossland, BC during the Great War Kenneth Lawson; 9. Boundaries and belonging in conditions of extreme politicization: the Chinese state in private and public spaces, 1949-1968 Neil Diamant; 10. Reproductions and maintenance of group boundaries: Why the 'secular' Wtate matters to religious authorities in Israel Patricia Woods; Part V. Beyond the State: Transnational Forces and the Challenge to the State: 11. Belonging in the PACE lane: fast border-crossing and citizenship in the age of neoliberalism Matthew Sparke; 12. Contested boundaries: citizens, states, and the supranational belonging in the European Union Lisa Conant; 13. Boundaries of the nation-state and the lure of the Islamic community in Turkey Yesim Arat; Part VI. Conclusion: Conclusion Beatrice Hibou; Index.