This collection of essays seeks to bring a “new level of conceptualization” (p. 1) to the idea of boundaries in the burgeoning field of American political development (APD). In their introduction, the three editors note how the concept of the state “lacks an overarching conceptual framework” (p. 3) and is prone to four simplistic scholarly misconceptions. Those misconceptions are the state as monster, tyrant, autonomous bureaucracy, and modernizer (p. 4). The chapters by contributing scholars offer “boundary conditions” concerning “America and the world” and “civil society” (p. 6).

This is a daunting empirical challenge. In his concluding chapter, editor William Novak notes that the boundary concept needs additional study. He is right about that, though several chapters contribute notably to advancing the conceptualization of state boundaries in the United States. It is the more empirically grounded chapters that make the strongest contribution to that enterprise.

An example is C. J. Alvarez’s exploration of the history of the U.S.—Mexican border, which became well defined in the late nineteenth century because both national governments developed incentives to police it. The Diaz government in Mexico sought to contain and suppress rebel factions in the borderlands, and the United States sought to bolster the Diaz government with border enforcement (p. 81). A clear border was also necessary in order to facilitate the growth of farming and extractive industries in the borderlands (pp. 95–96). The broader point evident here is that common interests in policing and economic development contribute to the establishment of national borders. That is a sound generalization from this case that is worthy of further empirical tests in other national contexts.

Four chapters on the U.S. state’s linkages with civil society promote a rethinking of the borders of the American state. Gabriel Rosenberg documents growing federal support for 4-H clubs in the 1920s. Elizabeth Clemens demonstrates how the American Red Cross, initially a private organization, gradually became enmeshed in a “complex web” of public and private organizational linkages (p. 226). Omar McRoberts reveals how the 1960s War on Poverty led to the creation of a “public religious welfare state” (p. 253) in which the Office of Economic Opportunity had to define the practices of religious organizations in order to determine which practices could receive OEO funding. Robert Lieberman’s discussion of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission documents how its bureaucratic entrepreneurialism insured the success of affirmative action policy despite a “lack of state capacity” to impose it (p. 264). The commission succeeded by creating strategic alliances with private civil-society groups to achieve its ends (p. 285).

How do these four chapters stimulate a rethinking about the state in U.S. society? Each in its own way indicates how the American state expanded in the twentieth century by blurring its borders with private interests. By working with, regulating, and coordinating private organizations, the state entrenched itself further in civil society while making its parameters less distinct.

This may be the long-term trajectory for American state growth in the future. If so, it makes the concept of boundaries problematic, because tracing clear lines of public/private demarcation can become increasingly difficult.

Novak’s concluding chapter understandably calls for more study of American state boundaries and urges an avoidance of the ideological controversies about government size so central to current public discourse (p. 327). He urges students of APD not to become fixed upon studying the state only statistically or by employing anthropomorphic metaphors (p. 338). Those warnings are apt, but the difficulty of establishing state boundaries, given the findings noted, demand multiple methods—both qualitative and quantitative—in the study of boundaries.

An additional aspect addressed in the volume involves the impact of public opinion upon changing boundaries. James Sparrow examines the evolving image of Britain during changes in U.S. state boundaries in the first half of the twentieth century, with particular attention to Franklin Roosevelt’s attempt to encourage a positive public view of Britain as war worries grew in the 1930s. He concludes that the “scale and scope” of the U.S. national government’s “effort devoted to monitoring public discourse and political attitudes betrays a recognition of the centrality of public opinion to the unprecedented state-building enterprise on which the United States was embarked” during the New Deal and World War II (p. 121).

Today, public opinion consistently registers distrust of the U.S. national government. A 2013 Gallup survey of 129 nations found that a higher percentage of Americans (73%) believes that “corruption is widespread throughout the government” than the pollsters found among the publics of Haiti, Belarus, Venezuela, or Mexico (see “Government Corruption Viewed as Pervasive, ” Gallup.com, October 18, 2013, http://www.gallup.com/poll/165476/government-corruption-viewed-pervasive-worldwide.aspx ).

Such empirical findings suggest that contemporary public opinion about the U.S. state’s borders may have a great impact on the nation’s future course and deserves much investigation—both quantitative and qualitative. In all, this collection has great heuristic value for APD scholars. Though several authors reveal the difficulties of tracing U.S. state boundaries, their analyses underscore the importance of the concept for understanding the nation’s past and future.