This chapter lays out some of the key concepts and theories that support the book, as well as a key conceptual typology of colonial governance. It starts with an examination of the literature on civil conflict, highlighting its attributes but explaining its limitations in relation to the types and patterns of both insurgent and social violence in south Asia. It then lays out the framework of political order and institutions that has implicitly driven much of the research on political violence and related outcomes in comparative politics. I argue that some of the assumptions embedded in this framework do not allow for the examination of the historical roots of subnational institutions. I provide an alternative in the analytical tradition of state-building, and suggest how uneven state-building in developing countries can shape state-society relations. The chapter concludes with laying out the key conceptual typology of colonial governance, by interacting two dimensions of direct and indirect rule, which serves as the basis for legible categories of colonial difference.