Matthew Lange has a Ph.D. from Brown University and is Associate Professor of Sociology at McGill University. His work focuses on states, development, colonialism, ansd ethnic violence. Lange's books include Educations in Ethnic Violence (Cambridge, 2012), which explores how education affects ethnic violence, and Lineages of Despotism and Development (Chicago, 2009), which analyzes how different forms of British colonialism initiated different developmental trajectories. He is co-editor of States and Development (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005) and The Oxford Handbook of the Transformations of States (Oxford, Forthcoming) and has published articles in the American Journal of Sociology, World Development, Social Forces, Studies in Comparative International Development, Commonwealth & Comparative Politics, Social Science History, the International Journal of Comparative Sociology, and Nationalism & Ethnic Politics. His work uses comparative-historical methods, and he specializes in mixing methods.

This bright, engaging title provides a thorough and integrated review of comparative-historical methods. It sets out an intellectual history of comparative-historical analysis and presents the main methodological techniques employed by researchers, including: - Comparative-historical analysis, - Case-based methods, - Comparative methods - Data, case selection & theory. Matthew Lange has written a fresh, easy to follow introduction which showcases classic analyses, offers clear methodological examples and describes major methodological debates. It is a comprehensive, grounded book which understands the learning and research needs of students and researchers.